BEALE AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. –
"This is it. This is exactly what our role as Reservists is," said Lt. Col. Scott Hinkle, an RQ-4 Global Hawk pilot and the Director of Operations for the 13th Reconnaissance Squadron at Beale Air Force Base, Calif.
When an earthquake rocked the small country of Haiti last month, disaster relief efforts brought an unexpected mission surge to key military operational units, including Beale Air Force Base, home of the RQ-4 remotely piloted aircraft. But Beale's 9th Reconnaissance Wing and its affiliated units did not panic. Their Reserve counterparts at the 940th Wing were ready to assist with the sudden increase in workload.
Shortly after the natural disaster struck, the 12th Reconnaissance Squadron, Beale's active duty unit that flies the RQ-4, was tasked to fly humanitarian missions over Haiti. The 13th RS stepped up to help with the additional tasking, providing both maintenance and operational augmentation. Two Global Hawk crew chiefs, 940th Reservists Master Sgt. Andres Sandoval and Tech. Sgt. Mathew Myers, helped launch the first Global Hawk that left Beale to over fly Haiti on the night of January 13.
Lt. Col. Hinkle, who, as a civilian, flies for Delta Airlines, was able to take a military leave of absence to participate in subsequent RQ-4 humanitarian flights. "My employer is very supportive, allowing me to be available to volunteer for this," he said. "As Reservists, we were able to augment the above-normal workflow demands of our active duty counterparts. This is a perfect example of the very definition of integration."
The 13th RS represented only one facet of the 940th Operations Group's multi-mission capabilities tapped to support Operation Unified Response, according to 940th Operations Group Commander, Colonel Jon Ellis.
"Taking the picture is only one piece of the puzzle. Going that last tactical mile - processing the image and getting it into the hands of the folks on the ground there - is where the hard work is rewarded," said Colonel Ellis.
At the 940th Wing, the 50th Intelligence Squadron was responsible for "that last tactical mile," gathering and analyzing high-altitude imagery and full motion video of the devastated region captured by a variety of airborne imagery platforms. 50th IS members directly integrate into the active duty Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance mission crews of Distributed Ground System - 2.
DGS-2 conducts the processing, exploitation, analysis and dissemination of near-real-time imagery sensors, such as the U-2 Dragonlady, the RQ-4 Global Hawk and MQ-1 Predator. All of these platforms were tasked to support ongoing Haiti relief operations. The analysis of the imagery of Haiti provided military responders, relief agencies, and international rescue teams with valuable information about the capability of the region's roads and port facilities to receive and transport food, medicine and supplies, according to Major Mike Ehnstrom, 50th IS ISR Flight Commander.
"The Haiti relief operation is a nonstandard mission which caused us to build mission tactics, techniques and procedures from scratch. There were a lot of pieces to put in place; it's been a lot of work for us," Maj. Ehnstrom said.
50th IS members assigned to DGS Analysis and Reporting Team, or DART, prepared DGS imagery crews for the Haiti relief missions."They weren't satisfied with just accomplishing the original tasking. By interfacing directly with supported military and civilian relief agencies, the DART supplemented the standing imagery requirements with ad hoc imagery. This quadrupled the images collected and maximized the Global Hawk's capacity," Major Ehnstrom said.
940th Wing Reservists assigned to the DART are Master Sgt. Travis Lemon, Tech. Sgt. Chester O'Leary, and 1st Lt. John Durkee.
Imagery analysts at the 50th IS also stepped up their tempo of operations, tripling the number of images normally processed during a single mission, according to Maj. Ehnstrom. "The imagery analysis processed by the IAs focused on potential landing locations and distribution center sites, infrastructure, and an assessment of the overall destruction," he said.
The eight Reservists providing imagery analysis for Operation Unified Response included Tech. Sgt. Alex Roberson, Tech. Sgt. Reuben Elliott, Tech. Sgt. Matthew Neff, Tech. Sgt. Brian Jaeger, Master Sgt. Rich Mier, Staff Sgt. Stacia Willis, Staff Sgt. Derek Chouinard, and Senior Airman Kristopher Pederson.
"We still managed to take care of our regular workload, providing for CENTCOM, through all of this," said Maj. Ehnstrom. "That's pretty amazing."
"The relief efforts have been overwhelming. Everything moved so fast," said Capt. Barbara Jewell, a 50th IS Reservist with more than 400 missions under her belt. Capt. Jewell, who has served the 13th IS active duty host as full-time Chief of Tactics for the past year, deployed late last week to Joint SOUTHCOM in Miami, Fla. As a Liaison Officer there, she will provide Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance expertise for all DGS efforts.
"I could stay here at Beale to do the mission, but this is an opportunity for higher headquarters to really understand what we can bring to the fight," Capt. Jewell said. "When they see what is at their disposal, they'll realize that the DGS is uniquely capable of supporting the disaster relief effort!"
Capt. Jewell is replacing another 940th Wing Reservist, Capt. Justin Giovannettone of the 713th Combat Operations Squadron, who deployed to Miami earlier in the month in support of U.S. SOUTHCOM's initial Haitian relief efforts.
Also deploying in support of the Haitian relief efforts is 50th IS member Master Sgt. Rich Mier. Sergeant Mier will serve as a DGS imagery subject matter expert at the National Geospatial Imagery Agency in St. Louis, Mo.
Yet another 940th Wing Reservist, Tech. Sgt. Kelly Allen, of the 710th Combat Operations Squadron at Langley Air Force Base, Va., is currently deployed in support of Operation Unified Response to HQ 12th Air Force, Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, Ariz. NCOIC of Air Defense Elements, Sergeant Allen is a member of one of the two geographically separated units in the 940th Operations Group. While deployed, Sergeant Allen is serving staff duty for Brig. Gen. Millmann, Director of Mobility Forces for the unified relief efforts.
"The 940th is uniquely organized and organically staffed to provide support across the entire range of military operations, including humanitarian relief," said Col. Ellis. "We say this all the time, and it's as true for Haiti as it is for our continuing support of Overseas Contingency Operations: we are Citizens Warriors, seamlessly integrating across the spectrum of conflict."