Photo By Shawna Keyes | Gen. Herbert Carlisle (left), Air Combat Command commander, presents Lt. Col. Lucas...... read more read more
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The award is sponsored by the Air Force Association and recognizes the most outstanding contribution to national defense in the field of flight, in the atmosphere or space, by either an Air Force military member, Department of the Air Force civilian, unit or group of individuals.
The award dates back to 1948 and was originally named the Flight Trophy before being renamed in 1957 in honor of Col Schilling. The award has previously been won by Capt. James Jabara, world’s first jet ace, in 1950, Maj. Charles E. Yeager in 1954, and Col. Robin Olds in 1967.
“This award reflects the dedication and professionalism of all Rockets; aircrew, maintainers, officer and enlisted,” said Lt. Col. Lucas Teel, 336th FS commander. “The squadron’s accomplishments captured in this award build upon our history dating back to World War II, and the Rocketeers’ ‘World Famous’ heritage. It’s such an honor to serve alongside the Rocket team.”
The time period the award recognizes is Jan. 1 - Dec. 31, 2015. During that time, the 336th FS was deployed to an undisclosed location in Southwest Asia with all 18 F-15E Strike Eagle aircraft and associated aircrew and 417 maintenance Airmen in support of OPERATION INHERENT RESOLVE.
The aircrew ran continuous 24-hour operations and executed 1.7K combat missions, totaling 12.6K hours of flight time, with an average sortie lasting eight to nine hours during their deployment. The squadron dropped 2.3K bombs and 4.9K bullets, totaling more than one million pounds of weapons dropped.
“What the Rockets did during that deployment was record breaking,” said Maj. Craig Nordgren, 336th FS evaluator pilot and director of staff. “We flew more hours and dropped more bombs than any other deployment in history before that.”
The Rockets flew combat missions into Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, and Africa while supporting OIR.
“Some of our guys flew 12-hour sorties which is pretty unheard of,” said Nordgren. “It wasn’t a standard deployment.”
Nordgren added that completing their combat missions wouldn’t have been possible without the maintenance Airmen that are assigned to the 336th Aircraft Maintenance Unit being there to keep the jets in the air.
“Our maintenance unit has been recognized in the [4th Fighter] Wing as the best multiple times,” said Nordgren. “It’s hard to describe the amount of time it takes to turn a jet, load it, get the weapons we need based on where we’re going, and take off. They worked 24-hour operations for the entire deployment and we wouldn’t have been able to do what we did without them.”
| Date Taken: | 09.26.2016 |
| Date Posted: | 09.26.2016 11:27 |
| Story ID: | 210588 |
| Location: | NORTH CAROLINA, US |
| Web Views: | 420 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, 336th FS takes home the David C. Schilling Award, by Shawna Keyes, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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