36th LRS three-peats PACAF win

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Angelique Smythe
  • The Pacific Edge
ANDERSEN AIR FORCE BASE, Guam --  The verdict is in -- Andersen has the best non-flying logistics readiness squadron in the Pacific Air Forces.

This fact was confirmed when PACAF announced the 36th LRS won their third consecutive PACAF Non-flying Logistics Readiness Unit of the Year Award for 2006.

"Winning this award validates what we do here," said Capt. Scott Sitterson, 36th LRS installation deployment officer. "It helps us realize what we do and its impact. Hopefully, it makes a difference to the Air Force and not just the PACAF level."

The 36th LRS is comprised of many behind-the-scenes workers who make the missions on Andersen a success.

For example, the War Reserve Materiel program supports bombers, tankers and Air Expeditionary Force rotations by supplementing these units with important non-deployed resources.

"The peacetime assets that we have here are not enough to accommodate their requirements so we actually dip into our WRM to help fill that requirement -- vehicles, aerospace ground equipment, things of that nature," said Captain Sitterson.

The readiness flight coordinates all transportation and briefings for inbound forces, as well as lodging and services.

"We coordinate all actions that are required to deploy forces to their locations," said Tech. Sgt. Kevin Leonard, 36th LRS NCOIC of deployments and receptions. "We also coordinate the actions required for incoming forces so they can meet their mission requirements."

The receptions section coordinates the lodging, facilities, and equipment needed for all the inbound units and contingency units.

"We make sure everything is in place by the time they get here," said Airman Lance Freeman, 36th LRS in-garrison expeditionary site planning specialist.

The 36th LRS also handles support agreements.

"Our support agreements manager handles any agreement between one entity on base with another," said Captain Sitterson. "He looks over those agreements to make sure they're still current -- not only on the base but also with units off base, international agreements or base-to-base type issues."

Transportation consists of traffic management, combat readiness, contingency operations, vehicle maintenance, and vehicle operations.

The fuels management flight, is responsible for all fuel received, stored, tested and issued on Andersen.

Throughout 2006, this squadron has achieved great success as well as faced several challenges, said Captain Sitterson.

"Exercise Valiant Shield may be one of the biggest accomplishments we've had," he said. "We provided for the needs of those who came in and if we couldn't provide it, we found someone who could."

Exercise Valiant Shield is a Pacific Command-sponsored contingency exercise that involved the Navy, Marine Corps, and the Air Force.

"During Valiant Shield we issued 1.9 million gallons of fuel and we serviced 587 aircraft without a delay or incident," said Master Sgt. Larry Robbins, 36th LRS.

In all, the fuels management flight issued 32 million gallons of fuel last year.

"Probably our biggest challenge was when our transportation supply contract was cut by approximately $2.2 million about three months prior to implementing our new contract," said Master Sgt. Jody Crockett, 36th LRS traffic management and combat readiness manager. "We had to make a decision to cut certain services so we could reach our funding cap."

A lot of time was spent trying to obtain funding for the contract and figuring out ways to make the contract work with the limited available funds. For example, the LRS cut maintenance only 70 percent of the vehicle fleet versus 100 percent. Additional cuts included some vehicle corrosion control and shuttle services.

Manning was also a big challenge for the squadron.

"Our office is authorized staff sergeant and technical sergeant positions," said Master Sgt. Mike Warren, 36th LRS superintendent of readiness flight. "We have Airmen performing the jobs of NCOs and doing a great job at it. I think our ability to still meet suspenses on critical plans with the junior airmen that we have with the shortage of manning is a huge accomplishment."

Another challenge was corrosion control and updating the fuels systems.

"Our fuel system is the largest in the U.S. Air Force," said Sergeant Robbins. "However, a lot of our systems, such as fuel separators, are pre-Vietnam era."

He said it's estimated to cost $8.8 million to update our systems.

These challenges are no barriers for the 36th LRS; they still continue to excel in all they do.