Five Years, More than 1,000 Missions

“The Heavy Airlift Wing and its support organization, the NATO Airlift Management Programme have proven their place in the world’s airlift community. During the five years of operation the SAC has shown that the concept of pooling and sharing defense assets can be turned into reality in a cost-effective way", the commander said. Colonel Rombouts also expressed his thanks to the personnel of SAC who have enabled the program to become a success. “I am very proud of the milestones you continue to achieve daily. Our HAW airmen make a difficult task look easy. They serve as a bright example of what we can do when we work together as a team", Col. Rombouts said.

The commander of the HAW added that Zrínyi Publishing House recently published a photo album about the work of the last five years. “The future is bright too, let us just think about the upcoming new investments", the commander stressed.

As Wiek Noldus, the Programme Manager of the NATO Airlift Management Programme reminded in his anniversary speech, the SAC nations are committed to the program for several decades to come which gives a good foundation for development. “One of the strong features of SAC is the commitment of the member nations, written in the Memorandum of Understanding; to jointly own and operate the C–17’s for – at least – 30 years. This allows us to invest in the future and optimization of SAC", the programme manager said.

As an example of a development SAC is making in its host nation Hungary, Mr. Noldus mentioned the construction SAC campus and the C–17 hangar building that will be completed in 2016 at the HDF Pápa Air Base funded by the member nations. When completed, the building will house the SAC functions in Pápa and be the first C–17 maintenance facility in Europe. The new facility will ensure high C–17 mission availability rate and excellent cost effectiveness of the SAC C–17 fleet maintenance.

According to Mr. Noldus, another path of development for SAC exists through expansion as the program is open for new NATO members and partner nations to join. “The more nations join SAC the more efficient we can organize SAC and the stronger NATO and its partners demonstrate the vitality of the alliance by Smart Defence. I’d like to thank Hungary for hosting the programme", Wiek Noldus said.

Boeing’s Bob McMahon, Director of C-17 Field Operations expressed his pride for the significantly high C–17 mission capability rate of almost 94 % achieved by cooperation of SAC and the Boeing team in Pápa maintaining and providing technical support to the SAC C–17s. As he said, over the last five years the aircraft have flown more than 1,000 missions including humanitarian aid missions. Besides the cargo, the C–17s also transported hope to many people and will continue to do so in the future, the director said.

On behalf of Hungarian Chief of Defence Gen. Dr. Tibor Benkő, the five-year anniversary audience was greeted by Brigadier General Zoltán Mihócza, the Deputy Chief of Staff of the HDF Joint Force Command. He praised the achievements of the last five years and highlighted the advantages of the SAC programme to NATO as a whole. As he pointed out, the Hungarian Defence Forces and the Ministry of Defence are committed to further development of the SAC programme and Pápa Air Base. “All the developments of the base are contributing to the overall success. We hope that the achievements serve the attractiveness of Pápa and the will to transform Pápa Air Base to a modern hub", Brig.-Gen. Mihócza said.

As it is known, 10 NATO Member and two NATO Partnership for Peace (PfP) nations signed the Memorandum of Understanding establishing the SAC program in September 2008. Less than nine months after the standing-up of the program, in July 2009, the SAC’s operational arm, the Heavy Airlift Wing received the first of its three Boeing C–17 Globemaster III long-range cargo jets and started operating it with multinational air crews. The first SAC operational airlift mission took place on 13 August 2009 as SAC responded to a request from its member nation the United States and transported passengers from Ramstein Air Base, Germany, to Pristina International Airport, Kosovo.

Photo: Veronika Dévényi