Combat aircraft

T

HE 192ND AIRLIFT Squadron

‘High Rollers’ of the Nevada

Air National Guard has

been in the C-130 Hercules

business for over 20 years.

The squadron  ies eight

C-130H3s as part of the 152nd Airlift

Wing out of Reno-Tahoe International

Airport, Nevada, and has evolved to

embrace an unusually diverse range

of missions. Typical of the ANG, this

makes use of the experience on hand,

many of the squadron members having

been here throughout their careers and

accumulated in-depth knowledge of

their mount.

The regular day-to-day cargo and

trooping tasks are all on the  ying

schedule at the ‘High Rollers’ as you’d

expect, from local airlift to international

disaster relief. However, what makes the

‘High Rollers’ stand out are two niche

roles, which have been acquired thanks

to the enthusiasm and experience of the

resident personnel. In 2016, after several

years of lobbying, the 192nd assumed

the airborne  re ghting role with the

roll-on/roll-o Modular Airborne Fire

Fighting System (MAFFS II). In addition,

a home-grown mountain  ying course

has drawn the attention of the entire

USAF Hercules community.

The Advanced Mountain Airlift Tactics

School (AMATS) has become one of the

most important C-130  ying courses

in the entire US military. ‘We run four

classes per year, one in January, a

March class, one in June and another in

October,’ says Lt Col Ricardo ‘Finch’ Bravo,

the AMATS director, who adds that the

unit would like to expand the number of

classes it runs. ‘Demand for the course is

through the roof,’ he says.

The need for the course

Since August 1996 there have been

eight C-130 controlled  ight into

terrain (CFIT) mishaps in hazardous

environments. Within the same

timeframe, US C-130 losses due to

combat engagements were zero. This

was the principal driving factor in the

AMATS course being launched  ve

years ago.

‘Combat losses are not occurring due to

enemy engagements’, says primary AMATS

instructor and co-ordinator Maj Joseph

‘Spock’ Jaquish. ‘Losses are occurring due

to the misapplication of performance,

energy management and crew resource

management [CRM]. In order to operate

tactically, we must  rst operate safely. The

idea of a mountain  ying course came

up because a lot of C-130 squadrons

were coming to Reno to inter- y with us

in our local terrain to prepare for their

forthcoming deployments. They asked

us for a local area brie ng about  ying

in the mountains. After that happened

a few times we talked about starting a

formal mountain  ying course, because

a lot of those units came here and found

themselves in hazardous situations they

weren’t prepared for.’

The rationale behind the seven-day

course is that at some point a Hercules

crew will be required to  y at low level,

whether that’s on departure from an

air eld or arriving at a landing strip, a low-

level air drop or avoiding ground threats.

The initial training o ering from the

192nd included threat scenarios, whereas

the emphasis now is placed upon properly

executing standard tactics, techniques

and procedures (TTPs) in a performance-

degraded environment, without the

added stress of a threat scenario. Jaquish

says that the low- ying element alone is

often su cient to mitigate ground threats.

‘Flying low in terrain means the enemy

only has visibility on the formation for

a few seconds, which means there’s not

enough time for them to engage. There

are a lot of advantages but also a lot of

requirements to  ying low. It’s just going

to happen in a Hercules.’

Bravo adds, ‘When you’re in a threat

environment you want to get down

low and terrain-mask. We teach the safe

execution of  ying low, down to 300ft

above ground level [AGL] in the desert

or 1,000ft AGL in a deep valley. You don’t

want turbulence to push you down into

the terrain, or if you have an engine shot

out you have to be able to climb out. In a

worst-case scenario a crew could be in a

box canyon and not have the performance

to safely execute an escape. They have

to respect the performance energy

When C-130

Hercules pilots

started getting

into trouble in

challenging

terrain, the 192nd

Airlift Squadron

‘High Rollers’ of

the Nevada Air

National Guard

reacted by

establishing

a specialist

fl ying class.

REPORT

Jamie Hunter

‘Roller 31’, a C-130H3 of

the Nevada ANG’s 192nd

AS, exits a canyon in the

California high desert.

All photos Jamie

Hunter unless credited

otherwise

RIVER

MOUNTAIN

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