Exercise tests wing's readiness Published Aug. 15, 2014 By Will Huntington 88th Air Base Wing Public Affairs WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Oh. -- Base emergency response personnel, as well as much of the base populace, were put through their readiness paces Aug. 4-8 as the 88th Air Base Wing participated in its thirdquarter exercise for 2014. Designed to test the base's ability to handle a variety of contingencies, a quarterly exercise is long in the making and involves many players working together to meet objectives and assess successes as well as failures. "It's more of a detailed process than most people know," said Tom Purtle, installation exercise/inspection program manager. "It starts with unit representatives building objectives for areas that they want to test." Once a commander, function or unit decides what to test, they develop an objective. According to Purtle, the objectives need to be specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timely. Purtle said the exercise planners try to lace all of the objectives of the functional areas together so they can be tested in the context of the exercise scenarios. Often one scenario leads to another scheduled later in the exercise. "We try to build in a timetable, as much as we possibly can, to make all exercise events relative to each other and try to keep continuity through the week," Purtle said. be simulated, limiting factors must be identified and exemptions considered before all of the elements coalesce into an exercise. These elements are built into a master scenario events list, which is a tool to keep the exercise on track so that all tasks can be accomplished in the correct order at the correct time. The process requires creativity and imagination, but it also requires a sense of what might be the unintended consequences of any given exercise inject. Purtle cited an example of how the name created for a fictitious "bad guy" could unintentionally be the same as an innocent individual coming on base who, because of the name similarity, gets detained as the suspect. "Any time you put out an inject, you have a Plan B in case it doesn't go in the direction anticipated," Purtle said. The week's exercise began with a deployment phase which saw 47 Airmen and more than 85,000 pounds of cargo processed and readied to be loaded onto C-17s for an overseas destination. "The cargo tasking for this exercise was two to three times what we normally exercise so that really stretched us," said Nicholas Reed, 88th Mission Support Group alternate installation deployment officer. "Other than that, people-wise, it was standard fare." Wing leaders and unit deployment managers received a concept briefing the day before their people were scheduled to depart. The briefing outlined troops' destination, what they would be encountering as they went through the personnel deployment function as well as what they might expect upon arriving at their destination. Tasked to deploy were members from the 88 ABW staff agencies, 88th Security Forces Squadron, 88th Communications Group, 88th Force Support Squadron, 88th Operations Support Squadron and 88th Medical Group. Deploying Airmen passed through various stations in the deployment line to ensure all of their information was current. Airmen then attended briefings to prepare them for some of the things they might face overseas. Although they were in the midst of a contract transition, 88th Logistics Readiness Squadron contractors who, among other things, handle the passenger terminal function of the deployment line, still effectively provided service to deploying Airmen. "There was a gray area between the old contract going out and the new contract coming in," Reed said. "Despite all that 'fog-of-war,' if you will, that comes along with that, the contractor stepped up and did what they are supposed to do and met the mission requirements." Other exercise scenarios led to the base transitioning between all Force Protection Condition (FPCONs) levels. Additionally, there was a mass casualty/casualty assistance event featuring a simulated bus accident with multiple injuries, and a confined space exercise which saw two 88th Civil Engineer Directorate workers trapped in an underground utilityaccess tunnel. The biggest exercise event occurred Aug. 7 and featured a radiological incident which culminated with simulated terrorists detonating an explosive device containing radioactive material. Throughout the week leading up to the attack, base officials received intelligence reports of a terrorist organization believed responsible for the theft of radioactive material and the possibility that Wright-Patterson AFB was a target. Parking stand-off plans were implemented and other FPCONs were implemented to ensure the base was ready and its personnel protected in the event that an attack occurred. Reports of an explosion resulted in first responders converging on the location in Area B and establishing a cordon to keep onlookers at a safe distance while they tried to determine the true nature of the explosion and what steps needed to be taken to mitigate any possible effects. The wing's Emergency Operations Center (EOC), as well as the Commander's Action Team (CAT) assembled to provide support, information and coordination to the incident commander working at the scene. The radiological exercise ended once the nature of the radiological threat was identified and all of the exercise objectives were met. The next base-wide exercise is scheduled for the first week inNovember.