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33rd, 31st RQS hone skills at Red Flag

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Jeremy McGuffin
  • 18th Wing Public Affairs

The 33rd and 31st Rescue Squadrons will get a unique training experience April 7-18 as they work alongside other services and allied forces from around the world at an Alaskan exercise. 

Red Flag at Eielson Air Force Base, Alaska, allows aircrews to train and integrate with air forces from other services and nations to fly against realistic threats with the goal of improving combat skills. 

"The 33rd RQS will fly air component combat search and rescue missions," said Lt. Col. Mike Trumpfheller, 33rd RQS commander. "We are attending Red Flag as part of a spin up for Operation Enduring Freedom deployments later on." 

Participating in these exercises is important to enhance the 33rd RQS core capabilities. 

"It gives the aircrews a great opportunity to focus on our combat search and rescue mission," said Colonel Trumpfheller. "This is especially important following multiple deployments to OEF doing 'in-lieu-of' medical evacuation for the U.S. Army." 

Because of recent deployments, the 33rd has not been able to participate in the Red Flag exercises until now. 

"We try to conduct CSAR large force employment training at least once a year," he said. "Our deployment rate has not allowed this recently so we are excited to be a part of this event." 

Red Flag offers training events not available at Kadena Air Base, making these missions crucial for the aircrews. 

"We will fly mostly pre-planned or alert CSAR missions for recovering downed aircrew," said Colonel Trumpfheller. "In addition, we are training with the 31st RQS using electronic threats and will use the weapons ranges to employ our .50 cal weapons and conduct terminal area employment training." 

The rescue squadron's objective this exercise is to safely deploy, fly, and redeploy to and from Red Flag and leave the exercise with a higher level of combat skills, in preparation for future deployments. 

"We can achieve more specialized training we can't always get on the island," said Maj. Jason Gingrich, 33rd RQS B flight commander. "With mountains and large plains, our electronic warfare training will provide us with more information we can't get over water around Okinawa." 

Red Flag offers the opportunity to train with the other rescue forces. At the end of the exercise, all the participants will leave Red Flag better trained in CSAR, said Colonel Trumpfheller.