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Combat Mobility Flight key to aircrew qualification in Guam

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Nathan Allen
  • 15th Wing Public Affairs
ANDERSEN AIR FORCE BASE, Guam --  Tech. Sgt. Francisco Aguilera, 647th Combat Mobility Flight team chief from Joint Base Pearl Harbor Hickam, Hawaii, flashes a toothy smile reminiscent of a carefree kid playing catch in a nearby street as he cocks his arm back and lets fly a tight-spiraled bullet of a football. His receiver is Senior Airman Daniel Allen, a 647th Logistics Readiness Squadron rigger, who, despite his best efforts, can't seem to jump quite high enough to catch the oblong projectile headed his way.

The drop zone here with its worn concrete and abundance of knee-high weeds likely won't be confused with a football field anytime soon, nor will the football skills of Aguilera and Allen rival that of professional football players. However, when it comes to ensuring loadmasters and pilots have the qualifications they need to conduct airdrop operations around the world, there may be no one an aircrew would rather have in their huddle than a quality Combat Mobility Flight.

For this mission here, from April 5 through 10, four members of the 647th LRS CMF accompanied the 535th Airlift Squadron; also from JBPHH.

"Our role is to provide currency and airdrop qualification for loadmasters and pilots while at the same time building relations between the AS and the LRS," said Staff Sgt. Matthew Cortes, 647th LRS Combat Mobility Flight team chief. "We do that by making sure everything we do is 100 percent."

According to Cortes, this means the CMF has to be perfect in preparing the loads that will be dropped. All items dropped during this mission were built by the CMF team, inspected, and prepared for airworthiness before departing JBPHH. Consequnetly, the ability of loadmasters and pilots to receive their airdrop qualifications is dependent on the performance of the CMF.

"If there's any fouls in what we do then the loadmasters won't keep their qualifications," Cortes said. "If any discrepancies are found in the rig material on the aircraft when it's inspected, they won't be able to drop that load. If one had a discrepancy, that loadmaster wouldn't be able to get his currency and we wouldn't be able to complete the mission."

MSgt Jon Callaway, the 647th LRS CMF chief, added that the mission of the CMF is dedicated to providing forces downrange with what they need to survive and operate.

"You can't do without the CMF," Callaway said. "Our sole purpose is to train guys to go to Afghanistan and give live drops of ammunition and supplies to deployed locations in austere conditions. Without guys being qualified on currencies, they wouldn't be able to conduct airdrop operations."

Beyond ensuring the time spent dropping loads by pilots and loadmasters is well spent, there's another reason why the pressure is on the CMF to perform perfectly.

"If parachutes aren't properly packed, they don't deploy properly, which ends up in a malfunction, which destroys our assets, and causes reports to have to be generated," Callaway said. "It's an intense job due to the fact that when the parachutes deploy out, if there's anything that goes wrong while they depart the aircraft, they can get caught up and take aircraft down. (The aircrew) is entrusting us with their lives."

Although Callaway admits that he had a few butterflies in his stomach watching the plane drop bundles over the drop zone, he said the performance of the bundles and the CMF team couldn't have been better.

"We were flawless," Callaway said. "The drops went according to plan, and we didn't have any malfunctions. They were rigged properly, inspected properly, and in the field we recovered them with no problems or injuries. That always ends up being a flawless mission. The airdrops were on time and finished ahead of schedule."

And Callaway, like any football coach likely would, will take a flawless performance from his team any day of the week.