Lakehurst New Jersey

Joint Base Fuelers Keep Aircraft Ready

It also was before two realignment actions brought Navy and Marine Corps units from Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base Willow Grove, Pa., and Marine Corps assets from Marine Corps Reserve Center Johnstown, Pa., to the New Jersey base during the past several months.

The merger and new arrivals brought to the joint base a full complement of Army, Navy and Marine Corps fixed-wing and rotary aircraft -– all now being fueled by the 87th LRS.

“At most deployed locations, it’s pretty typical to service all types of aircraft,” said Air Force Senior Master Sgt. Jon Kristof, 87th LRS superintendent. “But at the stateside location, it is somewhat out of the norm to do it on a regular basis. That doesn’t matter to us here. We service them all.”

The changes have increased monthly fuel output here by about 600,000 gallons, for a total of about 4 million gallons. Most of the newly arrived aircraft are helicopters or smaller fixed-wing planes with relatively small fuel tanks, Kristof explained.

“That means we do a lot more [fuel] runs, but not necessarily a lot more gallons,” he said.

Learning to refuel different aircraft, and to work with other services to identify their unique ways of doing things, involves “a learning curve on both sides of the fence,” Kristof said.

“As new customers, they have to adapt to how the Air Force does business, and we have to adapt to how the other services do their business when they are refueling,” he said. “Even though we are all Department of Defense, we still speak a different language, so we have all learned a lot about that over the last year and a half.”

That makes Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst a perfect training ground to keep the fuels management flight primed for future deployments. It’s particularly valuable, Kristof said, in giving junior members such as Airman 1st Class Alonso Hall experience working with other services before their first deployments.

Hall, with just 14 months in the Air Force, has been a quick study. He was named the 87th LRS’ “Pumper of the Month” in June for personally dispensing 422,271 gallons of JP-8 jet fuel. Hall’s recognition came shortly after the 87th LRS was named the Air Force’s best fuels management flight for fiscal 2010.

The award marked the first time the Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst squadron received the Air Force’s only flight-level award, presented by the American Petroleum Institute. The award was based on direct mission support, innovative management and quality-of-life initiatives.

Defense.gov News Article: New Jersey Base Realizes Joint Benefits

American Forces Press Service

JOINT BASE MCGUIRE-DIX-LAKEHURST, N.J., July 15, 2011 – With two months left for the Defense Department to comply with the 2005 base realignment and closure plan, a related initiative -- joint basing -- already is paying off through closer interservice collaboration and the promise of future cost savings, officials here reported.

Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst was part of the first phase of the plan that consolidated 26 military installations around the country into 12 joint bases. The concept was designed to generate efficiencies, reduce redundancy, and ultimately, save taxpayer dollars.

“I think this joint base initiative is great,” said Army Col. Joseph Poth, the deputy commander here who helped to plan and execute the merger. “The logic is, if we can train together, if we can fight together, why can’t we run a base together?”

Joint basing brought big changes here when three installations -- McGuire Air Force Base, Fort Dix and Naval Air Engineering Station Lakehurst -- merged on Oct. 1, 2009, to become the Defense Department’s only tri-service base.

It was part of the first wave of joint-base consolidations. Also during Phase 1, Naval Amphibious Base Little Creek and Fort Story in Virginia merged to form Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek. Fort Myer and the Marine Corps’ Henderson Hall in Virginia formed Joint Base Myer. Andrews Air Force Base, Md., and Naval Air Facility Washington, D.C., became Joint Base Andrews.

And thousands of miles away in the Pacific, Navy Base Guam and Andersen Air Force Base formed Joint Region Marianas.

As McGuire, Dix and Lakehurst formed one giant base that stretches 20 miles east to west and encompasses 60 square miles of southern New Jersey flatlands and forests, each retained its operational identity and mission, Poth explained.

The Air Force, the lead service here, continues to provide global mobility and expeditionary combat support with its C-17 Globemaster III, KC-10 Extender and KC-135 Stratotanker aircraft. The Army conducts soldier training and pre- and post-mobilization activities. The Navy designs and tests aircraft carrier catapult and arresting gear and other naval air support equipment.

Joint basing offers the three services the opportunity to share some of the costs of supporting these operations, said Air Force Col. John Wood, who took command of the joint base June 24.

In his new role, Wood has command and control of the 87th Air Base Wing and support responsibility for more than 80 tenant organizations referred to here as “mission partners.

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