For the first time in 10 years, Fort Indiantown Gap held an open house Saturday celebrating the military base’s ties to the local community and recognize the vital role the installation plays in our state and around the world.
“So it’s been 10 years since we had the opportunity to not only celebrate and highlight what we do on the military side but also to connect with our community,” said Brigadier General John R. Pippy during the opening ceremony. “We’re very proud of being here in our community.
“A lot of you may not know that this is the second busiest National Guard training facility in the nation and it hosts our headquarters in the Guard, the military side, the men and women who serve in the Army and the Air Force.”
That’s not the only role the base fulfills.
“It’s also the headquarters for the Department of Military and Veterans Affairs, which oversees a tremendous, large organization, six veterans homes, over 1,100 long-term care residents, 2,300 very proud employees, so we’re just really excited that you get to see a piece of it,” added Pippy.
“We have over 1,500 men and women from the Army that are overseas, and we want to thank the families for all the sacrifices and what they do to help. One of the best things about being in the Guard is that you get a tremendous sense of purpose and you really understand not only how you relate to our national defense, but also how you make a difference in our communities.”
Pippy also highlighted the critical connection Lebanon County has to the military base.
“We’re the largest employer in Lebanon County. When you go to your local fire department or a police force or school district community there’s a good chance that someone there wears a uniform when they’re not doing that job,” said Pippy. “The men and women of the Guard are connected to our communities. We’re very proud of that but we couldn’t do it without your wonderful support.”
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Following his remarks, LebTown asked Pippy to expound further on the base’s Lebanon County connection that touches so many people over the course of their lifetime.
“In our state we care. We’re proud Pennsylvanians, so whether it’s with the Keystone Academy and helping high school-age youth get a second chance at fulfilling and achieving their dreams or it’s a soldier serving 20 years, airmen serving 20 years, when they come out of that service they can still work here helping those veterans take care because we have an obligation to take care of our veterans,” said Pippy, referencing the Keystone Academy Challenge program and the VA Hospital in Lebanon. “So that whole 360 degrees of cradle to grave where you can spend your entire time in and around this area and continually support either in uniform or outside uniform.”
While there were a plethora of military-based booths that had information about their missions, it was the sights and sounds via demonstrations that drew the attention of many open house attendees.
Immediately following opening remarks, there was a flyover by Pennsylvania National Guardsmen in a KC-135 Stratotanker from the 171st Aerial Refueling Wing and two MC-130J Commandos from the 193rd Special Operations Wing.
Following the flyovers was an aerial medical evacuation demonstration by the National Guard’s General Support Aviation Battalion. Many attendees filmed or took photographs on their phones.
Along a grassy area of the airfield, a helicopter hovered over several soldiers on the ground. A soldier was lowered from the aircraft to the ground via a hoist to retrieve a comrade who was being extricated from the field.
LebTown asked Col. Timothy Zerbe, state army aviation officer, about the training requirements for a crew to perform an airlift in an emergency situation when land-based vehicles are impractical.
Zerbe equated the training regiment to that of a young child, who first has to learn to crawl, then walk before being able to run. He said pilots have roughly 200 hours of flight school training and between another 50 and 100 training hours to learn hoist operations. He noted that Charlie Company, which is FTIG’s medical unit, is typically assigned to conduct hoist operation missions.
“It’s a crawl, walk, run. So for example, they’ll start logging time, they’ll progress from, ‘I’m just a baseline pilot,’ and they get trained on mission tasks and that could typically be about 50 to 100 hours,” said Zerbe. “Once they hit that point then we start doing dummy loads. So we go out in better weather conditions, we take a concrete block or rubber block and they practice doing dummy loads. As they show proficiency, which can be anywhere from 25 to 50 additional hours, then we start introducing live loads. And the live loads are done very specifically at a safe location like Fort Indiantown Gap where we have medical responders.”
Training, however, doesn’t end there.
“Once they master that in the daytime, then we do it under night vision goggles. So we go through those iterations just to get somebody trained up. So in total, it’s basically a minimum of 50 hours to start saying I can operate the hoist up to 200 hours until they’re actually going to do a first live mission. So it is an investment,” added Zerbe.
And there’s still even more training.
“And then after that they have what’s called currency requirements, which you kind of alluded to, those currency requirements are typically every 30 days,” Zerbe said. “We can push that as far as 60 (days). But I can tell you based on our program here, that we make sure that weight lifts are done every 30 days with groups.”
Another helicopter demonstration that kept the audience rapt was the aerial sling operation demonstration by the Guard’s General Support Aviation Battalion.
As a Chinook helicopter hovered just above a Jeep, soldiers on the ground attached three massive hooks to the vehicle so that it could be lifted into the air. The Chinook picked it up, turned it 180 degrees and returned it to the ground.
That demonstration elicited screams of delight from small children watching it.
“One reason is we have to traverse terrain where we can’t get it inserted into an area, it may be wrecked or damaged, where extracting it out with a linehaul vehicle is not attainable. So really it becomes more of a supply logistics event of moving equipment either to get it in or get it out for whatever reason it needs to be,” said Zerbe. “The center hook maximum is 26,000 pounds. So we can do 26,000 pounds off that center hook. There’s three hooks underneath that belly. The main one underneath has got the most weight capacity and then there’s two on the fore and aft part of the outback.”
Various military vehicles were placed along the outside of the fence at the airfield and these, too, were popular with guests. Whether a tank, a military ambulance or semi-truck, guests waited in line to climb in for a bird’s eye view of those interiors.
Tyvonne Gibson, 10, of Palmyra was all smiles as he donned military gear while sister Kayden, 8, was enamored with “Diesel,” a robotic dog used to teach soldiers how to treat canine soldiers injured in the line of duty.
Stacy Twaddle, their father, said he was injured during basic training in Georgia but is looking to revive his military career at FTIG now that he is rehabilitated. He believes the open house provides a valuable service to the community.
“I think it’s great, I think it’s good to show younger kids about the army, about the National Guard, about the military, it gives them a sense of purpose, gives them a bit of excitement and for families to be out here. It also gives adults a chance to see a lot of the equipment that the military gets to use.”
Other event highlights included an appearance by Miss Pennsylvania and musical entertainment. As part of opening ceremonies, about 40 students of Northern Lebanon Elementary School sang the National Anthem and a variety of patriotic tunes.
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