Patrick Air Force Base CDDAR team trains to ensures mission goes on

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  • 920th Rescue Wing Public Affairs
PATRICK AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. --  Airmen from the Air Force Reserve Command's 920th Rescue Wing and the active duty 45 Space Wing, Crash, Damage, Disabled Aircraft Recovery team worked together here, Jan 25 to ensure their skills to quickly remove a damaged aircraft from a runway were still intact.
 
"The goal is to get the plane of the runway as quickly as possible with minimal damage to the aircraft," said Senior Master Sgt. Farris Riggsbee, 920th RQW CDDAR team member."The mission must go on."

In the latest scenario, the CDDAR team responded to a simulated collapsed nose gear on a C-130. After evaluating the situation, members determined airbags were the answer. Airbags were placed under the nose of the aircraft behind the simulated collapsed landing gear and inflated.

"We only inflate the bags to a few inches below the belly of the aircraft ... this is only training and the bags could cause damage to the plane," Riggsbee said. "We don't want to damage a perfectly good plane!"

The low pressure, high volume 7 pounds per square per inch airbags are just one of the many tools available to the team. If a crane is available the team can utilize a sling lift or belly band to raise or move the aircraft off of the runway. In severe cases the team has tools on hand to cut the aircraft up in to manageable pieces or could call upon a bulldozer to clear the runway. The mission must go on.

CDDAR team members complete a weeklong course in which they learn many techniques to clear the runway. The CDDAR's responsibility could either be the safe recovery of a completely broken apart aircraft, or the aircraft could be flyable and they would need to recover it without causing further damage.

CDDAR's function is the recovery of aircraft, in the unlikely event of a mishap at Patrick AFB the response would involve numerous organizations. Those include the fire department, security forces, civil engineering and others.

"In all the years I have been here, I have never responded to a real life emergency," Riggsbee said. "I attribute that to the highly skilled maintainers and flight crew."