Reserves pump up economy by $86M

Some 300 reservists from the air station were away from their families and jobs for a combined 13,804 days during 2002.
VIENNA -- The Youngstown Air Reserve Station, home to the 910th Airlift Wing and Naval and Marine Corps Reserve units, infused about $86 million into the local economy in 2002, up $13 million from 2001.
Some 2,000 airmen, sailors, Marine Reservists, civilians and contractors work at the Youngstown Air Reserve Station, according to the 910th's annual report.
Last year, about 300 men and women with specialties such as aircraft maintenance, security, transportation, civil engineering, intelligence, avionics, public affairs, culinary arts and supply deployed in support of military operations to places such as Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Turkey, Puerto Rico, Spain and many other countries.
The missions required the reservists to be away from their families and full-time jobs for a combined 13,804 days to support their active-duty Air Force counterparts as part of the Aerospace Expeditionary Force, 910th officials said.
Training
Air Force Reserve aircrew members flew nearly every day of the week, including training weekends aboard the 16 C-130H Hercules aircraft assigned to the 910th Airlift Wing.
Aircrew members practiced low-level flying operations and other types of flying training, including about 500 "touch and go sorties" for pilot proficiency training on the 9,000-foot runway shared with the Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport, and 1,500 practice landings on the 3,500-foot assault landing strip owned by the 910th.
The Youngstown-Warren Regional Airport is the training location, not only for the 910th Airlift Wing C-130s, but other non-Youngstown-based military C-130 cargo planes and KC-135 air refueling planes from Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard units from across the United States.
Officials said the regional airport is particularly well suited as a military training area because of the recent $40 million airport improvement project, which provides an airfield adequate to meet the demands of the 910th fleet and the other types of aviation activity.
Also, the airspace is not congested and readily available for military air operations.
Missions
Training missions of the 910th included joint operations with Army, Navy and Marine Corps paratroopers.
In addition, the 910th participated in mosquito and sand flea aerial spraying missions in the southeastern United States to control disease.
During 2002, 910th C-130 crews completed about 2,600 flying missions (5,833 flying hours) and transported 1,659,578 pounds of cargo and 9,853 personnel to places all over the world.
In addition to regularly scheduled training missions, the men and women of the 910th responded to the terrorist attacks of 9/11 by flying homeland defense missions in support of Operation Noble Eagle and with the activation of 75 members of the 910th Security Forces Squadron.
Also, 12 reservists out of the seven full-timers and 182 reservists assigned to the Naval Reserve Center were mobilized in support of Operations Enduring Freedom and Noble Eagle.
Ten if the 12 were deployed to the Persian Gulf region and two were assigned homeland security duties.