A measure to modernize C-130 military aircraft in Ohio is headed for the President’s signature.

Staff report

WASHINGTON, D.C.

A measure to modernize C-130 military aircraft in Ohio, including at the Youngstown Air Reserve Station in Vienna, is headed for the President’s signature.

A provision U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, co-sponsored was included in the defense bill that passed the Senate late Friday. This provision would speed modernization of Ohio’s C-130 fleet and was included as part of the National Defense Authorization Act.

U.S. Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, also noted his co-sponsorship of an NDAA amendment that would allow the Air Force to use alternative programs and funding in addition to the Avionics Modernization Program to modernize the C-130 aircraft fleet.

The language included in the conference bill requires the Air Force to move forward with the AMP program while permitting the service to make near-term airspace compliance improvements.

The legislation supports jobs at the Youngstown Air Reserve Station and Mansfield Lahm Air National Guard Base by allowing the C-130 fleet to make upgrades to meet federal and international standards.

“The C-130 fleet is vital for our nation’s emergency preparedness and national security,” Brown said. “This provision will help ensure that the fleet has the resources it needs to make necessary upgrades and to keep these planes flying.”

Portman said: “I’m pleased this provision will now become law.

“We must ensure we keep these planes compliant with upcoming airspace changes, but we can’t lose sight of the very real needs the aircraft fleet has for more robust modernization. It’s important we keep the Air Force on track to ensure these planes in the Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve are mission capable for decades into the future.”

The C-130 fleet is the U.S. military’s primary combat delivery aircraft, and has provided humanitarian assistance, precision airdrop, and tactical airlift missions across the globe for more than four decades. Because of Federal Aviation Administration and international airspace regulatory constraints, the fleet will be largely inoperable unless major updates are made by 2020.

Last month, Brown toured the Youngstown station which, along with Mansfield, is home to Ohio’s Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard C-130 fleet.

Ohio is home to more than 3,000 Air reservists, and has six Air Force bases including Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Air National Guard bases at Mansfield, Columbus, Springfield and Toledo as well as Youngstown. Both the Air Force Research Lab and the Air Force Materiel Command are headquartered in Dayton at Wright- Patterson Air Force Base.

In May, Portman pressed the Senate Armed Services Committee in a letter on the need for this C-130 modernization and securing important language in the Senate NDAA to help the C-130 fleets located in Mansfield and Youngstown.

In October, Portman penned an op-ed in The Vindicator outlining the issues facing the C-130 fleet, including the following excerpt:

“The Air Force had a production-ready program to address many of [the aircraft’s] shortcomings. Unfortunately, similar to their fielding plan that leaves the Reserve and National Guard getting the short straw, the Air Force has been trying to cancel that upgrade program and only focus on the bare necessities for the aircraft — chiefly, making sure they have some of the tools necessary to fly in the national airspace that will be required in 2020.

“This plan is woefully inadequate to address the needs of the aircraft our airmen are flying every day and should not be the Band-Aid that allows us to put our head in the sand for another decade regarding the condition of our C-130 fleet as we call on our Reserve and National Guard Airmen to continue to put their lives on the line in old aircraft.,” Portman wrote.