TACP: Maintaining the standard

  • Published
  • By Airman 1st Class Daniel Phelps
  • 20th Fighter Wing Public Affairs
SHAW AIR FORCE BASE, S.C. --  Editor's note: This is part two of a three-part series on the 682nd Air Support Operations Squadron tactical air control party members and their stories of their everyday job and responsibilities.

It was a bright and early morning and the heat from the South Carolina sun was already making itself known as the three Airmen from 682nd Air Support Operations Squadron gathered for a briefing on the day's tactical air control party training exercise.

The TACP are the specialists who are assigned to combat units. They advise ground forces on aircraft employment and capabilities and direct combat aircraft onto enemy targets.

"The course we're doing today is designed to cover six different task evaluations we have to do for currencies," explained Staff Sgt. James Poole, 682nd ASOS tactical air control party, to the three Airmen. "We're covering GPS navigation with the (Defense Advanced GPS Receiver), land navigation with compass and map, man portable radios with the PRC-117, vehicle-mounted radios and a couple other skills like (Military Grid Reference System) plotting and handling weapons."

The course was going to be broken down into four legs; two as land navigation and two as vehicle navigation, he said.

After the briefing, the Airmen began looking over their maps.

"Right now, they are going over the grid zone patterns on their maps to figure out where their way points are," said Senior Airman Michael Munson, 682nd ASOS TACP. "They have to distinguish between grid north and magnetic north because their compass is a magnetic compass."

Back stops also need to be established on the maps for safety to ensure they don't go beyond where they need to go, Airman Munson said.

After plotting their points on the maps, the group began to head out one at a time into the woods armed with an M-4 trainer weapon, map, compass and a ruck sack on their back for the first leg of the course.

The evaluation started with the Airmen heading out solo because as a group it's easy to follow others' navigation, said Sergeant Poole. Each one needs to be able to rely on themselves. The first leg of this course is about individual skills.

Airman Munson pointed out that while the training course is TACP training, these Airmen were not TACP. He and Sergeant Poole were supervising the training.

"Today, these guys aren't TACP, but they are going through TACP training to keep their standards up because they do go out with us on deployments," he said.

Senior Airman Sam Brown, 682nd ASOS C4 systems technician, a support Airman attached to the TACP, works with the data flow and goes through a lot of the same training and temporary duty assignments as TACP members, such as air assault school.

"Not everyone in my career field in the Air Force gets to be attached to a TACP squadron," he said.

Airman Brown was the last of the three to head into the woods. He pushed his way through the thick brush and stepped over giant roots sticking out from the ground. At one point, he stopped when he came to a small clearing where a gravel road divided the canopy and a fence stood in front of him.

"It looks like the line is going through this fence," he said. "So, we'll need to side step it."

Once all the Airmen arrived at the way point and had some water to drink, Sergeant Poole began the briefing for the second leg of the course, which was designed for small unit skills with each individual having a different job.

"For small group tactics, the lead has the compass, the second has the DAGR GPS and the trail guy has pace count," he said. "Just remember to go off your compass first and to back up the compass with the DAGR."

Airman Munson met with the Airmen to help out with the coordinates. Sergeant Poole pointed out that as Munson was aiding them, he was keeping his M-4 trainer weapon on his foot, keeping it off the ground.

"Throughout all of this, we ensure weapons discipline is maintained at all times," Sergeant Poole said.

Once their coordinates for the next way points were established, the three Airmen headed back into the forest. A couple feet in, they stopped and grouped together.

"We're trying to calibrate the DAGR with the satellite so we can proceed onto the next way point," explained Staff Sgt. Michael Barnwell, 682nd ASOS radio frequency transmissions.

Staff Sgt. Wilfredo Godreau, 682nd ASOS power production, was the pace counter for this leg of the course.

People naturally will veer to the right or left depending on which foot they are heavy on, he said. Between that and the various obstacles people come across while navigating, he was constantly making adjustments as they moved forward to ensure they stayed on course.

As the 682nd ASOS members came close to their second way point, they came upon a clearing between their way point and the woods.

"We're going to need to run across this," said Airman Brown, and they took off across it with their weapons at ready position.

Just beyond the clearing was their final way point, where they hydrated and were briefed on their next leg, vehicle navigation.

The Airmen were given road maps for this part of the trip, said Airman Munson. After that, they go through and map out the roads they are going to take. They mark ticks for distance intervals and mark out major intersections. While they are driving they will watch for distance on the odometer of the vehicle to show where they are in correlation with the marks.

"When driving in the vehicles, you really have to pay attention because you can't use the compass," said Airman Munson. "The vehicle makes the compass go off."

Once the briefing was finished and the maps ticked, the 682nd ASOS members piled into two Humvees with Sergeant Poole and Airman Munson as the drivers to receive their navigation guidance.

They took off down the road with Airman Brown guiding the sergeant. As the vehicle took turns, Airman Brown constantly turned his map to keep the road on the map facing forward.

"The idea makes it kind of like a homemade GPS," he explained.

After about 10 minutes and several twists and turns in the road, the Humvees reached their destination and were ready for their final way point.

"There is a twist to this one," said Sergeant Poole pointing to a road on the map. "This road doesn't go through all the way anymore."

He explained "ghost roads" such as this make vehicle navigation tricky and can throw everything off. Many times on maps, there are roads that aren't on the map but are there in actuality and vice-versa.

Once again, the vehicles headed off for the final leg of their training. They took a couple more twist and turns and finally turned onto a gravel road with a gazebo and picnic area overhead.

"It looks like this gazebo might be our way point," said Airman Brown.

Reaching the gazebo, the 682nd ASOS Airmen completed the course and the evaluations.

This was a basic skill sets course that needs to be done every couple of months, even though most of them just came back from deployment, Sergeant Poole said.

"Coming back from a deployment, you think that you would be green on everything," he said. "But, the long list of task evaluations and training requirements that we are on require time frames, either on six-month or 12-months. So, even though we just come back from deployment, we still need to keep on track with our training requirements."

As a TACP member, Sergeant Poole also has to go through the training, but today he played the role of instructor which also helps him with these same skills.

"Training other personnel is a good way for us to keep up on our skills," he said. "It's a win-win situation. We brush up on our skills instructing others, and the Airmen that we're going through the courses with get to learn the field skills, navigation and small unit skills we teach them."