Air 
National Guardsmen from Alabama, Delaware, Kansas, and Mississippi pulled an expeditionary medical support (EMEDS) soft-sided hospital out of storage in Kansas—shaking it out for its first use. Put aside for homeland security emergencies, the EMEDS facility is now the only medical support in Hancock County, Miss. Some 85 Guard medical professionals set up the Hancock EMEDS in two days and began 12-hour shifts on Sept. 7. It took two C-17s to move the EMEDS, but transporting older medical facilities required a squadron of airlifters. The hurricane wiped out the Hancock Medical Center, so Guard officials say the EMEDS will stay until the center can reopen.
A three-month continuing resolution that ended in December inflicted less pain on the Department of the Air Force than it had expected, as procurement and construction continue in the new year. The federal government operated under a stopgap spending measure that stretched from the beginning of the fiscal year on…