[Rhodes22-list] Equal Opportunity

[brad haslett]

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Here's a great story about our servicemen (women).  I
stand by ALL my earlier statements about the need to
do away with affirmative action.  When these flyers
end their military careers it will be a pleasure to
work with them in the civilian world.  They HAVE paid
their dues.  Brad.

Ladies' night over Afghanistan 
             by Capt. Elizabeth Ortiz 
376th Air Expeditionary Wing Public Affairs 

02/06/03 - OPERATION ENDURING FREEDOM (AFPN) -- In one
of her songs,
country singer Shania Twain croons about all the
things women do these
days; they are judges, politicians, doctors and
soldiers, to name
a few. 

Not mentioned in the song, but occurring more
frequently as the global
war on terrorism continues, is something else: female
fliers in combat
missions over Afghanistan.

Early on Jan. 31, a KC-135 Stratotanker took off from
Ganci Air Base,
Kyrgyzstan, carrying more than 180,000 pounds of fuel
and an
all-female crew-both pilots, a navigator and a boom
operator. The event marked
the first all-female crew to fly an air refueling
mission into Afghanistan
from Ganci. 

"We've been really lucky," said 1st Lt. Alison, the
navigator on
board.  Last names are being withheld for operational
security. "You don't
always deploy with a lot of women. The fact that we
have four women on this
deployment, and the fact that we make up a crew is
amazing". After
living with each other in the same tent for almost two
months, the women were
eager to fly on the same mission. "We've gotten along
really well living
together, so we were very excited to finally be able
to fly together,"
said Capt. Waynetta, one of the two pilots on the
mission. 

The women, including the other pilot, Capt. Heather,
and the boom
operator, Senior Airman Lyndi, are all assigned to the
99th Air
Refueling Squadron at Robins Air Force Base, Ga. They
have been deployed here
since Dec. 9. 

Once inside the tanker, the women began their
preflight and takeoff duties
with an ease borne of plenty of experience and skill.
Most of them
have deployed before, to places like Saudi Arabia,
Qatar, Iceland and
Thailand. 

Between the four of them, they total almost 4,000
flying hours in the
KC-135. The flight path to Afghanistan traversed three
of the "Stans."
The country itself remains a dangerous place. Just a
few days before the
historic flight, coalition forces on the ground
encountered the
heaviest fighting since Operation Anaconda last year.
Norwegian F-16s from
Ganci dropped munitions in support from the air. 

Once over Afghanistan, the crew got down to business,
refueling F-16s
from the European participating air forces of Denmark,
the Netherlands and
Norway. Based at Ganci, the aircraft provide combat
air support to
coalition ground forces. In the refueling world, the
motto is, "Nobody
kicks ass without tanker gas." The crew emulated that
motto when the
boom operator connected two moving aircraft together
on a night with 1
percent moon illumination. "It's awesome knowing that
I'm having a direct
impact on the mission," said Lyndi on her 17th combat
mission over
Afghanistan. "The fighters couldn't put bombs on
target without gas, and I'm the
onewho gets it to them," she said. 

More than 50,000 combat missions have been flown in
support of
Operation Enduring Freedom. In all, Lyndi refueled 10
European F-16s during the flight, off-loading 63,000
pounds of fuel. "I'm accomplishing
something with my Air Force career," said Alison. This
is especially true in the case of OEF, an operation
that more than 1,800 women support, according
to the public affairs office at Central Air Forces,
the air component of
U.S. Central Command. "I've always thought the
greatest thing I could do
with my life was to serve my country and be willing to
die for it-for my
family, my neighbors, people I don't even know,"
Waynetta said. "Now,
we're here supporting troops in Afghanistan who are
defending our freedom
and way of life." 

Basking in the early morning sunlight, the tanker
headed back to
Ganci. As the snowcapped mountains poked out above the
clouds, the women
reflected on the significance of the flight. "All we
wanted was to fly
together," said Lyndi. "I'm so excited we got to do
it." "We believe in
equality," Waynetta said. "But, the fact of the matter
is, we're still girls, and
we're doing something our grandmothers couldn't do. 

(Clockwise from lower left) 1st Lt. Alison, Capts.
Heather and Waynetta
and, Senior Airman Lyndi, all from the 376th
Expeditionary Air
Refueling Squadron, flew an all-female KC-135
Stratotanker air refueling mission
over Afghanistan on Jan. 31. (Photo by Capt. Elizabeth
Ortiz.)



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