4th AMU superintendant leads Airmen at Red Flag

  • Published
  • By Andrea V. Mason
  • 388th Fighter Wing
The roar of an F-16 Fighting Falcon taking off reverberates through the chest of those on the flight line watching as their hard work comes to fruition.

The 4th Aircraft Maintenance Unit's primary mission at Nellis Air Force Base, Nev., is to maintain the F-16s at Red Flag 12-2, a realistic combat training exercise involving the air forces of the United States and its allies.

More than 140 Airmen from the 388th Fighter Wing at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, are deployed here to provide proper care and maintenance of the 16, F-16s so they can safely deliver combat capability on-the-fly, according to Chief Master Sgt. Robert Thiel, Hill's 4th AMU superintendent.

"My main focus is to pull together this large group of maintainers who are responsible for keeping the jets in the air and the mission going," said Thiel. "Our daily activities include fixing and generating aircraft, ordering parts for customers, receiving property and working with other maintenance units to ensure we can help them in any way we can."

Thiel leads the maintenance unit to support the flying mission at home station, during deployments and at exercises like Red Flag.

"We take our lessons learned from combat exercises like Red Flag and bring them with us wherever we are in a deployed location so when something comes up, we can react faster, because we have the experience," he said.

Seen walking the flight line throughout the day during Red Flag, Thiel often talks with the pilots and does post-flight inspections on the airframe.

While the 4th AMU supply section performs the same job here as they do at their home station, Red Flag still provides the venue to remain proficient in their job, and see first-hand what it's like in combat.

"This experience helps us think of what procedures we need to have set in place before we get [to a location] so things can run smoothly, and we can hit the ground running," Thiel said. "It also gives us a taste of what it would be like when we're actually in the combat zone. It sharpens our response times, and it prepares us, in a way, to know what to expect when we're out [in a deployed location], given what we're doing in this exercise."

An exercise like Red Flag not only sharpens the skills of the maintenance crew, but for the entire unit as well.

To maintain efficiency and flexibility, the structure of the AMU here is nearly the same as it is at Hill, except they report directly to Hill's 4th Fighter Squadron commander, Lt. Col. Jay Sabia, during Red Flag.

"This exercise plays a very important role in enhancing our wartime readiness, and we heavily rely on our Airmen to maintain and generate combat capable airpower so we can safely and effectively execute the mission," Sabia said.

"Without our disciplined and professional maintainers, our F-16s would not be primed for combat and our unit's ability to deliver lethal airpower when called upon would be severely diminished," he said.

Thiel has maintained aircraft at four Red Flags, two Green Flags, and traveled to many locations including Saudia Arabia, Afghanistan, Iraq and Korea.

According to Thiel, he got where he is today by; Doing the job, Doing it right and Double-checking to make sure he did it right.

"I try to motivate Airmen by telling them there's a chief in everyone," Thiel said. "It's also really inspiring for them to see first-hand the impact they have here at Red Flag and how we enable the mission."

That motivation and cohesion among the unit gets the job done to get aircraft off the ground and into the air to fly, fight and win, he said.

"And really that [ability to fly, fight and win] is what it's all about," Thiel said.

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