16 Shaw pilots take off for Iraq

The Item ^ | JANUARY 27, 2010 | By GINA VASSELLI

[Jet Jaguar]

SHAW AIR FORCE BASE - There were no tears and no grand last-minute gestures.

The 16 pilots from the 77th Fighter Squadron who deployed to Iraq early Tuesday were simply ready to go do their jobs.

Some had been trained for years, but they have not yet been "over there." Others, like Capt. Ben Williams, had already been to Iraq.

Williams deployed to Iraq about a year and a half ago, but he said this time he was "just as excited to go."

"It's different now," he said. "The training is the same, but the focus (is different)."

Lt. Col. Lance Kildron, commander of the 77th Fighter Squadron "Gamblers," said in a statement that the pilots will fly close air support missions in Iraq to support troops on the ground.

Williams said as far as he understood, the pilots will be there more to support Iraqis and Americans on the ground setting up the infrastructure than to drop bombs.

He said that when he went previously, the fighters might have had to knock out a strategic target, but now, "We're more likely to support the Iraqis so they can do that."

Williams said he was worried about going.

"Of course," he said. "I've got a family. I'm going to miss them tremendously."

But there is one thing he wasn't worried about.

"We're going there to do a job, and we'll do it -- not nervous at all about that part," he said.

These pilots are the last of more than 300 airmen from the 20th Fighter Wing to deploy to Iraq for this four-month air expeditionary force deployment.

Staff Sgt. John Gordinier, from Shaw's Public Affairs Office, said the majority of those 300 are already in Iraq waiting for the pilots to arrive.

He said there were three tiers of airmen to deploy.

The first were "prep," who are in charge of paperwork and administrative functions.

Then the maintenance staff deployed, Gordinier said, which was a "huge chunk" of the personnel, he said. "We're talking about 250 airmen."

And then the pilots went.

The deployment is planned to last about four months, but that's a rough estimate.

"You really don't know how long you'll be over there," said Gordinier, who returned from a deployment to Iraq recently.

The pilots didn't fly directly to Iraq on Tuesday.

Maj. Randy Pharr, with the Air Combat Command unit, helps organize Department of Defense fighter movements. For example, he was on and off the phone Tuesday morning making sure refueling tankers would take off at the right time to meet up with the F-16s leaving Shaw.

He said the pilots were taking an eight-hour flight to Europe. There they would wait a couple of days and then "press on to the desert," Pharr said. But all of those details didn't seem to be on the minds of the 16 "Gambler" pilots.

With the air of a summer-camp head count, they sounded off. Someone jokingly told the pilots to "GO! GO! GO!" as they began to collect their gear and walk down the short hall to the door that leads outside to the hangar where their F-16s were.

Several pilots tapped their hands on a sign that was hanging over the door: "Fly Like A Gambler Today."

[JRios1968]

[Liberty Valance]

[Peter Horry]