Exercises, training prepare RAF Mildenhall for worst-case scenarios

  • Published
  • By Karen Abeyasekere
  • 100th Air Refueling Wing Public Affairs
RAF MILDENHALL, England --  Gates closing and facilities going into lockdown were just a few of the necessary steps taken to ensure safety during an exercise here recently.

Exercises with a wide variety of scenarios are regularly planned and carried out in order to test capabilities in a realistic situation, as well as testing the response of others.

“The reason we conduct exercises is to test our preparedness for emergency and disaster response, training procedures and ensure there are no gaps in training,” said Master Sgt. Deandra Wright, 100th Air Refueling Wing Inspector General team manager.

Scenarios are based on worst-case situations that could affect RAF Mildenhall, not just the 100th ARW, such as an active shooter, aircraft crash or fuel spills.

“We practice these scenarios to ensure our training is up-to-date, test our response procedures, and that we have the appropriate facilities and supplies needed to support the situation,” added Master Sgt. Jason Hasty, 100th ARW IG wing inspector and exercise planner. “Without an exercise, you’re not going to know what your limiting factors are in response to these emergencies. If during an aircraft crash you realize you don’t have certain response equipment, the fire department doesn’t have certain tools, or security forces doesn’t have certain equipment, that’s going to come out in these exercises. It’s a way to identify where we’re short in resources, training and manpower.”

Practicing for real-world responses also allows the IG and other agencies, including first responders, to figure out what everyone’s roles and responsibilities are.

“When we train as agencies, such as security forces, we train alone and only practice our own roles – we don’t know what the fire department incident commander, the medical team or mortuary affairs do. Working together during an exercise means everyone gets see the big picture. It opens up lines of communication, and we get to see how everyone works together,” Wright explained.

As a result, the goal of each exercise is to highlight each agency’s strengths and weaknesses, as well as determining how everyone can support each other. Planning an exercise is no simple feat and requires input from many subject manner experts.

“We as the IG facilitate the event, but it’s actually the wing inspection team and SMEs who plan the series events which happen,” Hasty explained. “Although we might say we’re going to have an active shooter, the IG doesn’t go in and create the scenario. We work with a whole host of agencies including security forces, wing plans and readiness, emergency management and the fire department, and ask them what objectives they want to see within the scenario.

“The best part about the Air Force Inspection System is that we police ourselves,” he added. “In the old days, prior to 2014, there was a negative connotation that if you were ‘red’ and getting deficiencies, that was a bad thing. With AFIS, if we see something that’s wrong or not meeting the standard, we can identify that – it’s not considered a bad thing to get written up like that, but it means we can work towards fixing it.”