Air crews do it twice

  • Published
  • By Maj. Shannon Mann
  • 916th Public Affairs Office
SEYMOUR JOHNSON AIR FORCE BASE, N.C. --  Chemical warfare training is a required course for all Air Force members.
The four-hour, on-line classroom training coupled with the three hours of scenario training is typically one of the most dreaded required courses when it rolls around every 20-months, but for air crew members they do it twice...once to learn the ground ensemble and once to learn the air ensemble. 

In early October, four members of the 911th Air Refueling Squadron worked with the 916th Air Crew Flight Equipment shop to get needed training in the air crew defense ensemble. The half-day training required classroom instruction, donning air crew protective equipment and then reviewing the decontamination process. 

In addition to the regular chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear contamination training that all 916th Airmen receive, pilots and boom operators are trained to another standard learning two protective ensembles versus one. 

Master Sgt. Garry Isabell, boom operator with the 911th ARS, said the air crew ensemble is actually more difficult than the ground ensemble, although more comfortable once it is on.
"Set up on the [gas] mask is more difficult because of the ground and air modes," said Sergeant Isabell. "Learning how to get it on and off and how to install it once you're on the airplane is a challenge. " Isabell added that limited dexterity and field of vision make it harder inside the cockpit and boom pod. 

If an environment is contaminated then air crews must don the regular ground suit first, go through a decontamination process, then don the air crew suit to carry out a mission. Once at the tanker, every precaution is taken to ensure contaminated materials don't go along for the ride. It's a daunting process, but one the crews and flight safety shop take very seriously. 

Sergeant Isabell said that getting the process fully down can take a new air crew member awhile, but from his deployment experience he sees the value of the training and how each little part affects the next part of the process. 

Air crews and ground personnel alike train for deployed environments, but another big test of their chemical defense knowledge will come in early 2011 as the wing undergoes its Operational Readiness Inspection.