Outloading: Munitions flight keeps it moving

  • Published
  • By Capt. Will Thomas
  • 39th Munitions Flight commander
INCIRLIK AIR BASE, Turkey --  The 39th Maintenance Squadron munitions flight is responsible for managing and sustaining the base's munitions stockpile. Over the past four weeks, if you've traveled on the North side of Incirlik you probably noticed a great deal of activity within the munitions storage area and wondered what the heck was going on. 

The activity is in direct support of a tasking received by United States Air Forces in Europe reallocate a portion of our conventional munitions stockpile back to the United States. 

"An operation of this magnitude doesn't just happen - it takes a great deal of planning, manpower, and effort to do it safely," said Col. "Tip" Stinnette, 39th Air Base Wing commander. 

"The outload shipment of munitions was originally scheduled to take place in fiscal year 2008," said Chief Master Sgt. Bill Stamper, 39th MXS munitions flight chief. "However, an opportune ship returning to the United States was identified and we were tasked to draft an outload plan to see if we could meet the compressed timeline and take advantage of the 'opportune' sealift." 

Munitions flight personnel drafted the plan with the support of several base agencies to include civil engineering, logistics readiness, security forces, bio-environmental, contracting, safety, the anti-terrorism/force protection office, the host wing and the Military Surface Deployment and Distribution Command's local detachment. 

With the wing commander's approval, the plan along with the shortfalls was presented to USAFE. Within a week, USAFE approved the plan and the munitions flight here was given the green light to proceed. Fortunately, the majority of the required supplies, equipment, vehicles, facilities and personnel with the needed skill-sets were already in place here to support this operation. 

Munitions flight personnel augmented by the logistics readiness and maintenance squadrons have been on 12-hour shifts working six days a week to prepare the munitions for the outload shipment. 

"We will be shipping 1,884 short-tons of munitions requiring approximately 150 International Organization for Standardization containers," said Master Sgt. Andy Morris, noncommissioned officer in charge of munitions plans and programs. "This is significantly more than the last outload shipment in 2004 when 980 short-tons of munitions involving 78 ISO containers were shipped." 

"All of the munitions leaving the base needed to be cleaned, inspected, and deemed pest-free by both Turkish and U.S. customs inspectors," stated Master Sgt. Rodney Johnson, 39th LRS customs representative. "This is a huge undertaking in itself considering many of the munitions have been here at Incirlik for over 20 years." 

After being cleaned and inspected, the munitions are then 'stuffed' into ISO containers, which also have to be clean and pest-free. Because of compatibility requirements and weight restrictions only certain types of munitions can be packed in the same container. 

Additionally, all of the munitions are required to be blocked and braced with wood framing to ensure they don't shift inside of the containers while in transit. The ISO containers are standard receptacles in common use worldwide for transportation of almost all cargo and can be moved by sea, truck and/or train. 

"Normally, we would have had six to eight months lead time to start the sequence of events required to outload such a large shipment. In this case, we were tasked to prepare the munitions, make all of the blocking and bracing, and load the ISO containers concurrently," said Master Sgt. Ed Daniel, 39th NCOIC of the outload shipment operations. "AMMO and maintenance personnel from the MXS and LRS teamed up to pull this off and so far we've done a tremendous job and are ahead of schedule!" 

Every step of the operation, from the cleaning and inspecting of the munitions and ISO containers to the actual stuffing of the munitions, including the construction of the wood blocking and bracing was important to its success. 

"The team involved in this operation has put in a tremendous effort to make it happen, safely," said Colonel Stinnette.