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13 RS reservists join Team Andersen in Global Hawk training

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Veronica McMahon
  • 36th Wing Public Affairs
ANDERSEN AIR FORCE BASE, Guam --  More than 140 Air Force reservists from the 13th Reconnaissance Squadron at Beale AFB, Calif., have spend the last month deployed to Andersen, joining the active duty Global Hawk detachment members in training on the remotely piloted aircraft.

The 13 RS reservists work with the active-duty detachment members here regularly from different locations in conjoined efforts to pilot the aircraft around the world. This deployment allowed them to see the "Andersen portion" first-hand and integrate with their active-duty counterparts.

"This is our first deployment as a new unit," said Major Sinclair, 13 RS reservist deployed to Andersen. "We are out here to get some training in for our reservists on the Global Hawk and integrate into a forward deployed location."

The Global Hawk arrives and lands at Andersen. During take-off, the aircraft is controlled by Airmen here. After about an hour in the air, the 13 RS reservist Airmen take control over the RPA from their location at Beale for the length of the mission until it comes time for landing when Andersen Airmen again take control.

"At Beale we take the airplane once it is already airborne and fly it to where it needs to go to take the pictures it needs to take," Major Sinclair said. "All our aircraft our currently deployed so that is one of the reason we are here in Guam because this is one of the places are airplanes are located."

The major said such training is a great representation of total force integration.

"We are a reserve unit and we also brought members from California Air National Guard, and then there is the active duty that are here full time," Major Sinclair said. "We come out here and integrate seamlessly with the pilots and fly the missions. The maintenance folks come in and do all the maintenance on the airplanes while we are here. As far as total force, we are able to come in here, help the mission, and work together seamlessly, all doing the same job."

The RQ-4 Global Hawk is a high-altitude, long-endurance unmanned aircraft system with an integrated sensor suite that provides intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capability worldwide. Global Hawk's mission is to provide a broad spectrum of ISR collection capability to support joint combatant forces in worldwide peacetime, contingency and wartime operations. The Global Hawk complements manned and space reconnaissance systems by providing near-real-time coverage using imagery intelligence sensors.

"It's an aircraft that we can send anywhere in the world and it goes and takes pictures of whatever the congress or DoD tasked us to take pictures of and provide the intelligence that they need," Major Sinclair said. "We can also assist with natural disasters and go and find people. We don't have the restrictions the manned aircraft have."

This integration has been beneficial to both the reservists and the active duty members.
"Active duty members get worked a lot, and in case we have a surge situation and we need to plus up we are able to," said Major Summer, 13 RS reservist deployed to Andersen.

The squadron reservists were here for the month but rotated in two-week intervals.

The deployment here allowed them to gain a lot of information and on the job training.

"Some of the reservists have learned more in two weeks here then they would have in
two years back home," Major Summer said. "They have been exposed to a lot of different things here that they can take back home and we're able to see it from Andersen's side of the coin."

While this was the first deployment here by the 13 RS it won't be their last.

"We are trying to integrate a continuous force for us to come out here every year and bring people to Guam to continue training and integrate to the local situation," Major Sinclair said. "We brought our reservists out here and they have gotten to see hands-on what they are doing. It's been a great learning experience for all of us."