Air Force Reserve Command pararescuemen joined Royal Canadian Air Force search-and-rescue technicians for a week of SAR and parachute training in the Canadian northwest. “The purpose was to work with our Canadian brethren, the SAR techs [and] see how they do business,” said MSgt. Wes Hufnagel, non-commissioned officer in charge of the 308th Rescue Squadron at Patrick AFB, Fla. In addition to combined SAR activities in Yellowknife, Northwest Territory, the crews practiced confined-space parachute landings in Comox, British Columbia, during the July 15-22 exercise, according to an Aug. 6 Patrick release. “We don’t normally do that on home station, so it was definitely good to get exposed to that,” said Hufnagel. Jumping from an RCAF CC-115 Buffalo, the Patrick airmen tried the SAR tech’s newly developed “tree suits,” which are designed to protect against injury in wooded landing zones. (Comox report by SSgt. Anna-Marie Wyant)
Eielson Air Force Base, Alaska, celebrated the beddown of its full complement of F-35s with a ceremony just weeks after the base received the last of its 54 fighters. The arrival of those F-35s in mid-April gave Eielson the Air Force’s second fully-equipped, combat-coded F-35 wing, comprising two fighter squadrons.…