Coronet Oak continued

National Guard, Sep 2001 by Arana-Barradas, Louis A

Three-decade-old Southern Command airlift operation thriving in new Caribbean home

Tech. Sgt. Barry Shatter took off his sweat-soaked flight suit inside the empty C-130 Hercules and put on a pair of shorts and a tank top. The rest of the aircrew did the same.

They have done this ritual many times on their Caribbean travels.

Once dressed, Shatzer, a loadmaster from the West Virginia Air National Guard's 167th Airlift Wing, grabbed his overnight bag and followed his crew to the terminal at Norman Manley International Airport here. There was a hold up at customs.

"It's nothing new," Shatzer said. "Each country has its own way of doing things. Some are better than others. So you just learn to accept it."

After an hour, they made it outside, where a van from their hotel waited. They piled in, some sitting on the floor. Then the driver, named Carlos, took them on a ride the airmen would not soon forget.

There were a lot of groans and nervous laughs-and a near miss with a road-hogging bus--on the fast dash to the hotel. Everyone was sweating again, despite the air conditioning. They held on for dear life.

"Don't worry, `mon,"' Carlos said. "This is Jamaica. Everybody drives like this."

At the hotel, they all got out-fast. They were glad to check into their seaside rooms. Another day. Another successful flight for the crew, who were a mix of Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve airmen from three states.

The crew had flown the first leg of a two-day Coronet Oak mission. Based at Muniz Air National Guard Base, Puerto Rico, Coronet Oak is U.S. Southern Command's airlift arm. Since the late 1970s, it has given the command a quickresponse force of airlift planes.

The operation moved to Puerto Rico from Howard Air Force Base, Panama, which closed in 1999.

It is a key mission, said Col. Louis Wright, commander of the six-person 12th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron, or EAS, that overseas the mission. The 12th EAS is there, mainly, to provide continuity.

Aircrews rotate in for a 15-day tour where they get to do "a little bit of everything," he said.

Coronet Oak aircrews are on alert to airlift special forces into any country in Central America, the northern part of South America and the Caribbean, where they might be needed, he said. One of the four C-130s on Muniz's cramped parking ramp is always on alert.

Luckily that does not happen often, he said, so aircrews support a host of airlift requirements, mostly for Navy and Army customers.

Most are routine transporting of passengers and cargo, but the C-130s also help in hurricane and flood relief efforts. They also make runs to resupply embassies in the region. That adds up to more than 20 missions a month averaging one to six days long.

As in the case with Shatzer's crew, the mission is done by a mixed group of airmen. The Guard provides about 55 percent of the crews, and the Reserve the rest. Sometimes an active-duty crew will also pull a two-week tour. They all bring their own planes, and share them.

In the past, units volunteered to fly Coronet Oak. Now the Air Force is stepping in to make things a bit easier. The Georgia Air National Guard's 158th Airlift Squadron, which deployed there throughout July, was the first unit to pull Coronet Oak duty as an Expeditionary Aerospace Force rotation.

"But no matter who does this duty, or where they're from, there's no training going on here," Wright said. "Our people fly real-world mission."

Crews arrive at Muniz-- located in the heart of Puerto Rico's capital of San Juan--each Saturday. There is a one-week overlap between arriving and departing units, and new crews are at work the second day after arriving.

"That's fine by me," Shatzer said. "I volunteered to come here to work, not sit around."

The crew he was on during his mission to Jamaica was a very diverse outfit. Most of the crew was from the Georgia Guard, except Shatzer from West Virginia's Guard and the flight engineer, who is from the Delaware Guard's 142nd Airlift Squadron.

"We run a truly Total Force effort here," said Wright, himself a reservist on a four-year active-duty tour in Puerto Rico. "They get a lot of experience."

The crew started its mission at Muniz, where they loaded a C-130 with 11,000 pounds of foodstuffs bound for Naval Station Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Flying onto the station's windswept, cliff-top airstrip is not easy. The pilot has a narrow air corridor to stay within on the tricky approach. The plane is in a turn the whole time-and trying to avoid flying past the border that will put it in Cuban airspace.

"That wouldn't be good," said Maj. Ty Rhame, the cargo plane's pilot from the 158th. But he didn't land the plane. He was on his checkout flight.

"You must be certified to fly into Guantanamo," he said. The co-pilot, Capt. Mike Gesser, made the complex landing.

Flying Coronet Oak missions is a change of pace for the aircrews. Rhame said each mission "keeps you thinking all the time." That is because of the challenges aircrews face.

Airports do not always have the same navigational aids as those in the United States. Crews sometimes land on dirt strips. The terrain is different. Plus, the weather is unpredictable in the tropics and communications is a problem, he said.