Photo By Airman 1st Class Asha Wiltshire | U.S. Air Force Airman 1st Class Ian Woods, 325th Operational Support Squadron air ...... read more read more
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TYNDALL AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. -- Checkered Flag, one of the Department of Defense’s largest air-to-air exercises, is a large-scale aerial exercise designed to integrate fourth- and fifth-generation airframes to enhance mobility, deployment and employment capabilities of aviators and maintainers. Although all roles share importance when it comes to an exercise like CKF, pilots and ground crews wouldn’t be able to operate efficiently without one key team: air traffic control.
Air traffic controllers are responsible for managing the airspace that pilots fly in. During CKF, they coordinate the takeoff, flight and landing of aircraft from various branches, including Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps and Air National Guard.
According to Senior Airman Ashner Santana, 325th Operational Support Squadron air traffic control trainer, a primary role of ATC is ensuring everyone involved in flight operations has a full picture of everything happening on the ground and in the air.
“As ATC, we do a lot of making sure everything is safe. We make sure pilots know what’s going on when they’re inbound and when they’re departing,” said Santana. “If there’s a vehicle crossing the runway, we need to relay that to pilots. If there’s an in-flight emergency and a pilot needs to land, we need to relay that to the ground team. Our job is to make sure everyone involved has situational awareness at all times.”
A large-scale exercise such as CKF is a prime time for Airmen to prepare and train for real-world combat. Santana stated CKF provides higher-tempo operations that allow new and seasoned controllers to challenge their skills and familiarize themselves with different types of aircraft.
“It’s a great opportunity to get to see aircraft that we don’t usually have here fly and see a higher volume of traffic and teach the trainees with them,” said Santana. “[Trainers] are also learning every day because that’s just how air traffic is; you never know everything. We can always learn something new.”
Tech. Sgt. Kalei Sloan, 325th OSS senior watch supervisor, explained that working with a new mix of aircraft at a high tempo can be challenging, but it is a very integral part of staying mission ready.
“The increase [in operations] can be difficult, not just for trainees but for all of us. My two previous bases had a mix of aircraft, but the tempo was slower,” said Sloan. “We need these exercises to be able to challenge ourselves, because without this experience we wouldn’t be able to test what we know, apply it and continuously learn.”
She expanded further that the exercise isn’t just about flying. It’s about preparing aircrew for potential combat scenarios through intense, realistic training, ensuring Airmen stay lethal, agile and ready for anything to come.
“We’re not doing this for fun,” said Sloan. “We’re doing it to make sure that at the end of the day we can go anywhere in the world and execute the mission.”
| Date Taken: | 05.22.2025 |
| Date Posted: | 05.22.2025 15:09 |
| Story ID: | 498739 |
| Location: | TYNDALL AIR FORCE BASE, FLORIDA, US |
| Web Views: | 41 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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