The Deuce finishes FY13 Flying Hours

  • Published
  • By Capt. Phil Ventura
  • 2nd Bomb Wing Public Affairs
BARKSDALE AIR FORCE BASE, La. --  Lt. Col. Ryan Link, 96th Bomb Squadron commander, closed out the 2nd Bomb Wing's fiscal year 2013 flying hours when he landed a B-52H Stratofortress here, Sept. 27.
There was a certain level of irony in his being able to personally zero out the program; since his squadron was one severely impacted by the sequestration-imposed cuts to the flying hour program.

In April, shortly after the Budget Control Act known as sequester went into effect, the U.S. Air Force announced that it would stand down active combat units and implement a tiered readiness concept as it planned to absorb a reduction of approximately 45,000 flying hours service-wide.

In explaining this action, Gen. Mike Hostage, Air Combat Command commander, characterized the situation as "uncharted territory" and said that, "Historically, the Air Force has not operated under a tiered readiness construct because of the need to respond to any crisis within a matter of hours or days."

As part of the Combat Air Forces, the 2nd BW receives its flying hours through Air Combat Command and in a typical year is allotted roughly 7,000 hours, according to Capt. Jason Doleman, a wing scheduler from the 2nd Operational Support Squadron. These hours are divided between the flying squadrons and allow aircrew to practice bombing, air refueling and touch-and-go skills during sorties which typically require five to six flying hours to accomplish.

While the wing ultimately flew more than 6,000 hours, describing the cut as simply a 15 percent reduction does not adequately capture its impact on the wing, according to Doleman.

One way to understand this is by looking at the 96th Bomb Squadron, which was one of 17 combat air squadrons across the Air Force stood down from March 1 - July 15.

"Most of my squadron regressed to non-combat ready status," said Link. "In fact, a large portion of the squadron lost their currencies and some even had their check rides expire."

Post-stand down, Link explained that the squadron has focused on "regaining lost capability and getting to the same operational level that we were at prior to sequestration." And while the squadron's combat mission ready status, currently at 70 percent, is projected to reach near 100 percent by the end of October, longer term impacts on the crews include elongated timelines for upgrade training, which may translate to a less capable force in the future.

Another challenge imposed on the flying hour program was the way the hours were released over the course of the fiscal year. While initially distributed in predictable 500-600 hour blocks on a monthly basis, once sequester was implemented the hours were cut in half from April through July and then surged to a peak of 700 in September, according to Doleman.

This unpredictability created strains across the wing, but was particularly difficult for Airmen who work in maintenance. Asked to describe the situation, Maj. Gerald Davis, 2nd Aircraft Maintenance Squadron Operations Officer, used just one word - "turmoil."

This turmoil was driven by two things. First, while sequestration reduced the number of flying hours allotted to the wing, it did not reduce the number of sorties - typically five per day - being flown by the 2nd Operations Group and supported by the 2nd Maintenance Group. Instead, the duration of each flight was reduced.

When flying hours were restored toward the end of the fiscal year, the duration of each flight was increased, along with the number of sorties being generated. This gave maintainers less time to turn each B-52 on the ground before it was needed for its next sortie. And, since a plane typically requires more maintenance the more it is flown, the issue compounded.

The 2nd AMXS was further challenged by accomplishing this while deploying a portion of its unit forward to support the Continuous Bomber Presence mission in Guam.

Ultimately, to meet the demand, "Ops adapted, maintenance adapted and we ended up getting it done," said Davis, while giving credit to the Airmen on the line for their hard work and dedication.

While the hard work and ingenuity of Airmen - both on the flightline and in the cockpit - helped bring the fiscal year 2013 flying hours successfully to zero in the 2nd BW, there were few silver linings. Fortunately, the Deuce's pace of operations does not allow much time for reflection and the wing's planners and leaders are already looking forward to getting the mission done in 2014.