IRAQ - Senior Airman Christopher Barton, a vehicle maintainer with the 70th Medium Truck Detachment, recently deployed to an undisclosed location in Southwest Asia from Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska.
Barton, a native of Las Vegas, directly impacts Operation New Dawn in a big way - by keeping the trucks on the road. The same vehicles responsible for trucking supplies out of Iraq.
Barton is a traveling mechanic. He inspects and maintains vehicles before, after and during convoys to Iraq. By doing this, he enables trucks to make long hauls to and from Iraq as U.S. forces withdraw from the country.
Though some people may not be cut out for constant road trips, Barton prefers them.
"A majority of the month, I'm on the road," said Barton who also doubles as truck commander. "The more I'm on the road, the faster the time flies by."
In recent months, the 387th Expeditionary Logistics Readiness Squadron, which the 70th MTD belongs to, has increased its amount of missions trucking out cargo from Iraq by approximately 200 percent.
"When we first got here last month, the squadron was averaging about 11 missions per week," said Lt. Col. John O'Connor, 387th ELRS commander and native of Albany, Ga., before going on to say that the squadron is on track to average about 35 missions per month.
Barton is on his second deployment since joining the Air Force four years ago.