“AGE”-ing facility receives much needed upgrades

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Ned T. Johnston
  • 6th Air Mobility Wing Public Affairs
MACDILL AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. --  Maintenance professionals at aerospace ground equipment, or "AGE" for short, maintain and repair equipment that supplies electricity, hydraulic pressure and air pressure to MacDill's KC-135 Stratotankers. Throughout 75 years of dedicated excellence, the AGE maintainers have overcome and adapted to the challenge of changing missions and aircraft. One thing that hasn't changed; however, is their "AGE"-ing facility.

These "go-getters" have endured for decades without proper cover for many of their outdoor work areas and equipment, and a lack of air conditioning in their office building. Fortunately, they recently received a much deserved facelift to their facility.

A ribbon cutting ceremony was held Feb. 11, 2016, to celebrate the official completion of three "quality of life" improvement projects for AGE.

"The upgrades to the facility begin with the installation of an air conditioning system in the main maintenance bay," said Tech. Sgt. Nicholas Olcott, the AGE production support section NCO in charge with the 6th Maintenance Squadron. "Oftentimes in the summer, temperatures inside the building would actually be higher than the outside ambient temperature."

This caused an increase in prescribed work/rest cycles that would require personnel to completely leave the maintenance bay just to cool off from the heat.

"I mean when you think about something like that; the impact of having the air conditioning and ventilation system is actually very drastic," said Olcott. "We were able to cut back on our work/rest cycles. These guys don't have to necessarily put all their tools away and secure the building just to take their 15 minute breaks now."

Secondly, an overhang was constructed on the flightline side of the facility.

"A large amount of our workload involves troubleshooting and testing powered AGE systems outdoors," said Olcott. "This overhang works two fold; in that we protect various pieces of test equipment that were previously exposed to the elements, and we afford our technicians the ability to mitigate sun exposure."

One of MacDill's AGE specialists, Senior Airman Jonathan Lee, shared his thoughts on the overhang.

"Sometimes some of our bigger systems are too big to fit inside in the shop," said Lee. "Now, we can just bring them under the overhang and work on them in the shade. We're getting our mission done better, because we're not 'dying' in the heat. At least, now, we're comfortable while we're trying to do our work. I think that's the biggest part for me."

Lastly, a covered shelter with overhead lighting was installed over AGE's wash rack.

"Washing our equipment is a keystone in corrosion prevention," said Olcott. "Pressure washing removes the salt that forms on our equipment from the atmosphere, because we are surrounded by water. Tampa is a peninsula on a peninsula on a peninsula."

A majority of AGE's maintenance efforts are devoted to corrosion control. With the lighting, they'll be able to work around the clock to accomplish equipment washes, which before was a two-shift operation.

"So we're talking about safety increases, efficiency increases and comfort increases," said Olcott. "When you're a comfortable worker, you're a happy worker, and you're a more productive worker. It's still early on, but we're already seeing the results from the upgrades. We're better because of them, and we're only going up from here."