Air Force adopts Personnel Recovery as core function

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Brigitte Brantley
  • 23rd Wing Public Affairs
MOODY AIR FORCE BASE, Ga. --  Although Moody's focus has traditionally been on combat search and rescue, the Air Force is transitioning to a mindset with a more current operational focus--but one that still fulfills a promise to never leave an American behind.

Personnel Recovery is the over-arching name that encompasses all rescue assets under the same umbrella.

"What we provide at Moody and the 23rd Wing is support for the operational capabilities within this new core function," said Colonel Gary Henderson, 23rd Wing commander. "On a day-to-day basis, it's not a huge change at Moody. We'll continue to organize, train and equip to do what we do best, provide joint world-wide rescue capabilities."

This umbrella comprises not only CSAR but civil search and rescue and shuttle recovery support. This core function can also include non-combatant evacuations, humanitarian assistance/relief operations, medical/casualty evacuations and rescue command and control, among others.

"The Air Force is the only service who possesses weapon systems and career fields that are solely dedicated to recovering isolated personnel," said Col. Darryle Grimes, 347th Rescue Group commander. "It's essential to develop a global PR capacity which will help achieve national security objectives."

Even today, Air Force rescue forces are often seen as only being focused on preparing to rescue and recover high-risk personnel such as aircrew or special operations personnel in combat situations.

"In reality, the vast majority of people that we have recovered since 9/11 have not been those types of trained personnel," said Colonel Grimes. "They have been casualty evacuation or medical evacuation missions for both our United States servicemembers and friendly coalition forces, civilians and even the enemy in some instances. Right now, the demand for CSAR is not in particularly high."

An Air Force decision in September 2008 to adopt personnel recovery as one of its twelve core functions signifies that these activities are now viewed on the same level with other core Air Force functions such as nuclear deterrence, air/space/cyberspace superiority, agile combat support and rapid global mobility, among others.

"CSAR is just one of many operational capabilities that we possess," said Colonel Grimes. "We are more able to utilize our full range of abilities if we realize that and if joint force commanders realize that. The nature of war has changed in the many years since our rescue forces first had their beginning.

"Our combat rescue forces had their beginning in World War II, but the nature of our current overseas contingency operations presents new challenges because there are no longer fixed battle lines," said Colonel Grimes. "The combat environment is anywhere and everywhere and the operations we are asked to perform go throughout that environment. But what we are being asked to do is not beyond our existing assets and training."

Despite the change in terminology, training for different missions has not changed.

"The way we train is still geared toward CSAR because it is demanding and challenging," said Colonel Grimes. "When we train at such a high level, we are ready to support other operations and incidents at all levels of intensity. We need to retain all the necessary skill sets to conduct rescue across the full spectrum of military activities."

Under personnel recovery, rescue assets are constantly training and prepared to respond to any variety of situations that may present themselves.

"We recognize that we have these capabilities, we expect to be tasked and we're ready to support missions globally," said Colonel Henderson. "Although we rarely have an opportunity to rescue an Airman, we stand ready."