|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
U.S. to help fix
Indonesian planes
From CNN Senior Pentagon Correspondent Jamie
McIntyre JAKARTA,
Indonesia (CNN) -- -- The U.S. military has begun helping Indonesia repair
more than a dozen C-130 cargo planes, crippled by the U.S. ban on military
sales to Indonesia, so they can be used in tsunami relief operations. Indonesian
officials said a shortage of spare parts, caused by the U.S. ban, has left
only nine of the country's 25 C-130s airworthy. As he left
Indonesia for Sri Lanka Monday, U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz
inspected the repair operation at the Jakarta military airport. Inside a hangar,
he met with American contractors and Air Force personnel who are working with
Indonesian air crews to install spare parts on Indonesian C-130H cargo
planes. American
restrictions on the sale of such parts were waived last week so the planes
will be able to fly relief missions into Banda Aceh. Two technicians
from Lockheed Martin's Air Logistics Center in Greenville, S.C., arrived on
Sunday with spare parts to begin work on five C-130s. "We'll go as
far as they want us to go, in terms of advising or doing the actual
mechanical work," one of the contractors, Jerry Lavender, told
Wolfowitz. Crews
from the 517th Airlift Squadron at Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska, are also
helping the Indonesia air force assess what needs to be done to get the
Indonesian aircraft up and working. "We'll
make sure all the right parts are installed to make their planes
airworthy," said Lt. Col. Gary Gottschall, commander of the 517th, which
arrived here on January 6 with four C-130s and 120 personnel. He said the first
of the five Indonesian C-130s to undergo repairs should be ready for flights
in the next day or two. At one point
while in the hangar, Wolfowitz clambered into the cockpit of one of two
Indonesian C-130s there, and talked to Indonesian technicians. The
517th's primary mission is flying three round trips a day to Banda Aceh,
ferrying a total of about 30 tons of palletized supplies, Gottschall said.
The unit's original deployment orders were for 45 days, but that might
stretch into March, he said. A short drive
down the ramp, Wolfowitz toured an AID loading area where 110-pound bags of
rice and iodized salt were piled high, waiting to be put on the U.S. planes. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Find this article at: |