AMC commander visits Aviano

  • Published
  • By Tech. Sgt. Michael O'Connor
  • 31st Fighter Wing Public Affairs
AVIANO AIR FORCE BASE, Italy --  Gen. Arthur Lichte, the commander of Air Mobility Command, visited Airmen from the 724th Air Mobility Squadron here May 18-19.

The visits here and to other AMC units stationed in U.S. Air Forces Europe Command were made part of General Lichte's trip to the European Theater to attend the Combat Air Forces and Mobility Air Forces Conference in Germany. The visits afforded the general the opportunity to see how his Airmen are running the AMC operation and how AMC contributes to the fight down range.

While at Aviano Air Base, the general received a briefing on the current operations of the 724th AMS and how the Airmen play a key role in the mission success of the 31st Fighter Wing. He also met and spoke with his AMC Airmen and walked through the new NATO passenger terminal located approximately a quarter-mile down the street from its current location and is scheduled to open in July 2009.

"The new terminal down here really adds a new dimension and is essentially twice the floor space than they had before," said General Lichte. "They can take and process folks quicker ... handle more cargo ... and when you start to think about what happens in the future [with supporting U.S. Africa Command] ... it's very important and gives us many more options."

By having the air mobility en route structure at Aviano AB and the new NATO terminal helps everyone -- it helps our Air Force, it helps USAFE, and it helps NATO, said the general.

"The Airmen of the 724th are absolutely key and essential to our operations here in Europe," said General Lichte. "They add a new dimension and it gives us options on whether we're going on a northern route or a southern route and so by having them here at Aviano and partnering with the 31st, partnering with USAFE, it just adds a whole new dimension for us and gives us a lot more options."

During his visit here, the general spoke about today's AMC Airmen and how they're holding up to the high operations tempo.

"Our Airmen are fantastic," said General Lichte, who had an opportunity to see Airmen at Ramstein, Aviano and Incirlik Air Bases and to continue on down range where he saw an aeromedical evacuation up close and personal, and his AMC family flying the KC-135 tanker -- the Air Force's oldest airplane in the fleet.

The general said this trip gave him a whole new dimension on what's going on with Airmen and how they're holding up and that they continue to impress him.

"My take away from the visit here is just like I've seen throughout the entire theater, is that we have tremendous Airmen contributing to the fight," said General Lichte. "When I looked at our three core competencies of airlift, aeromedical evacuation and air refueling, I'm getting a great feel for all three of our core competencies and of course I'm pretty comfortable with our airlift."