MacDill Citizen Airmen Fuel Pacific Exercise

Citizen Airmen from the 927th Air Refueling Wing, MacDill Air Force Base, Florida, conducted about a month of air refueling operations in support of 29 participating nations during the 2024 Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) exercise in July.

The world's largest international maritime exercise, RIMPAC 2024 promotes a free and open Indo-Pacific by fostering multinational cooperation and trust. The exercise allowed the Florida Reservists to practice Agile Combat Employment and showcase their mission-ready capabilities.

Taking place far away from the 927th ARW's usual stomping grounds over the southeastern United States and Gulf of Mexico, RIMPAC challenged the wing to set up operations on Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, Hawaii, and begin rapidly carrying out aerial refueling missions over the world's largest ocean.

Five aircraft and just over 100 Citizen Airmen - ranging from operations and maintenance to logistics and personnel - put their collective skills and minds together for this display of Agile Combat Employment, leveraging Mission Capable Airmen to deliver the necessary fuel for the U.S. and partner nations to train longer and travel farther.

"We started the planning process more than a year ago and treated it as if it were a full deployment," said Maj. Jeff Grove, 927th ARW RIMPAC 2024 detachment commander. "We came with everything we needed, including personnel, parts and equipment and set up our shop, treating it as if we were isolated to prove the Agile Combat Employment concept. If we were to go to a location with no military presence, we could do the same thing."

Global reach is a vital capability that the 927th ARW trains to provide to combatant commanders, remaining ready for any future near-peer fight. Capable of off-loading 200,000 pounds of jet fuel to thirsty fighters, bombers and mobility aircraft, the KC-135 Stratotanker aircraft and its highly trained crews meet aircraft such as the U.S. Navy's FA-18 Super Hornet, F-35C Lightning II, or the U.S. Air Force's B-1 and B-2 stealth bombers mid-air, allowing them to prolong training over the open ocean. RIMPAC provided the perfect opportunity to work in a combined, joint atmosphere, bolstering the interoperability, agility and flexibility required of tomorrow's Citizen Airmen.

"One of our biggest objectives from the aircrew side is to get the training that we can't get at home station," said Grove. "We're far from just administrative gas, we're doing so much more than that so we can meet the training objectives that require us to be part of a large-scale exercise in order to log."

Back on the ground on Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam, maintenance crews worked around the clock to keep the 60-plus-year-old KC-135s from MacDill AFB, Grissom Air Reserve Base, Indiana and March ARB, California mission ready. Flexing their critical thinking, they operated in small, flexible teams to conduct both scheduled and unscheduled maintenance, including exercising their ability to conduct hot-pit refueling, allowing a KC-135 aircraft fresh back from a mission to refill its fuel stores and return to the sky for another without fully powering down. Being mission ready for these Airmen means expanding their skill sets outside of their foundational training, broadening their ability to do what needs to be done to accomplish the mission.

"I don't think we would have been able to do what we've done out here without the Airmen we have who are multi-capable," said Tech. Sgt. Rene Gonzalez, 927th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron dedicated crew chief. "We wouldn't be able to do it without the maintainers taking the time to do these other things outside their specialty that may seem small but help tremendously."

The challenges that come from operating so far from home station provide a realistic training scenario for Citizen Airmen working out of a far-flung corner of the flight line and doing so within the framework of a multinational Combined Air Operations Center required the 927th ARW to maintain constant connectivity and access to cyber systems.

Staff Sgt. Ryan Covert, 927th Force Support Squadron client systems technician, found himself thinking on his feet right from the get-go to guarantee this capability for the detachment.

"One of the big challenges in coming out here was making sure we had what was necessary for each department to cooperate and accomplish the mission together," said Covert. "It's always a dynamic situation so I try to bring anything and everything I can so that when something isn't working, we have several options."

Throughout the exercise, logistics and force support experts worked in the background ensuring the entire agile operation was staffed and well-suited for the demanding operations tempo of RIMPAC.

Out on the flightline, Petroleum, Oil and Lubricants Airmen delivered clean, reliable jet fuel to the KC-135s after each mission, completing the first major step in the process to smoothly continue operations. Planning, scheduling and ultimately carrying out these missions depended on a wide variety of Citizen Airmen capable of solutions-based, quick thinking and who answer the call outside of their day-to-day job.

"We're all Citizen Airmen and have civilian jobs outside of what we do in the military," said Grove. "For instance, I fly for FedEx and come in to do the Reserve job on the weekends and when I have a day off to come fly the KC-135. It saves the taxpayers money because they don't have to pay me 365 days out of the year, yet I maintain the same qualifications as an active-duty evaluator pilot."

For the 927th ARW at RIMPAC, a small, diverse team of Citizen Airmen came together and made a large impact, accomplishing many of the training requirements necessary to keep them ready for world-wide taskings and deployments.