Photo By Staff Sgt. Kasie Faddis | U.S. Air Force Senior Airman Riley Hawkins, a member of the hydraulics shop at the...... read more read more
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This month’s Unit Spotlight is the Hydraulics Shop within the 117th Maintenance Squadron!
“We work on the airplanes, flaps, landing gear, rudders, the boom, we overhaul the boom, replace components, troubleshoot hydraulic leaks and of course our back shop works the Air Force Repair Enhancement Program (AFREP),” said Master Sgt. Jason Vines, Hydraulics Shop NCOIC. “ A lot of times we rebuild the parts that we do remove and other times when we can’t, we just put them back into the supply system.”
Master Sgt. Sean Hogan, Hydraulics Systems Technician, describes the hydro shop as a “mini depot” in reference to the AFREP. Since the inception of the program in 2023, they have been able to profit around $1.2 million for the wing.
“We have really expanded the program. In the past other shops have taken parts off and shipped them to depot at Tinker Air Force Base to be rebuilt,” said Hogan. “We actually receive some of those parts worldwide to rebuild here, which is how we are able to get extra money and credits for the unit.”
Technical training for hydro is held at Sheppard Air Force Base in Texas and is around eight weeks long. In some maintenance career fields Airmen are put into specific shreds based off the aircraft they will be assigned to for their duty station, however, for the Air National Guard they already know what aircraft they will be assigned to prior to training.
“Some of our 99th personnel have come from working on other airframes, transitioned to KC-135s and may end up working on a totally different airframe when they leave here,” said Hogan.
Currently the hydro shop has four maintainers from the 99th Air Refueling Squadron, five full-time guardsmen and then some drill-status-guardsmen with an overall total of around 15 to 20 in the shop.
Vines stated that coming from fuel shop, which was easy in his opinion, has opened his eyes to the complexities of hydro because they work on the many flight surface of the jet.
“Hydro is a dirty job, but it is fun. I personally enjoy the work and it is rewarding. Every day is different,” Hogan said. “There is never going to be the same thing happen and there is always something new to learn or experience.”
| Date Taken: | 04.11.2025 |
| Date Posted: | 04.24.2025 11:15 |
| Story ID: | 496028 |
| Location: | BIRMINGHAM, ALABAMA, US |
| Web Views: | 30 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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