The Mighty War Wagon: KC-135's Replacement is Near, But 50-Year-Old Aircraft Still Has Few Years Left to Carry AF Fuel

An F-16 Fighting Falcon is refueled by a KC-135 Stratotanker during a cross-country flight. The KC-135 also provides aerial refueling support to Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps and allied nation aircraft.

About 20,000 feet above Valdosta, Ga., Capt. Matthew Swee and Master Sgt. Nancy Primm complete their checklists to prepare their tanker to link up with six A-10 Thunderbolt IIs for a training refueling mission.
KC-135 Stratotankers like the one flown by the 6th Mobility Wing crew from MacDill Air Force Base, Fla., will eventually be replaced by the KC-46A Pegasus. But the 50-year-old airplane the old Strategic Air Command alert crews nicknamed “The Mighty War Wagon” still has some years ahead of it and planes to fuel.
“I think the latest generation of tanker crews have kind of lost that concept of ‘The War Wagon,’ because the majority of crew members never sat on alert for SAC. The majority of those boom operators have retired, so the concept of ‘The War Wagon’ and what it was designed to do has been kind of lost over the years,” said Master Sgt. Ernest Burns, the superintendent of a 418th Flight Test Squadron detachment that is testing the KC-46 in Seattle.
Early in his career, Burns was a boom operator with many of the SAC alert crewmembers who came up with the nickname because of the KC-135’s original mission.
“The nickname stems from what the KC-135 was designed to do. It was designed to re-fuel a SAC bomber, specifically the B-52 (Stratofortress), to go to war. So that was where ‘The War Wagon’ came from, it was designed to go to war, to re-fuel the B-52.”

Tech. Sgt. Stephen Shin inspects KC-135 Stratotanker nose gear doors before taking off a training mission. Shin is a crew chief with the 927th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron at MacDill Air Force Base, Fla.

The KC-135 has been at the core of the Air Force’s aerial refueling mission for more than five decades. The first one flew in 1956, and the Air Force received the latest models nine years later. In the past 13 years, the tankers flew 33,500 sorties and refueled more than 135,000 aircraft with more than 12 billion gallons of fuel, according to Air Force statistics. In addition to refueling, KC-135s have also been used in command post and reconnaissance missions. Life-cycle upgrades, including communications, auto-pilot and surveillance equipment, to the KC-135R/T models expanded their capabilities and made them more reliable.
In 1993, MacDill AFB lost its flying mission when the Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission moved the F-16 Fighting Falcon mission to Luke Air Force Base, Ariz. But it began to change with the arrival of the 6th Air Base Wing a year later, followed by the refueling mission in 1996, said 6th Air Mobility Wing historian William R. Polson.
“MacDill was chosen as the site for the KC-135 air refueling mission, in part, because tankers flew fewer flights than the fighters and were less noisy, the tankers were more compatible with the aircraft of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the tankers were compatible with the predominant types of aircraft using the nearby busy airports in Tampa and St. Petersburg,” Polson said.
The 1995 BRAC sent the Malmstrom Air Force Base, Mont., refueling mission with 12 KC-135s to MacDill AFB, and the 6th ABW became the 6th Air Refueling Wing, Polson said. In 2005, the Defense Department’s streamlining effort moved four more KC-135s from Grand Forks Air Force Base, N.D., to MacDill AFB. The base’s active-duty and Reserve KC-135 crews continue to support aircraft in the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility with about 1 million pounds of fuel daily, Polson said.

Senior Airman Rowdy Moore washes a KC-135 Stratotanker. Moore is assigned to 6th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron at MacDill Air Force Base, Fla.

Before Swee, Primm and the rest of their crew took off to meet the A-10s from Moody Air Force Base, Ga., Staff Sgt. Estefano Estrada, Airman 1st Class James Wild-Garcia and other 6th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron members prepared the KC-135 for the mission. As they drew near to the area where they would link, Primm began talking to the pilots and observing how they were flying their aircraft. Handling multiple planes requires the boom operator to become somewhat of a conductor, said Primm, a 91st Air Refueling Squadron boom operator and 6th Operations Support Squadron combat support flight superintendent.
“Aerial refueling is an aerial ballet,” said Primm. “It also takes on the aspect of the boom operator becoming something of a conductor, in that I’m telling this musician that his piece is coming up, and this is how I want you to play it. Once this person has played his piece of music, I’m going to direct him over here, and I’m going to direct you. So I become somewhat of a musical conductor.”
Even as the two planes draw near at 232 mph, Primm keeps her conversation to her pilot at a minimum, maybe telling him over her radio, “He is flying a little low,” or “He is flying a little to the right.” She learned the lesson of both minimal words and a moderate tone from an experienced pilot during boom operator training at Altus Air Force Base, Okla. “I try not to be a chatty Cathy because after a certain point, they’re going to start to tune me out, not because they want to, but because their brains can only handle so much,” she said. “So if I keep my updates to a minimum, then when I do start talking, they’re going to be listening to what I have to say.”
When the planes are linked for refueling, Primm is sometimes close enough to read the pilot’s name tag, she said.

The boom of KC-135 Stratotanker is connected to an A-10 Thunderbolt II during an aerial refueling mission. Once connected, fuel is transferred from the KC-135 to the A-10.

Once the KC-135 disconnects from aircraft it refueled, there isn’t a lot of emotion, whether they just completed a training mission or have given gas to a fighter aircraft in a war zone. All attention is still on the plane, and on the checklists that help make each mission successful and safe.
“Traditionally, we do this a lot, so it’s pretty routine for us because we train every day,” said Swee, a 6th OSS instructor pilot. “In terms of thoughts, what you’re doing is making sure all your safety checklists are complete, that you’re thinking ahead of the airplane, what the weather is down-track and trying to anticipate any issues that might come up while you have airplanes roughly 10 to 12 feet apart like we do.
“As you’re flying through the air, a lot of times you have to overcome turbulence that’s associated with flight, and you have additional air dynamics created from two airplanes interacting with each other,” he said. So, emotions don’t really come into play. There are plenty of things in terms of checklists and safety checks, and basic air traffic control that keep you busy.”
Burns is working on the developmental test for the KC-46A with Boeing and the 418th FTS detachment in Seattle. The new tanker’s first flight is scheduled for this summer in Washington, but Burns believes the KC-135 will be around for a few more decades.
“If you think about it, that airplane first flew 50 years after the Wright Brothers,” Burns said. “It’s really amazing how technology kind of went from the Wright Brothers to the KC-135 in just those 50 years. The first KC-135s rolled off the assembly line in 1955, and the last one was made in 1964, and they’re still around, very capable and reliable.”

From a pod in the rear of a KC-135 Stratotanker, Master Sgt. Nancy Primm connects a refueling boom and transfers fuel to an A-10 thunderbolt II during a training mission over Valdosta, Ga. Primm is a boom operator with the 6th Mobility Wing at MacDill Air Force Base, Fla.

Fallen Marine's Family Adopts His Best Friend

LACKLAND AIR FORCE BASE, Texas, Feb. 4, 2011 – "Whatever is mine is his," Marine Corps Pfc. Colton W. Rusk wrote about Eli, his military working dog, in the final days of their deployment in Afghanistan.

Brady Rusk, 12, gets a somber kiss from Eli, a bomb-sniffing military working dog, during a retirement and adoption ceremony at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas, Feb. 3, 2011. The Labrador retriever was assigned to Brady's older brother, Marine Corps Pfc. Colton Rusk, who was killed in Afghanistan. U.S. Air Force photo by Tech. Sgt. Bennie J. Davis III   (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available.

Yesterday, Rusk's family helped to prove his words true when they adopted the black Labrador retriever in a retirement and adoption ceremony at the military working dog school here.

After Rusk, 20, was killed Dec. 5 in Afghanistan’s Helmand province by Taliban sniper fire, Marine Corps officials told Darrell and Kathy Rusk, his parents, that Eli, the young Marine’s infantry explosives detector dog, crawled on top of their son to protect him after he was shot.

The Rusks drove here from their home in Orange Grove, Texas, along with their sons -- Cody, 22, and Brady, 12 -- as well as Rusk's aunt, Yvonne Rusk, and his grandparents, Jan Rusk and Katy and Wayne O'Neal.

Marine Corps Staff Sgt. Jessy Eslick of the Defense Department’s military working dog research and development section handed the leash to the family, praising Eli as "a dog that brought Marines home to their families."

Eli immediately began licking Kathy Rusk's palms and fell into the arms of his former handler's father.

"In his last letter we got the day before we buried him, at the very top was a little smudge that said 'Eli's kisses,'" said the fallen Marine’s mother, who wore a two-sided pendant with a photo of her son on one side and another snapshot of him with Eli on the other. "[Colton] thought whatever was [his] was Eli's. "We're Colton's family, so it's just right that we're Eli's family now."

Eli, who was trained in the military working dog program here, reportedly is the second working dog the Marines discharged to permit adoption by a fallen handler's family. Cpl. Dustin J. Lee's family adopted his German shepherd, Lex, after the Quitman, Miss., Marine died from wounds he received in a mortar attack in Iraq’s Anbar province March 21, 2007. The corporal's family worked for nine months with an online petition and congressional help to secure the adoption.

Kathy Rusk said her family didn't have as many obstacles in their quest to adopt Eli. Texas Gov. Rick Perry started the process of working with the Marines on the dog's discharge, and Scooter Kelo, who trained Eli and also taught Rusk on working with the dog, also helped to make the adoption possible.

"It gets our mind off the sadness of losing Colton," she said, "just knowing we're going to have a little piece of Colton in Eli. I just wished he could talk and tell us some stories. Just to know we're going to be able to share the love we have for our son with something that he loved dearly."

Rusk joined the Marines after he graduated from Orange Grove High School and committed himself to the Marines the same week that his best friend, Marine Corps Lance Cpl. Justin Rokohl, lost both legs in southern Afghanistan. Rusk deployed to Afghanistan on his 20th birthday, with Eli, as part of the 3rd Battalion, 5th Regiment, from Camp Pendleton, Calif.

"He wanted to be a Marine since he was 10 years old," his mother said of her fallen son. "We talked to him about maybe going to college first, but he said he had to fight for his country first."

Rusk often told his parents how dogs like Eli were well-trained here and in South Carolina, where he was trained as a bomb detector dog handler.

"We've had dogs all of our lives," Darrell Rusk said. "Since all of the boys were babies, they had one. Colton was probably the better handler of the bunch. When he went to train in South Carolina, he said, 'Dad, we don't know how to train dogs. These dogs here will bring you a beer, they'll open the can for you, but sometimes they'll drink it for you, too.' He said that was how well-trained the dogs were, and he was really amazed how much you can do with a dog once you've worked with them."

The dog Rusk liked to call "My boy, Eli" earned a reputation for wanting to be wherever his handler was. Eli didn't want to sleep on the ground; he slept in Rusk's sleeping bag. They even ate together outside after Rusk found out that Eli wasn't allowed to eat in the chow hall.

"He told a story of when they were in the chow line one time," the fallen Marine’s father said. "One of the Marines kicked at the dog one time and told him to get the dog out. Colton and the Marine got into a little scuffle. They told Colton he could stay inside and leave the dog outside, but from then on, Colton and Eli ate outside. That's how tight he and the dog were."

The family met Eli once when they visited Rusk at Camp Pendleton the week he deployed. After the retirement and adoption ceremony, the Rusks took Eli to their home on more than 20 acres of land, which he will share with the family, their horses and three German shepherds.

Jan Rusk said this was another way to honor her grandson’s memory, but it also will help the family as they continue to cope with their loss.

"Eli was a part of Colton, and now they have a little part of Colton back," she said.

Two Brothers With One Mission: Saving Lives

Pararescue Jumper Staff Sgt. Cody Inman, assigned to the 210th Rescue Squadron, Alaska Air National Guard, left and his brother Special Mission Aviator Staff Sgt. Jacob Inman, assigned to the 212th Rescue Squadron, Alaska Air National Guard, pose for a photograph in front of a HH-60 Pave Hawk helicopter on Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska, Nov. 20, 2013. (U.S. Air Force photo/Justin Connaher)

By Randy Roughton
AF.mil

Alaska -- Almost every time Barbara Inman hears a helicopter flying near her home in Anchorage, Alaska, she wonders if one of her two sons is on the way to save another life.

Staff Sgts. Cody and Jake Inman are both part of the Alaska Air National Guard’s rescue mission here. Cody is a pararescueman with the 212th Rescue Squadron while his brother is an HH-60 Pave Hawk special mission aviator in the 210th RQS, a new Air Force Specialty Code that combined the former aerial gunner and flight engineer career fields.

“My mom and dad (Michael) are always curious,” Cody said. “My mom thinks we’re on every helicopter in the state. She will text me, ‘Are you guys on a mission?’ I tell her, ‘No, Mom. We’re both off today.’”

While they were growing up in Anchorage, the brothers weren’t particularly close, partly because Cody was more than three years older than Jake. Working the same mission across the street from each other in their respective squadrons for the past two years seems to have strengthened their bond as brothers. However, when one brother knows the other is on a mission, the concern isn’t much different than it would be for any fellow squadron member. That’s because they both consider them brothers, as well.

“We both have pretty tight-knit squadrons, and I think we see everyone in our squadrons as kind of like our own brothers,” Jake said. “When my brother is out on a mission, I know the guys I fly with are going to do their absolute best every time they’re on a rescue. We work with an amazing group of professional people. I don’t doubt anyone he goes out with, and I’m sure he doesn’t worry about me, either. So when he’s out on a mission, he’s not really much different from any other guy in my squadron.

“Obviously, there’s a little of that worry factor, but we’re all professionals and want to get the job done. We know there’s a certain amount of danger and risk involved with doing what we do. We just accept that and hope for the best.”

In 2003, Cody joined the Marine Corps, and Jake joined the ANG three years later when he graduated from high school. While serving in infantry, Cody encountered a number of pararescuemen, and their stories, combined with the lifesaving mission, convinced him to leave the Marines and join his brother in the Alaska ANG in 2009.

"If I had tried to become a pararescueman (after high school), I would not have made it,” Cody said. “The Marine Corps laid a foundation that allowed me to make it through the training at an older age. The chances of me making it through my school at the age of 18 would have been impossible.”

About the same time his brother began his training, Jake finally got his wish of cross-training from crew chief to flight engineer. They were reunited while both were still in training at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M., and then moved on to their respective squadrons back in Alaska.

The 210th, 211th and 212th Rescue Squadrons conduct rescue operations in support of an 11th Air Force memorandum of understanding with the Alaska ANG, said Maj. Matthew Komatsu, 212th RQS director of operations. The late Sen. Ted Stevens pushed for a rapid rescue capability in the state after a plane crash at the Anchorage International Airport killed five people, including his wife, on Dec. 4, 1978. Stevens was also killed in a plane crash in Alaska on Aug. 9, 2010.

Two decades later, rescue crews continue to risk their lives under the motto, “That Others May Live.”

The 212th RQS is the only Guardian Angel squadron, which includes combat rescue officers, pararescuemen, and survival, evasion, resistance and escape, that is on 24/7 alert. So far this year, the squadron has completed about 55 missions and saved about 80 lives. Missions directed by the 11th Air Force Rescue Coordination Center, also located here, passed the 2,000 lives saved milestone earlier this year.

The pace for both jobs can get hectic, especially in the late summer and early fall. During one recent four-day period, the 212th RQS was tasked with six rescue missions, which included five crashed or missing airplanes and a bear attack. The real-world rescue missions are part of the reason many pararescuemen call Alaska “PJ Heaven.”

“Up here, things can go from pretty standard to crazy in a heartbeat,” Cody said.

One of his first missions after joining the squadron was a perfect example. His HC-130 Hercules crew was sent to rescue a woman who was experiencing serious medical issues near the Arctic Circle. They flew to Eielson Air Force Base, where they planned to board a Pave Hawk to rescue the woman and take her to a local hospital. However, the helicopter was down, so they were forced to leave the Pave Hawk crew behind.

“It was life or death for this woman, so pretty instantly, the PJs on the HC-130 crew went from watching an iPad movie to exiting the aircraft at 27 below in the dark under the Northern Lights with wolves howling at them,” Cody said. “I don’t think the man in that cabin expected men to fall out of the sky to help his wife.”

While the brothers have found themselves working on the same missions, it’s never on the same aircraft. The squadrons try to ensure they will never be on the same airplane or helicopter. They have also never deployed to the same location at the same time. But there have been times when they were both deployed at different places.

“We can’t fly together on the same aircraft, so we don’t usually see each other while doing our actual jobs,” Jake said. “The majority of the time we see the other is either at alert briefings or squadron functions. I’d say we both try to keep our heads together and just do our jobs and don’t even think twice about the fact that we’re brothers. It just doesn’t seem to affect us too much. I do my job, and he does his.”

There is time spent together and with Cody’s wife and Jake’s girlfriend, but it usually doesn’t involve activities one would think would interest Airmen with jobs like they have. Taking advantage of Alaska’s hunting and fishing opportunities doesn’t interest them because they get plenty of adventure on the job.

“I’m probably the only guy in Alaska who doesn’t really hunt or fish,” Cody said. “My job as a PJ allows me to do a lot of the outdoorsy things I want to do like hiking and mountaineering because of the environment I’m working in. The job kind of swallows everything to the point where the spare time you do have, you want to spend with your family and just enjoy a quiet weekend.”

They don’t consider the fact that they’re siblings serving in the Air Guard’s unique rescue mission in Alaska as anything out of the ordinary.

“There’s nothing really special about us. There are plenty of sibling members in the Guard,” Cody said. “We just happen to be related to each other, and we’re both very happy to be working in our respective units with the people we work with. I enjoy my work every day, and I think my brother does as well. There are dudes who have done a ton more than we have who deserve a lot more credit.”

The brothers consider each other perfectly suited for their chosen career fields in the Alaska rescue mission. Jake thinks his brother’s attributes serve him well while climbing ropes to rescue injured hikers, hunters and plane crash survivors, while Cody has similar thoughts on his brother’s skills as a special mission aviator.

“My brother is perfectly suited for his job because he’s a lot more intelligent and analytical than I am, and to a less extent, not as emotional,” Cody said. “He’s the one feeling the pulse of the helicopter, and if something goes wrong, he’s going to be the first to know, while I’m probably in the back eating my candy bars or worrying about my harness. The special mission aviator is the first one I look at when I feel something’s funny with the helicopter. There is a huge amount of trust placed on them, and I think that suits him very well.”

“I think being in pararescue suits his personality very well,” Jake said. “It’s certainly not a job I could do. It’s not for me, it’s not for everyone. Our personalities are quite different.”

It turns out their mother’s reaction to a helicopter overhead isn’t that unusual. The brothers do that, too, when they know the other is on alert.

“If I’m at home, and I hear a helicopter fly over my house during the weekend, and I know my brother’s on alert, I will say, ‘There goes Jake.’ If I go on a mission somewhere, I’m sure it’s the same for him.”

AF's First Female Fighter Pilot Continues to Break Stereotypes

FORT MEADE, Md. (AFNS) -- After Col. Jeannie Leavitt finished pilot training at the top of her class in 1992, she was given her first choice of aircraft, with a few restrictions. Her first choice, the F-15 Strike Eagle, wasn't yet an option for female pilots.

"I was told you finished No. 1, but you cannot pick a fighter," Leavitt said. "You cannot pick a bomber. You cannot pick a special ops aircraft. There was a whole list of aircraft I couldn't fly, and I was directed to choose among the other aircraft."

Fortunately for Leavitt and all female Airmen with similar aspirations, the following year then-Defense Department Secretary Les Aspin ordered all service branches to drop restrictions on women flying combat missions. Leavitt became the Air Force's first female fighter pilot and later the service's first woman to graduate from the Air Force Weapons School at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev. Almost two decades later, she's been the nation's first female fighter wing commander since she assumed command of the 4th Fighter Wing at Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, N.C., in 2012.

While she recognizes her place in Air Force history, Leavitt prefers emphasizing her role as an officer and commander. When she learned she would be flying the F-15 while she was in the middle of T-38 Talon pilot instructor training at Randolph Air Force Base, Texas, Leavitt didn't care about publicity or the chance to make history. She just wanted to fly in fighters.

"When we first discussed it, the individual from headquarters I was talking to mentioned there would be a lot of publicity since I would be the first (woman)," she said. "What I told him was I didn't want the publicity, but I really want to fly fighters. The thing was, I wanted to be a fighter pilot. It was part of who I was and what I wanted to do. The notoriety and publicity wasn't what I wanted, but it came due to the timing."

Not everyone was happy about the defense secretary's decision, and Leavitt had to prove herself to those who questioned her abilities because of her gender.

"A lot of times people were resistant because it was change, and a lot of times people don't like change," she said. "Some people weren't in favor of the change that happened and didn't want women flying fighters. In many cases when I'd show up, once they saw I was competent, and I was a skilled pilot, and I wasn't trying to change their whole world, they became much more accepting of me."

Leavitt flew more than 2,500 hours in the F-15, including 300 combat hours, mostly in Afghanistan and Iraq. Maj. Gen. Lawrence L. Wells, 9th Air Force commander, flew the F-16 Fighting Falcon as an operations officer with Leavitt during Operation Southern Watch in 1996. 

He recalls surprise when he first saw her at a mass pre-mission briefing because he didn't know any women were deployed in the area of responsibility at that time. But the surprise soon turned into admiration as he observed Leavitt, especially during a mission supporting a Royal Air Force Tornado GR1 during a threat of an Iraqi Roland surface-to-air missile. He could sense her professionalism and skill as he listened to tapes of her radio calls during the de-briefing after the mission.

"I remember thinking how cool and calm she sounded during the entire time," Wells said. "It was all just a very professional, well-run response to a potential threat, and I remember thinking at that time, 'This female fighter pilot is going to go far in our Air Force.'"

He also described the young F-15 pilot as "a great wingman," a trait he thinks will serve her well as a commander.

"We value in our young officers the ability to be in the right place at the right time," Wells said. "That's what a real wingman does. At the time, she was a great wingman, which in my view, makes her a better leader. Because you really have to know how to follow before you can lead. You have to understand what Airmen are thinking and how your Airmen are dealing with issues and what your young Airmen are focused on. Now having been a great wingman, she can be a great commander."

When Wells introduced Leavitt at her change of command ceremony at Seymour Johnson AFB in June, he chose his words carefully. Despite the historical significance of her career, Leavitt prefers recognition as an Air Force officer and commander. Wells chose remarks that would strike the same tone.

"I had some very specific things I wanted to say about her, and how I had seen her, not only in combat during Southern Watch, but also from kind of following her career," Wells said. "What I did not want to do in my speech was to highlight the fact that she was the first female commander. I was very sensitive to say the Air Force actually picked the right person to be in the right job at the right time, which I think speaks more for her as a professional Air Force officer, who, oh, by the way, just happens to be a female." 

Leavitt now commands one of only three Air Force units with the Strike Eagle, along with 5,000 active-duty members and 12,000 civilians. Looking back on the progress women have made in her 20 years in the Air Force, the biggest difference she's seen is women in fighter squadrons are no longer unusual as she was in 1993.

"One thing that's changed is women are no longer a novelty," Leavitt said. "When I started flying fighters in 1993, there were no other women. So there were no female instructor pilots, no flight commanders and no squadron commanders. So it was quite a novelty to have a female in the fighter squadron. The good news is this opportunity opened up, and quite a few women followed in my path."

Area Professor and Writer Falls in Love With His Characters

So you want to write that best-seller, believing that all a novelist needs is a word processor, a thesaurus - and "that little book inside" yourself that everyone supposedly has.
Dr. Russell Ramsey will quickly set you straight. It isn't that easy.
"Writing is similar to boxing," said the silver-haired but still fighting trim national security affairs professor at Air Command and Staff College at Maxwell Air Force Base. "Both are tough professions with very few at the top of the fight game or the literary world. Less than 100 make much money. Most people who box or write get their brains knocked out and earn practically nothing. The reality is that most boxers and writers need to have another source of income."
Ramsey's weekends are spent in his Albany, Ga., home with his wife Roberta, who works as an assistant to the vice president for academic affairs at Albany State College. During the week, a trailer outside Maxwell's Day Street serves as Ramsey's home and fortress of concentration for three hours of nightly head banging and writing.
But cry no tears for this writer. His passion for the written word has continued to grow since he peddled his first work to families of World War II troops as a 9-year-old boy in Sandusky, Ohio. After graduating from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in 1957 with a bachelor's in science and engineering, Ramsey wrote books on military subjects. In 1969, after a paratrooping accident and a tour of duty in Vietnam, Ramsey retired from the Army and has since found literary success with his sports articles and in the fickle arena of the paperback novel.
Though far from approaching the best-seller lists, Ramsey's story of a female Olympic swimmer fared well enough to justify two sequels.
"I developed a special love for this character," he said. "I don't think you can create a fictional figure, work with her for any length of time and not fall in love. My character, Angela Weber, became a daughter figure to me when she won the gold medal at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin in the first book, A Lady, A Champion. In A Lady, A Healer, Angela - now a middle-aged lady - became the counterpart to my wife, and transformed into both a world leader and a queenly figure in A Lady, A Peacemaker."
He didn't develop his character through mere daydreaming or divine inspiration. Ramsey did a complete character from the women swimmers he interviewed for articles published in Swimming World. One of these athletes, Marjorie Gestring, who won the diving medal at the 1936 Olympics, went further in telling her story than the writer dared to hope.
"This American swimmer became the youngest Olympic champion every at age 13, but failed to qualify for the 1948 games," Ramsey said. "Reporters slammed microphones in her face, asking how it felt to be around young girls who weren't even around when she won her first gold in 1936. She simply answered, 'They beat me.' Forty years later, when I interviewed her, she told me what really happened. She'd broken her back falling from a 48-foot wooden tower while entertaining soldiers."
This wasn't the only time when Ramsey's careful prodding uncovered a story within a story. After seeing "Chariots of Fire" in 1983, he became fascinated with Eric Liddell, the Scottish runner who refused to compete on Sundays for religious reasons in the 1924 Olympics in Paris.
But before he could begin, Ramsey had to recover from neck surgery that resulted from his paratrooping accident. Then, he was ready to dig.
"My vocal cords were damaged after the surgery, but I miraculously got my voice back three months later. I began asking myself lots of questions.
"Then I found this incredible man who was an Olympic champion but refused to compromise his beliefs. He gave it all up to become a missionary in China. When the war began, he could have left the country, but he sent his wife and children home and entered a prisoner-of-war camp where he died of a brain tumor. Everyone I talked to in his homeland, Scotland, told me there was more to his story than the movie told."
The result was God's Joyful Runner, one of many sports pieces Ramsey has published. His latest, Circles and Wings, is featured in the May issue of Airman magazine. Circles and Wings is a detailed history of military members in the Olympics.
Teamwork between the writer and a heavyweight boxing champion resulted in The Gentle Giant, a story about George Foreman that appeared in Amateur Boxer. Ramsey met the still active fighter while working with the Job Corps in Oregon.
"Foreman was a tough, street-wise kid who was hauled into juvenile court and forced to go to jail or the Job Corps," Ramsey said. "A boxing trainer saw that he was super fast and a terrific slugger and added him to his team. Foreman practically knocked every opponent out of the ring and went on to win the gold medal in the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City. But what impressed me the most was what he did after receiving his medal. While two other black athletes raised their fists in protest, Foreman paraded around the ring with an American flag."
Ramsey's interest in sports writing is no accident. He's an avid runner and swimmer, ranked nationally in his age group. He's recently been named the Air University nominee for the National Fitness Award and teaches an elective fitness elective at ACSC.
The setting for Ramsey's next project is slated to be behind the Iron Curtain. The story deals with Olympic stars in the Soviet Union. The Russian Embassy has arranged for Ramsey to co-write the book with a leading Soviet journalist who covered all the Olympic games since 1952.
"What I really like about this venture is that I'll be in a position to verify that they're telling the truth," Ramsey said. "I'll see the training centers and the athletes and can cross-check with the European and South African press who have covered the events these athletes have competed in.
"I believe the United States and Soviet Union have to find qualities they can respect in each other. I also believe the Russians are closer to the Greek ideal of athletics than we are. When a gymnast, swimmer or boxer succeeds in the Soviet Union, he's made into a role model for the entire country."
Ramsey tries to make his subjects come alive in his work, from the George Foremans to the Eric Liddelels.
"Practically everything I write is centered around a major character, someone who has done something. I try to focus on what makes that person special."

U.S. Maintains Air Superiority For Six Decades

A few months after the D-Day invasion in June 1944, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower surveyed the Normandy beaches with his son. "You'd never get away with this if you didn't have air supremacy," then 2nd Lt. John Eisenhower told his father. "Without air supremacy," the elder Eisenhower replied, "I wouldn't be here." The United States won air superiority in Europe by 1944 and the Pacific by the fall, won it in Korea in 1950 and hasn't lost control of the skies since. No American service members on the ground have died from enemy air attacks since three were killed during the Korean War more than 60 years ago. Control of the air gives a military power the opportunity to exploit height, reach and speed, enabling informed decision-making, the ability to strike freely at a distance, and the ability to maneuver unconstrained by the limits of terrain or ocean, said Dr. Richard P. Hallion, former Air Force Historian and senior advisor for air and space issues with the Directorate for Security, Counterintelligence and Special Programs Oversight. "I go back to David versus Goliath," said Hallion, author of "Storm Over Iraq: Airpower in the Gulf War" and "Strike from the Sky: The History of Battlefield Attack." "There wasn't a manhood issue here demanding he engage in the close fight, where he could have lost. Instead, David hit him with an aerospace weapon - a rock at a distance. In the airpower era, that aerospace weapon is the airplane and missile of today." When the North Koreans invaded the South in June 1950, they did so with overwhelming military force, and initially, without encountering immediate air attacks, Hallion said. Retired Marine Corps Col. Warren Wiedhahn experienced combat in Korea as a private first class, both with and without close air support. During the initial days of the Korean War, "there was no close air support, the North Korean juggernaut moved very rapidly with their tanks, artillery and infantry. They annihilated everything in front of them until there was nothing left in Korea but the Pusan perimeter," Wiedhahn said. But by then, robust air power forces - Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps - assisted by British, Australian and South Korean airmen as well - were taking a heavy toll on North Korean attackers, Hallion said. "During that period of time, the close air support was building up," Wiedhahn said. "The ships were coming in. The Air Force was flying. Now, all of a sudden, we began to see aircraft." After participating in the Inchon Landing and helping to liberate Seoul, Wiedhahn also fought in the battle of the Chosin Reservoir a few months later. United Nations forces chased the North Korean army to the southern tip of South Korea until China sent more than 100,000 troops that surrounded about 30,000 U.N. troops. "When we were up in the Chosin Reservoir, and the Chinese decided to attack, we began to see air - mostly Navy and Marine Corps (Vought F4U) Corsairs off of the carriers. That's how I really began to appreciate close air support. It (Control of the air) is absolutely, positively vital. After a 17-day battle in sub-zero temperatures, the Marines managed to withdraw to the coast, where they were evacuated in December." "Indeed, air power saved the Marines from annihilation as they made their way from the reservoir down to the coast," Hallion said. Five years after Wiedhahn retired as a colonel in 1982, he talked with four of the Chinese he fought against in the Chosin Reservoir during a visit to Beijing as part of his Virginia-based Military Historical Tours organization. About 40 years later, the sights and sounds of American aircraft were still engrained in their memories. "One of the greatest things we feared was your airpower," the Chinese told Wiedhahn. They said, they always moved at night, and never moved when the weather was clear because of their fear of our planes. Air superiority and supremacy are two of the five conditions in the air warfare spectrum, along with air paralysis, air inferiority and air parity. There is actually a huge difference between air superiority and supremacy that can be especially costly in war, Hallion said. "Air superiority is the absolute minimal condition we should ever be prepared to fight with," he said. "Air superiority means that the enemy is still able to undertake air action against you, but you are able to confound and defeat it. What we should really seek is what we had in the latter stages of World War II and what we had in the (Persian) Gulf War, where we had air supremacy, indeed, we had air dominance. That's where you so thoroughly dominate your opponent that they are instantly confronted with air attack, and they are unable to do anything about it. "We had air supremacy, clearly, in the first Gulf War because in that war, the Iraqi air force was simply unable to intervene either against our coalition air forces or against coalition surface forces. At the end of the Gulf War in 1991, by the second or third week, the Iraqi air force was fleeing the country, and the air action there was primarily intercepting aircraft trying to flee to Iran. That's what happens when you have air supremacy, and in the best of all circumstances, air dominance. You can then devote 100 percent of your air effort to ensure that the people on the ground get the support they need to prosecute the ground war." Gen. Charles A. Horner, who commanded all U.S. and allied air assets during Operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm, credited the airpower dominance to the intelligence, preparation and training before the invasion. "When did we get air superiority? We had it before the war began because we had the means to get it - the equipment, intelligence, training, and the courage of the aircrews," Horner said. "But do not get the idea that gaining control of the air was easy. It was not a macho, no-sweat operation. What turned into a turkey shoot in late January and February started out as a bitter struggle; those first few days were the hardest-fought, most-critical aspect of the entire war." Because the Air Force has had almost an unprecedented control of the skies for decades, it might be easy to forget how costly it was to achieve air superiority, especially during World War II. In the European and Mediterranean theaters alone, the U.S. lost 4,325 fighters and bombers before D-Day, with 17,000 killed and 21,000 wounded or POW in the fight for air superiority and didn't achieve theater-wide supremacy until the final days of the war. More Airmen were killed in aerial missions over Europe "than all the Marines who unfortunately died in the entire span of World War II," said retired Gen. David Deptula, who was the Air Force's senior intelligence community official when he was the Headquarters Air Force deputy chief of staff for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance. Deptula was also the main attack planner during Operation Desert Storm in 1991 and a joint task commander for Operation Northern Watch in 1998-99. "If you take a look at how many aircraft we lost in the Vietnam War - 2,781 Air Force and Navy combined, that was against a fifth-rate power with only 206 fighter aircraft. Why did that happen? Because, we were late in achieving air superiority. "It took us some 30 years to apply the air superiority lesson, but we did it in the form of developing the F-15 (Eagle). But those F-15s first flew in 1972, and now some of them are more than 30 years old. In 1979, I flew F-15s at Kadena Air Base, Japan. In 2008, my son was flying the exact same tail numbers I did, but it was 29 years later, and that was five years ago. Today, we have a geriatric combat Air Force, and we badly need to recapitalize it in order to maintain the advantage of air supremacy in the future." Without control of the air, troops on the ground face many hardships and hazards, as the late Gen. Bruce K. Holloway, vice chief of staff during the Vietnam War, wrote in an article for Air University Press. For six decades, American troops haven't had to experience "what it's like to lose mobility except at night; to be cut off from supplies and reinforcements; to be constantly under the watchful eye of enemy reconnaissance aircraft; to be always vulnerable to strafing and bombing attacks; to see one's fighters and bombers burn on their handstands; and to be outnumbered, outgunned and outmaneuvered in the air," Holloway wrote in his article, "Air Superiority in Tactical Air Warfare." However, there are some who aren't convinced the Air Force's decades-long dominance of the air is a certainty, especially with recent cuts in weapons systems such as the F-22 Raptor, which Deptula calls "the most capable aircraft ever built specifically to achieve air superiority," and F-35 Lightning II. In 2009, then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates called for capping the original 722 Raptors to 187. Three years later, across-the-board defense spending cuts have put the F-35 at risk. "There are newer threats out there, quite frankly, that could defeat the aircraft that we currently have," Deptula said. "That's why the Air Force works so hard to recapitalize those aircraft by building F-22s and F-35s that can operate, using modern technology, to achieve air dominance by networking capabilities with sensors that we never had in the past. "Our challenge in the future is we're not going to have time to do what we did in World War II - bring America's industrial might to bear over the time necessary to create the kinds of aircraft to maintain our superiority advantage. It falls on Airmen of today, to articulate the air superiority lessons of the past and to make the Airman's voice in the defense of our nation heard. Today's Airmen need to be unabashedly clear about the lessons of history in order to maintain our capabilities in the future." As vital as Eisenhower perceived air superiority to success on D-Day, some airpower experts wonder if the day will come when the U.S. won't have the control of the skies needed for a crucial confrontation with another military power. "I think the greatest danger we face as a nation today is to assume that air and space power is a God-given right to the United States of America, and we will always enjoy it," Hallion said. "We see that sometimes, unfortunately, in our sister services. They have labored so long with perfect freedom of maneuver because of the American airpower shield that we've put over their heads that I think many individuals fail to realize that it is perishable. Air dominance is like freedom itself - you have to constantly nurture it, care for it and invest in it to ensure that you will still have it."

DINFOS Honors DoD's Top Communicators of 2010

Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs Douglas B. Wilson, the ceremony's guest speaker, recognized the award recipients for their outstanding achievements.

"Many of those being awarded here today are forward deployed, and it's a tribute to your dedication and professionalism that not only do you adhere to [DoD Principles of Information], you embody them," he said. "And the standards of excellence reflected in your work in the most difficult conditions is a credit to you, your units and the Defense Information School."

The school's hosting of the ceremony is the evolutionary result of three separate military schools combining into a single communications school in 1995 at Fort Meade.

Retired Navy Mass Communication Spc. 1st Class Brien Aho, a DINFOS instructor, started competing in the photography part of the competition in 1998. He has won six first-place Military Photographer of the Year awards in various categories.

"I think if the students see that the instructor they have is considered one of the 'best,' then they will pay attention to that individual more and with more respect," Aho said. "I compete every year to see where I stand against my peers. And you're only as good as your last photo."

Winners were selected for Military Graphic Artist of the Year, Military Photographer of the Year, Military Videographer of the Year, and Thomas Jefferson Award winners in print and broadcast journalism. Their products include covering combat operations, humanitarian assistance, sporting events and daily military news events around the world.

"I want to congratulate all of the winners who have been honored here today," Keck said. "Thank you for all of the hours you've dedicated to perfect your craft in the public affairs and visual information communities. You have the incredible privilege of telling the story of the men and women who make up the Department of Defense team, and the products you produce consistently deliver immediate and lasting impacts."

Keck presented a total of 60 awards to winners representing all five service branches.

The awards programs date back to 1960 for military photojournalists and 1968 for the Thomas Jefferson Awards.

Another DINFOS instructor bringing home first place in the Military Graphic Artist of the Year competition wasn't born when either started.

"I don't think I could say that I'm the best in my career field," said Tech. Sgt. Kristi Machado, Digital Multimedia Course instructor. "I'm constantly learning from the people I work with, and I consider myself lucky to be able to work beside them. I consider them to be the best. These competitions are part of the growing process as a photographer, videographer, graphic artist or journalist. What I've learned, I'll do my best to share with my students and peers."

DINFOS graduates are working in a world in which communication is integral, Wilson said. Their efforts are not in a stovepipe, he noted, and are not a separate entity from all that is going on in the world. These respective career fields are part of the policy development, not an afterthought to it. They are an essential part of the military mission, not an adjunct.

"What you do here in the continental United States, and around the world -- very often in harm's way now -- to tell the story of our military for our internal and external audiences is critically important," Wilson said. "Your professional images and the reports you compile provide our internal audiences and the American people [with] the initial look into the most sensitive operations around the world."

One of the highlights of the annual ceremony was Air Force Master Sgt. Jeremy T. Lock's selection as the Military Photographer of the Year for an unprecedented fifth time. He won the award in 2003, 2005, 2006 and 2008, as well as runner-up honors in 2007 and 2009.

"I thrive on working stories, diving into each experience, and living for a moment in a world outside of my norm," Lock said. "It is an honor to be able to share my vision and, hopefully, foster awareness, understanding and empathy."

Department of Defense Communicators of Excellence Overall Award Winners:

* Military Graphic Artist of the Year
Marine Sgt. Shawn P. Sales

* Military Photographer of the Year
Air Force Master Sgt. Jeremy T. Lock

* Military Videographer of the Year
Air Force Staff Sgt. Burt Traynor

* Broadcast Journalist of the Year
Dave Annarino, Army, Defense Media Activity

* Print Journalist of the Year
Randy Roughton, Air Force, Defense Media Activity

* New Broadcaster of the Year
Airman 1st Class Tori Fleck

* New Writer of the Year
Marine Cpl. Reece E. Lodder

Tinker Epitomized Native American Strength, Leadership

PAWHUSKA, Okla. (AFNS) – The nation’s highest-ranking Native American general didn’t have to be on the ill-fated mission in the Pacific that took his life in 1942. The question of why he was always intrigued Dr. James L. Crowder, a historian and author of “Osage General: Maj. Gen. Clarence L. Tinker.”

Maj. Gen. Clarence L. Tinker was a natural leader who personally led his airmen into combat missions during the early days of World War II. He perished, along with his crew, during the battle of Midway. (U.S. Air Force photo/Courtesy)

 
So he once asked the question while talking to members of the Osage Nation in Oklahoma.
“We were having a meeting about Osages who served in the military, and I asked them, ‘Why would he do that?’” Crowder said. “All of the key documents from that time showed he didn’t have to be on that mission. They said an Osage leader is never at the back of his band of warriors.”
Tinker, a one-eighth Osage, grew up on the reservation in Pawhuska, Okla. George Edward Tinker, his father, started Osage County’s first newspaper, the Wah-Sha-She News. Even after Tinker became a general, he sometimes called home to talk to his father, just so he could hear his native language.
“So General Tinker was always proud of his Indian heritage,” Crowder said. “In 1906, when they turned the tribe lands into individual holdings after oil was discovered in the Osage Nation, the Osage became the richest tribe in American history. As an alumni member at 19 years of age, General Tinker became quite well-to-do and had a lot more money than many of the officers he served with. He was not one to show off his wealth, although he did like to show off. He was known for coming in the MacDill (Air Force Base, Fla.) officer’s club on a mule with full Indian headdress for the Army-Navy football game. He liked to be the center of attention, yet he was kind of a quiet person, too.”

Crowder describes the general as 5-foot-10 and 150 pounds, with extremely long sideburns he was always proud of.”(Gen. Henry H.) Hap Arnold told him several times, ‘Get those sideburns shaved,’” Crowder said. “He would, as long as Hap Arnold was around. But then he would just grow them back out.”
Early in his military career, Tinker served with the 25^th Infantry Division, originally in Spokane, Wash., and later moved with the division to Hawaii. In 1919, Tinker took an interest in flying, earned his pilot’s license and entered the Army Air Service in 1922. Five years later, he was named the commandant of the Air Service Advanced Flying School at Kelly Field in San Antonio, and later commanded several pursuit and bomber units. In 1940, he pinned on his first star, and, after Pearl Harbor, was named commander of the Army Air Corps’ Hawaiian Air Force, which became the 7^th Air Force in February 1942, with Tinker as its first commander. He was promoted to major general a month earlier, just six months before he disappeared over the Pacific. In its announcement of Tinker’s appointment as Hawaiian Air Force commander, Time magazine described Tinker as “a spit-and-polish, sky-ripping flight officer part Osage Indian, flyer since 1920.”
When Tinker assumed command of the Hawaiian Air Force, his father reassured friends in the corner drugstore in Pawhuska, “You can go home and sleep peacefully now. The Tinkers have got the situation well in hand,” he said, according to an article in The Milwaukee Journal on Feb. 14, 1942.

Before Dec. 7, 1941, Tinker warned that the Japanese were the biggest threat instead of Germany, and he thought the Air Force would be the major factor during World War II. He also believed that a long-range attack against Japan would be the key to war in the Pacific. During the spring of 1942, he considered the Japanese on Wake Island as a threat to Midway and Pearl Harbor. However, he didn’t think the B-17 Flying Fortress could make the 1,300-mile trip so he acquired four Consolidated LB-30 Liberators and prepared for an attack on Japanese forces on the island, Crowder said. Tinker, then commander of the ArmyAir Forces Hawaiian Department, died with eight crewmembers when their B-24 Liberator disappeared through a formation of clouds over the Pacific Ocean during a long-range mission on Wake Island that he chose to personally lead. He was the first American Army general officer killed in combat during World War II. Oklahoma City Air Depot, the base that had only recently opened, was renamed Tinker Air Force Base.
“His career stretched from the beginning of the Air Force as we know it into World War II,” Crowder said. “He came through that period in the 1930s when the Army Air Corps wasn’t really held in great respect and was very poorly funded. Yet he came through it, and I think he was a very natural pilot.

“The fact that he gave his life in such a dramatic way as commander of the 7^th Air Force leading his men, is also important in remembering General Tinker.

“But General Tinker’s favorite thing was working with young Airmen. He thought the key was the young men coming up in the military, and he always tried to give them positive experiences with officers. He was an encourager is a way anybody could remember him.”

Images and items of Tinker and his career can still be found throughout the base that was named for him more than seven decades since he disappeared over the Pacific. There’s a bust of Tinker in the Air Force Sustainment Center Headquarters, and a painting and a display of his awards and medals greet visitors to the Tinker Club.
But the first seeds of his leadership skills were planted in Tinker’s Osage childhood. His portrait hangs in the chiefs room of the Osage Tribal Museum in Pawhuska, and to this day, the Osage Nation honors him with a song and dance on the final day of their four-day In-lon-shka. The annual celebration emphasizes the culture and values that date back to the 1880s after they moved to their current reservation in Oklahoma. The Tinker family attends each year, with most of the men participating in the dancing.
“We have veteran dances that honor our soldiers,” said Chief John D. Red Eagle, principal chief of the Osage Nation. “My father was a World War II veteran, and we honor him during that time, as our other families honor their soldiers. We talk about when they were in the war because they were very proud to be a part of the military. That’s the way they felt about General Tinker because of his service to the United States as a soldier. It is a big honor to have a song in that dance.”

How's Your Luck on Friday the 13th?

Black cats, bad pennies, broken mirrors and other bad luck trolls could be waiting behind any corner today.
This is the day the superstitious dread when Friday and the number 13 coincide on the calendar. The law of averages demand that good things are bound to happen, even on the unluckiest of days. Yet that knowledge is little comfort to the people who take great pains to avoid cracks in the sidewalk or wait under a ladder. Some will not even begin a trip on a Friday, especially if it falls on the 13th.
For the superstitious, the kids at Camp Crystal Lake in the Friday the 13th movies had it easy. They know the corners could have worse dangers in store for them today.
For centuries, otherwise sensible, intelligent people have held special fear in their hearts for both the day and the number. The explanation for the association of Friday the 13th with bad luck is the belief that Christ was crucified on a Friday and the fact that there were 13 men present at the Last Supper.
Another legend from the 17th century says that witches and warlocks gathered on the Friday before the Sabbath and the 13th attendant was considered Satan.
Centuries later, there are still events such as breaking a mirror, spilling salt or having a black cat cross one's path that seem especially ominous on Friday the 13th.
People try, consciously and unconsciously, all kinds of methods to break their bad luck spells and hopefully invite good fortune. Some look for four-leaf clovers, horseshoes and pennies with Lincoln facing up. Others knock on wood, rub a rabbit's foot or carry silver dollars in their pocket, all designed to invite good luck on the day most associated with the bad.

Hurricane Forecast Calls For Another Stormy Season

The forecast released recently for the 2005 hurricane season calls for bad news and maybe even worse.
The bad news is the season is expected to be at least as active as in 2004, which saw four hurricanes in Florida. The worse news is this active trend is expected to remain in the next few years.
Forecasters predict 13 named storms and seven hurricanes in the 2005 season, which begins today and continues through Nov. 30. There's also a 73 percent chance that at least one major hurricane will make landfall somewhere in the United States, according to the forecast.
Dr. William Gray, the renowned Colorado State University meteorologist, says this is part of a 25-year cycle of active hurricane seasons, which began in 1995.
"We're in the middle of this big, long, lasting cycle in the Atlantic, and this is something we're going to have to contend with for a long time," said Steve Letro, meteorologist in charge at the National Weather Service in Jacksonville. "So there's no reason to believe it's not going to be active again, as far as numbers of hurricanes.
"The question is where these storms will go, and that we just don't know."
The 2004 season, one of the top three on record, produced 15 storms and nine hurricanes, including four that hit the state in a span of six weeks, causing $22 billion of damage and 116 deaths in Florida alone. Only 1950 and 1995 rival 2004 as the most active hurricane seasons on record.
"Who would ever have envisioned a hurricane season when you would have said 90 percent of Florida would have been affected by hurricanes, and Miami and the Keys were the two areas that weren't affected," said Harvey Campbell, Columbia County Emergency Management public information officer. "That would have been the long shot almost like the horse that won the Kentucky Derby.
"It's important for us to have learned, not only from what happened here, but also from what happened in some communities that were hit harder and learn what they have learned."
This year, emergency management will have its own radio station at 530 AM, with a range of 8 to 10 miles. It was scheduled to be on the air by today.
During the 2005 hurricane season, for the first time, inland hurricane watches and warnings will be issued, something the National Weather Service in Jacksonville has wanted for years, Letro said.
Once again, experts at the National Hurricane Center and National Weather Service are urging people to not focus exclusively on the black line studded with dots used to project paths of storms. This caused considerable confusion when Hurricane Charley slammed into Port Charlotte on that Friday the 13th in September instead of 90 miles north at Tampa Bay, where the black line suggested.
The hurricane center considered eliminating the black line, but decided to keep it after surveying the public, media and emergency workers.
One new development will be an experimental graphic that shows the probability of hurricane and tropical storm force winds over inland regions like Columbia and Suwannee counties.
Officials are also still trying to get the word out statewide for residents to consider the "cone of uncertainty," the margin of error cone around the black line," Letro said.
"People need to pay attention to the warnings that are given, not just to where the skinny line says the hurricane is going to go," he said.
"A hurricane is a big thing, and as we saw last year, there could be significant impact far removed from the center. We also saw last year how just a small change in course can have a huge impact on the damage that will occur in a given location."
If there is a positive side to getting hit like Florida did by hurricanes in 2004, it's that hopefully no one will be caught sleeping this year, Letro said.
"There's no question last year's hurricanes got everybody's attention," Letro said. "We hope that translates into a higher preparedness level for the upcoming season.
"Up until last year, we had trouble convincing people in inland areas that a hurricane can seriously affect you. People in Orlando don't think that anymore.
"Under the right circumstances, Lake City could easily be like Orlando was last year."

Category 5: 'What If' the Big One Hit Lake City?

EDITOR'S NOTE: The following story is based on the possible scenario of a Category 5 hurricane sweeping through North Central Florida. To help illustrate the importance of preparedness, this story uses tracks of previous storms and quotes from local and national tropical weather experts to comment on this fictitious, while possible, hurricane.

While much of the Suwannee River Valley sleeps on Sept. 4, Hurricane Emily is born several hundred miles off the Cape Verde Islands. Not yet named, the tropical wave moves directly west at 29 mph. Even with the memory of the hurricanes of 2004, the community's mind is on other things.
But within less than two weeks, the monster soon frightens coastline populations from South Florida to Texas as a Category 5 hurricane.
Formation of hurricanes like Emily begin when the air is warmed by contact with ocean waves and moistened by evaporation. As the air warms, it rises, spiraling inward toward the system's center. The closer it gets to the center, the faster the motion. Three conditions determine how a potential hurricane like Emily will strengthen: warm surface waters, high humidity and the ability to concentrate heat.
As the wave continues its forward movement across warm waters, it develops the counter-clockwise, cyclonic circulation typical of North Atlantic tropical storms. A day later, the wind speed reaches 40 mph, and the hurricane center upgrades it to a tropical storm named Emily. By the time Emily hits the Dominican Republic on Sept. 8, she has become the year's third hurricane with winds of 76 mph.

Emily wreaks havoc

Even as a Category1 hurricane, Emily leaves havoc in the Dominican Republic, killing 12 people and leaving thousands homeless. She loses some punch, dropping temporarily to tropical storm force, and is somewhat disorganized as she skirts the southern tip of Cuba near Guantanamo Bay.
But by Sept. 10, Emily meanders in the warm waters of the Caribbean Sea, where she will regain much of her power back over the next couple of days.
Emily appears headed directly for the Yucatan Peninsula, but on the following day, Columbia County residents, along with the rest of Florida, receives an unwelcome surprise. Forecasts show Emily taking a definite turn northward into the Gulf of Mexico. The danger of a direct hit on the northwest Florida coast is a definite possibility.

Small eyes have it

The most intense hurricanes rotate around relatively small eyes, less than 10 miles in diameter. The center is relatively calm and is the area with the lowest pressure. But immediately around this calm center is the hurricane's most violent area - the eye wall. Moist air rushes toward the eye, spiraling upward to create the eye wall. Once atop the eye, the air cools and descends back into the storm.
By now, Emily's hurricane force winds cover thousands of square miles, and her tropical storm force winds cover areas 10 times larger. Along the contours of the spiral rain bands are dense clouds where torrential rains fall. Lightning glows in these rain bands, and turbulence whips the cloudy terrain.
Emily all but misses the Yucatan Peninsula and is already close to hurricane status again one day later. By Sept. 11, exactly one week after she was detected by the hurricane center. Emily is packing 109 mph winds and is making a curve toward the northwest.
Two days later, the hurricane is up to 127 mph, and there are hurricane warnings along the Florida, Alabama and Mississippi coasts. Emily is still two days away, but the hurricane center is reporting the probable strike zone stretches from the Tampa area to New Orleans.

Steaming ashore

On Sept. 12, there are many unoccupied businesses and offices in Lake City as people scurry to grocery stores to stock up on supplies since Emily, now a Category 3 hurricane, is only a day away and appears headed directly to Cedar Key, much like the 1986 hurricane did when it devastated the entire region.

Take shelter

Columbia County Emergency Management and American Red Cross have begun establishing shelters and advising residents to begin making preparations. Emily continues to strengthen over the next couple of days, reaching Category 4 status in the early morning hours of Sept. 14 with 132 mph winds, and more strengthening is expected. Just before Emily blows ashore shortly after midnight on Sept. 15, weather reconnaissance shows wind strength has reached 158 mph. That wind strength is expected to remain at landfall, making Emily the nation's first Category 5 storm at landfall since Andrew in 1992.
Emily is moving fast and still packing 132 mph winds when the eye reaches Columbia County with gusts as high as 175. How seriously residents took the hurricane's threat will determine how the community fares when the storm passes.
Fortunately, Hurricane Emily was only make-believe. When the next threat becomes real, the only question that matters is: Will Columbia County be ready?

New C-130J May Join Hurricane Hunters

The view of a hurricane is quite different at 10,000 feet. But even from the vantage point of a WC-130 Hercules aircraft, the 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron  crew knows the potential death and destruction that could lie within the eye of the storm below them.
The 2005 hurricane season is expected to be a historic one for the Hurricane Hunters as they hope to complete the transition from the WC-130 to the faster, modernized WC-130J model this summer.
"We've done many experimental missions with this aircraft, and there were issues with radar, and with props that were previously reported in the press," said Lt. Col. Doug Lipscombe, 53rd WRS aerial reconnaissance weather officer. "Those issues, we think, have been resolved. We aim to prove that in the coming months, and we hope we will be able of fully implement the aircraft.
"If everything else goes as we hope, we will reach initial operating capability this summer."
The WC-130J's main features include an all-glass cockpit, heads-up display and modernized computer systems. But its best attribute will likely be what it will be able to accomplish in hurricane conditions.
"This aircraft can fly higher, faster, and consequently, farther than the C-130H," Lipscombe said. "The engines are more powerful, but also we're not required to carry that big 10,000 pound gas tank in back of the aircraft like we have in the WC-130H.
The 53rd WRS, based at Keesler Air Force Base, Miss., flies into tropical storms and hurricanes to gather information that is invaluable to National Hurricane Center forecasters.
"When a storm is way out in the Atlantic, about all we have aside from aircraft reconnaissance is satellite imagery," said Steve Letro, a meteorologist in charge at the National Weather Service in Jacksonville, Fla.
"Satellites tell us something about the storm, but nothing gives us information like the planes going through the hurricane and getting information from inside it. This is how we get an idea of what steering currents there are and whether the environment is favorable for strengthening or weakening."
In September 2004, Hurricane Hunter aircraft flew a combined 59 missions into Hurricanes Frances and Jeanne, Lipscombe said. Crew members, as well as the rest of the population in risk areas, learned valuable lessons in the 2004 hurricane season. Even though the squadron is based on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, last year's hurricanes also made a personal impact, especially for Lt. James Linder, 53rd WRS commander. Linder, who is also a Delta Airlines pilot, just recently moved back into his house on the east coast of Florida after it sustained heavy damage in Frances and Jeanne.
"The lesson from 2004 was to be prepared," Lipscombe said. "Every year, we see the number of deaths due to hurricanes decreasing, and that's the good part of it. The unfortunate part is we also see the damage. Through no fault of your own, a bullseye was painted on Florida, and you experienced four major hurricanes in one year, which is hard for anyone to bear.
"But when a hurricane is coming ashore, there's nothing anyone can do about that. People in Florida can be assured that we will continue helping the National Hurricane Center fulfill its mission of putting out the best possible forecasts."
With the help of the WC-130's Improved Weather Reconnaissance System, the crew measures outside free air temperature, humidity, barometric pressure and evaluates other meteorological conditions such as turbulence, icing, visibility, cloud types and ocean surface winds.
The crew obtains other vital information by dropping dropsondes - 16-foot cylindrical weather sensor packages that resemble canisters at the bank drive-through window.
These dropsondes gather information as they descend about 2,400 feet per minute beneath a small parachute to the ocean. The canister radios weather data on the temperature, humidity, pressure and winds inside the storm. The crew then processes the data and transmits the information by satellite to the National Hurricane Center ever 30 seconds.
"The National Hurricane Center is getting high-density data via satellite," Lipscombe said.
"They get a complete look at all four quadrants of the storm, so they'll be able to see what the intensity of the storm is and where the exact center is, along with wind speed and pressure. All that information is fed into the National Hurricane Center computer modules."