F-16 Fighting Falcon News

March 9, 2007 (by SSgt. Phillip Butterfield) - In February, F-16C Fighting Falcons from the 61st Fighter Squadron performed a mission in the skies over the Gila Bend Air Force auxiliary field that had not been performed there before.
Pilots of the 61st FS recently deployed to Gila Bend AFAF and performed air combat maneuvering and tactical intercepts sorties similar to missions they would be expected to perform in Southwest Asia.

"The flawless execution of these missions would not have been possible without the exemplary support provided by the 61st Aircraft Maintenance Unit," said Capt. Patrick Ragan, 61st FS C-Flight commander and deployment project officer.

In order to hone student pilots' air expeditionary skill sets, the instructor pilots employed fog and friction techniques to improve proficiency indeployed environments.

These techniques are used to pull student pilots out of their comfort zones of striking ground targets and flying out of an established base like Luke to get them ready to operate in a forwarddeployed area of responsibility, Captain Ragan said.

Although, the Gila Bend deployment was about practicing the skills student pilots must master prior to entering a combat zone, the deployment was essential to streamlining the 61st's logistical footprint when deploying in this manner.

Deployed Airmen were required to stay in tent city while on location.

"I lived in tent city," said Airman 1st Class David Rogers, 61st Aircraft Maintenance Unit crew chief. "It was actually pretty comfortable; we had air conditioning and electricity."

Another improvement in making the logistics footprint smaller was keeping the Airmen and the aircraft in the deployed location instead of commuting back and forth from Luke.

"Keeping the jets here means more training time for air combat because we're closer to the range and don't need to spend time in transit," Captain Ragan said.

According to Captain Ragan, flying and maintaining from a single location has made this deployment to Gila Bend highly successful and rewarding.

"I'm proud of how well everyone performed during this deployment," said Lt. Col. Jay Boyd, 61st FS director of operations and deployment commander.