Maintenance, all day, everyday

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Rachelle Elsea
  • 325th Fighter Wing Public Affairs
TYNDALL AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. --  Beginning the end of January, the 43rd Aircraft Maintenance Unit began running 24-hour operations.

"We switched our duty schedules on Jan. 28," said Senior Master Sgt. Raymond Phreaner, 43rd AMU superintendent and native of Titusville, Fla. "We wanted to be able to more efficiently and effectively leverage down time to maximize our ability to perform scheduled and unscheduled maintenance during the traditional weekend to improve overall aircraft fleet health as well as increase aircraft availability. This is all in a collective effort between us and the 325th Maintenance Squadron to be postured to meet the wing's flying hour program objectives and increase Raptor pilot training program productivity."

The unit's original hours were three eight-hour-shifts, with a weekend duty crew working from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m., said Capt. Kevin Kobithen, 325th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron maintenance operations officer. Now, we have full coverage on the weekends, with Airmen working 24 hours a day.

Sergeant Phreaner, whose responsibility it is to supervise the maintenance effort for 31 assigned F-22 Raptor aircraft as well as 330 enlisted personnel, said the transition has been successful so far.

"So far most indications are positive and favorable and point to improved aircraft health status and will allow stability to the weekly and long range schedule or aircraft and personnel," Sergeant Phreaner said. "We did have a slight reduction in manning on each shift due to essentially building another shift team to have a total of four teams. This, however, allows us to cover two full shifts on Saturday and Sunday as well as providing full 24/7 shift coverage."

He also stated that the Airmen in his unit are taking the change well.

"Our maintainers are some of hardest working, dedicated Airmen I know," said Sergeant Phreaner. "They constantly strive to continually improve our aircraft health and realize the direct impact their day-to-day efforts have on the wing's primary mission; delivering highly trained pilots to the Combat Air Forces Raptor units. Overwhelmingly, the feedback has been positive as it provides our maintainers with schedule stability as well as more down time to deconflict training, appointments and days off."