Crew Chief for a Day

When I walked into the Air Force recruiter’s office all those years ago, he asked me what job I wanted. I’d already taken the ASVAB test and the linguistics test as well. I scored high enough that I could have had any job in any of the services. He asked me about becoming an aircraft mechanic. I told him I was okay with that as long as I didn’t have to ride in anything I ever fixed. He stared at me for a minute, waiting for me to explain, and eventually I added, I have zero mechanical skills, and knowing that there was no way I’d board anything I fixed. He smiled, and then we reviewed several other jobs that had nothing to do with mechanics. Thanks to that brief interchange, the Air Force probably saved an aircraft.

Fast-forward years later, I was serving with the 930th Fighter Wing as a logistics planner. I liked the job for a lot of reasons mainly because I was good at it. I was deployed within the A-10 maintenance unit to Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Arizona, working out of a ready room near the flightline. Since I’d been part of the unit for several years, I was comfortable enough to step out of my role occasionally and into others I thought might be a good way to pass the time. Standing near the edge of the flightline, watching the morning takeoffs, I was talking to the Chief for maintenance as the crews got planes ready to go. At some point I made an offhand remark that I’d like to crew chief an A10 not as a full career but just as a onetime deal. As is often the case, if you say words in front of the right person, things happen.

The next morning when I walked into the ready room, the Chief saw me across the room and walked right over. Putting his right hand on my shoulder, he said, “Today’s your lucky day; you’re going to go launch and recover an A-10.” Without waiting for me to respond, he waved one of the veteran crew chiefs over and quickly explained that I was going to be doing a launch and recovery of his plane that morning. I half expected an objection since some amateur was going to get to play with his airplane, but he smiled and said, “Let’s go have some fun.”

Before anyone gets upset, I was never just turned loose on a multimillion-dollar airplane. I was being closely supervised by a crew chief with decades of experience, and I carried with me the knowledge of how to operate safely on the flightline where fighters were located having done it myself for several years. The Air Force’s formal program trains an auxiliary workforce to launch and recover aircraft, allowing people not normally involved to assist. It’s called cross-utilization training (CUT). I was getting the abbreviated version.

We walked out to his plane on the flightline, and he quickly oriented me on the steps it took to launch. We walked around each of the positions on the aircraft; he explained what each did and then took me back to the nose aircraft where I’d be working from. He then handed me a checklist, and we started going over each step and what functions had to be performed and verified. We went over the list twice, and I felt comfortable with each step. We spent maybe an hour out there, but when it was done, he declared me ready, and we went off to get a cup of coffee until the pilot was scheduled to show up. I was pretty wired at actually getting to do this. I know it may seem silly to crew chiefs who did this three times a day every day, but for me it was something far different from my normal skill set. We saw the aircrew van headed for the flightline, so we walked back out to the aircraft.

Aside from the maintenance folks, nobody knew what I was up to that morning until the pilot walked up to the aircraft. Like the other guys, I stopped and saluted the wing commander as he walked toward the A-10. A look of confusion crossed his face for a moment, and then he asked, “Why are you out here?” I replied I was his crew chief du jour. He looked over my shoulder toward the real chew grew chief, who was standing, and then nodded. “Okay, why?” For the past several months, I had been working on a special duty assignment with the Wing Commander that was going to downsize the unit. So, my response to his question was an inside joke “Looking for job security.” He smiled and turned to climb up the ladder into the cockpit.

With the pilot securely in place, I began running through the checklist with a few other airmen helping me accomplish the preflight of the plane with the pilot. I’ll never forget standing there with the aircraft completely ready to go, rendering the salute to the pilot as he pulled out of the parking space and the airframe I was in charge of – – for the moment – – rolled forward and started heading for the end of the runway. My part was done, but at the end of the runway there were guys who would arm all the munitions. I followed the veteran crew chief back into the break room, and for the next three hours we sat and played euchre while the plane went off to fly its mission at the range.

We walked back onto the flightline as the plane taxied back to its parking spot. I then marshaled it into a perfect parking position and ran the return checklist on the plane. After the pilot shut down the engines, I stood by on the ground as he climbed out of the cockpit and returned to earth. I asked if he had had a pleasant flight and if there were any problems. He smiled and shook his head. “No problems at all, crew chief.”

I turned toward the actual crew chief with a huge grin on my face. A successful mission is one where the takeoffs and landings are equal. I’d done that.

There are many things I did in the Air Force both regular and reserve that I never would’ve been part of if I hadn’t raised my hand and put on the uniform. Once I did that, it was easy to seek other challenges and life experiences within the realm. I am so glad that I can count this as one of them.

Not my launch, but this will give you some idea of the process.

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