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Show uu u uuuuu D Hill AFB, Utah V hill.af.mil Vol. 57 No. 36, September 6, 2001 www.hiiltoptimes.com hilltop.pa 84056-582- 4 Wiirtg li mmeirtnibeu's depBoy ffoir Team Hill serves as U.S. Air Force exercise lead Bright Stat by Capt Bernadette Oozler 3 Public Affairs deputy director About 150 people from Hill AFB and other bases left for Egypt Aug. 30, Monday and Tuesday to prepare for Bright Star, the world's largest exercise involving U.S. and coalition forces. Although the exercise does- INSIDE: deployed members must build an air base from scratch before the exercise begins. They'll set up complete support of a forward operating air base, Cairo West AB, to include water, electricity, a tent city, morale vices, dining facility and other services and facilities required command 2 bids NoA-7- 6 2 n't start until October, the DECC's new received 3 SI 't 4 c vr to operate. Other Air Force troops will operate at an exist- Page 2 ing Egyptian air base, Beni Suef. Bright Star is comprised of about 24,000 U.S. troops who n J VV, will be involved in land, sea and Commentary: Ryan legacy Page 3 air operations. Twelve other ii coalition nations will contribute an additional 72,000 troops. While Air Force Materiel Command and Hill AFB have sup- Photos by Senior Airman Rum Martin loaded with Left, Senior Airman Jeremy Traughber, 75th Transportation Squadron, guides In a cargo to be lifted onto a KC-1-0 destined for Cairo, Egypt The 75th Trans personnel loaded 14 Increments of cargo weighing In at more than 33,000 pounds on to the aircraft for the month long deployment which will begin In October. Above, Airman 1st Class Jason James, left, hands off meals to Airman 1st Class Stuart Simmons, 75th Trans, for the more than 20 airmen making the 7,000 mile journey. ported this biennial exercise before, this is the first time New program managers Pag5 commander and Bright Star's 75th Aerospace Expeditionary Group Jcb ht AFMC units will serve as the "nucleus" for the expeditionary combat support, according to Col. J. C. Dodson, 75th Support Group com- mander. Dodson said this is a milestone for Hill because Air Combat Command actually requested Team Hill be the lead element for all U.S. Air Force troops participating in the exercise. Team Hill will provide a total of 300 people for the exercise, and Hill people will fill most of the key leadership positions in the 75th AEG. As the 75th AEG commander, Dodson will be in charge of two operating bases in Egypt, as well as more than Mne Page 6 Career goes full circle Page 9 1,500 U.S. Air Force troops, seven sup-po- rt squadrons, and three flying squadrons. "For the first time, a command', is taking the lead for the expeditionary combat support 'non-combata- nt Bodybuilder visits Hill behind an exercise of this magnitude," said Capt. Gary Herbert, operations officer for Hill's command post. He will oversee the command post for the 75th AEG. "Although Hill will take the lead, we've called upon a lot of organizations from around the Air Force and Pages 12 ' .... even the I've never experienced anything like this and I still don't know what to Herbert sees this exercise as a unique opportunity for people to work with members of other services and nations. "I'm looking forward to deploying with the Hill and AFMC team," he added. "I know we do good work at Hill day to day, but I want to see how it works out in the field with a team as diverse as the one we have from Hill as well as the rest of the command, Air Force, DoD and other nations." For Senior Airman Bobby O'Neal, 75th Security Forces Squadron, ele- "It's our turn to be the lead and set the example for other bases to follow. It's exciting to be part of the lead element and part of the biggest exercise in the world," he said. Capt. John Nowak, deputy for the services division at Edwards AFB, Calif., also looks forward to taking part in this exercise. Nowak is the deployed mission support squadron commander, in which he'll oversee services, mission support and comExposing 75th AEG people to communications. plex coalition combat support and "Bright Star is important because flight operations. the Air Force is getting smaller and Providing an environment that smaller, and AFMC, which isn't a traoptimizes the troops' opportunity to ditional mobility command, is step- meet all training objectives and expeping up and filling as many roles as rience Egypt. possible to take it off the lead wings Demonstrating the capability to that do this more often," Nowak said. effectively plan and execute bare "This relieves tension for those wings base combat support and flight operand restores warrior spirit to this ations. command. And by stepping up and Other Team Hill people, including 6 taking on this role, it shows we're a operations and maintenance perreal military organization." sonnel from the 4th Fighter Squadron, Nowak said the exercise also offers will deploy to Egypt between now excellent training opportunities for and early October. ment leader for the elite entry Star offers him an exciting opportunity chance to do something different. He, along with security forces from other services and nations, will provide force DoD perprotection for sonnel, exercise participants and facilhigh-visibili- ty ities. O'Neal is no stranger to deployments, having spent time in Bosnia, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. Although he'll miss his family and job at Hill, "the experience is going to be awesome. expect," he said. F-1- v i UTTR detonates Trident second stage by Gary Boyle Hiiltop Times staff A? 7samspcm Day Page 13 its participants. "This is great because it'll get us back to the bare base. If you deploy to PSAB (Prince Sultan, AB, Saudi Arabia) , it's just like going TDY to a regular base," he said. "Bright Star will give people a taste of how to start from scratch again, which is something we could need in the future." Dodson's goals for making this a successful deployment are: Executing the mission safely and effectively while ensuring force protection. Army to provide the support that's needed." A dome offlame erupts upon the desert floor and a transparent pressure wave is visible emanating from the blast. Then for a moment there is no sound, even the wind is held silent. From the top of Bug Hill on the Utah Test and Training Range the shock wave becomes visible as the ground springs to life and a dust ring moves out from the epicenter of the explosion. Then... KABOOM! The shock wave can be felt like a jolt. The dust cloud rises into a mushroom shape until winds take it away. An .event that's over in an instant is actually the accumulation of countless hours of work and coor-- . dination that culminate on one day. The day begins with a meeting that includes UTTR police, fire and medical crews. Also in attendance are the 75th Air Base Wing Explosive Ordinance Disposal team who will do the actual detonation, a person from a state regulatory agency, a group from the Navy and a contracting team from CMH2HU1 who will be conducting an experiment for the Navy during the detonation. The meeting begins with UTTR Safety Officer Terry Olsen going over a map. The group reviews access roads the police will block and where fire trucks and the medical team will be positioned. "We'll follow plans and procedure 100 percent Our goal today is to make sure everyone goes home safely," Olsen tells the group. "We started this program in 1993 and have gone through a tremendous amount of missiles without any unfortunate mishaps sneaking up on us." jr .... r 6 If c c The motor to be detonated is a Trident 1 C4 second stage, weighing approximately 17,000 pounds. The goal for yearly detonations is 85. This year there have already been 112 with more than two million pounds of explosives detonated, according to Olsen. The motors are destroyed because of age, international treaties, environmental, storage and cost concerns. The detonation costs the Navy $10,000 but saved them $50,000. More than 80 C4s have been destroyed at the UTTR this year. "These motors weren't built with a zipper in the side," said Olsen. "It's very difficult to convert them to another mission. We also don't know what the degradation is. Most of these motors were built with a shelf life, the Minuteman has been in use for 30 years now. The best thing to do is to get rid of them with a fast burn or det. onation." This particular detonation is special because the CMH2Hillteam is going to attempt to get air sam- 10-ye- ar pies from inside the explosion plume to discover what kinds of gases are released. Four balloons similar in size and shape to blimps used at indoor sporting events have been tethered into position to enter the plume at the moment of the explosion. "All the sampling to date has been done on a small scale with less than a pound of propellant," said CMH2Hill lead technologist Mitch Lindsey. "We've done a lot of laboratory studies out here that show the pH soil here cleans a lot of the gaseous pollutants out of the plume. The only way we can get a handle on this is to take a sample from inside a large detonation that moves a lot of earth. This is the only place that can detonate over 10,000 pounds. They can do 84,000 pounds a day at 42,000 pounds per event, with a potential for 6.55 million pounds a year." The meeting adjourns after some quick questions and answers and teams go about accomplishing their goals to complete the mission. A weather balloon has been released and everybody waits to see if conditions are conducive to proceed. At 12:15 a.m. weather conditions are window for the favorable, there is a three-hou- r detonation to take place. Out where the motors are being lifted off of a flatbed trailer by a crane, the CMH2Hill team is repositioning their balloons. Gusts of wind have picked up and the lines are beginning to tangle. "It's a totally different configuration from what we started with, but it's the best we can do to take a shot now," said Lindsey. "We've been working on and off of this project for about four to five U See Detonation, page 2 |