176th Wing flies last Pave Hawk mission, fully transitions to Jolly Green

  • Published
  • By David Bedard
  • Alaska National Guard Public Affairs
JOINT BASE ELMENDORF-RICHARDSON, Alaska --  Airmen of the 210th Rescue Squadron flew the final training mission July 8 out of JBER for the unit’s last remaining operational HH-60G Pave Hawk combat search and rescue helicopter, signifying the squadron’s complete transition to the HH-60W Jolly Green II.

Capt. Erin Phillips, 210th RQS HH-60W pilot, said the new “Whiskey” is more lethal than the “Golf,” incorporating a suite of upgrades including Link 16, a jam-resistant datalink that allows the HH-60W crew to send digital information to other aircraft and military platforms across the joint force.

“It has an all-glass cockpit now,” Phillips said. “It has Link 16 instead of the legacy Situational Awareness Data Link, which gives us a lot more situational awareness during combat operations or large-force exercises.”

With the critical mission of rescuing downed pilots and other allied personnel isolated behind enemy lines, the Whiskey integrates better defenses and improved capabilities to search for isolated personnel.

“Our radar-warning receiver has been updated, and our [infrared heat-seeking] missile threat-warning system has been updated,” Phillips said. “We have a new high-definition electro-optical infrared camera that does daylight and low-light TV, whereas on the Golf, we had a low-definition, infrared camera only with no daylight and no low light.”

Also improved is flight performance.

“The Whiskey uses a wider cord blade – so a wider airfoil for the four main rotor blades, which increases climb performance, increases turn performance and increases hover performance for us,” Phillips said. So, we have a little bit better hover performance for high-altitude environments. We can climb better, and we can turn sharper than we could in the Golf.”

The pilot and enlisted special mission aviator transition didn’t happen overnight. Phillips said he and fellow pilot Lt. Col. Kevin Kelly as well as special mission aviators Master Sgt. Zach Little, Tech. Sgt. Cody Usher, and Tech. Sgt. Matthew McDonough composed the squadron cadre who completed the Type 1 Course. The foundational training at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico, included a week of academics, four simulator rides around a virtual facsimile of Southcentral Alaska, and culminated in training with the Whiskey manufacturer out of JBER.

“Crews returned back here to Elmendorf for four flights with Sikorsky instructors mostly focused on the differences between the Golf and the Whiskey as well as just emergency procedures and instrument flying procedures, which are some of the big differences between the Golf and the Whiskey,” Phillips said. “We then moved into the mission qualification portion, which was all done locally with Air Force instructors here from the 210th that accomplished full qualifications in the Whiskey prior to the unit starting the transition. Lieutenant Colonel Kelly and I were the two primary instructors who were initially qualified. The transition syllabus included two daytime flights, one nighttime flight, and then a check ride making sure that you also got live gunnery and helicopter air to air refueling during those flights.”

The final July 8 mission capped thousands of man hours of work for Airmen of the 176th Maintenance Group who labored to keep the legacy Pave Hawk flying while setting the conditions for fielding the Jolly Green II.

Senior Master Sgt. John Stoddard, 176th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron HH-60 Lead Production superintendent, underlined the importance of maintaining CSAR sortie generation during the fleet modernization. Specifically, the maintainer talked about the civil search and rescue capability the wing provides to the state as well as rescue support to Alaska NORAD Region during intercepts of foreign aircraft incursions into Alaska airspace.

“Over the last 10 years, the HH-60G Pave Hawk served as the absolute lifeline of the Alaskan wilderness and a vital shield for North American defense,” Stoddard said. “We had to execute a flawless logistical balancing act. We could not simply halt operations because local civilian search and rescues in the unforgiving Alaskan wilderness and NORAD homeland defense alerts demanded constant, 24/7 readiness.” 

Stoddard said keeping both helicopters airworthy at the same time was a training and manning challenge.

“To prevent a sudden, catastrophic loss of maintenance expertise on either airframe, the 176th MXG implemented a phased ’staggered training pipeline.’” Stoddard said. “A select, highly experienced group of crew chiefs and avionics specialists, called the Vanguard Crews, were sent first to intensive conversion courses to master the HH-60W. Concurrently, another dedicated cohort, called the Legacy Keepers, remained entirely ‘locked down’ on the HH-60G fleet. By keeping these teams segregated, the wing prevented cross-contamination of maintenance focus, ensuring that mechanics working on the legacy platform weren't distracted by the new platform's tech, and vice versa.”

Stoddard said the Vanguard Crews earned their name by sharing their expertise.

“As the newly trained HH-60W specialists returned to JBER, they immediately began training the next wave of maintainers on-site, creating an organic, self-sustaining educational loop,” Stoddard said.

Stoddard said 176th MXG had to balance transition training with the mission during high operational tempo periods using a surge-based scheduling model.

“Maintenance bays were physically and operationally partitioned – one half of the house operated like a high-tech software lab calibrating the brand-new digital systems of the HH-60W, while the other half remained a rugged, traditional grease-and-wrench shop keeping the analog Golf airworthy,” Stoddard said. “During high-priority operations such as multi-day rescue missions, transition training was temporarily paused. Transitioning technicians were recalled bolstering the flightline, generating far over normal aircraft capacity to ensure both dual-rescue operations and homeland security requirements were fully met.” 

Stoddard said a significant challenge in keeping the Pave Hawk flying was the availability of repair parts because suppliers have moved onto supporting the new model.

“As an aircraft nears the end of its life cycle, the original equipment manufacturers stop producing spare parts, which is known in military logistics as diminishing manufacturing sources and material shortages,” he said. “For the HH-60G, vital structural components, specialized rotor head assemblies, and older analog avionics components are no longer in production. Additionally, Air Force depots gradually shift their tooling and personnel to focus on the newer HH-60W, leaving the legacy Golf units to solve their own parts shortages locally.”

Stoddard said 176th AMXS crew chiefs had to work closely with 176th Maintenance Squadron Non-Destructive Inspection, also known as NDI, Airmen to keep the old helicopters structurally sound.

“The HH-60G was originally designed with a limited life cycle,” Stoddard said. “Due to decades of heavy operational deployment, many of these aircraft have flown well past these limits. To prevent catastrophic structural failures, maintainers must perform constant NDI – using x-rays, ultrasound and eddy-current testing – to hunt for microscopic stress cracks in the airframe, tail booms and rotor spars.”

The Alaska environment also poses additional challenges with subzero temperatures and frequent maritime operations.

“In the harsh, salt-heavy and freezing coastal environment of Alaska, keeping corrosion at bay on aging aluminum and steel airframes requires relentless washing, scraping, treating and repainting,” Stoddard said.

The transition from a helicopter fielded in the 90s to the state-of-the-art Whiskey required adjustments for 176th MXG.

“The HH-60 was largely an analog helicopter,” Stoddard said. “Troubleshooting was highly mechanical, hands-on, and relied on physical tools and legacy schematics.

“The HH-60W is essentially a flying supercomputer,” he continued. “Its troubleshooting is less about tightening bolts and more about software diagnostics. Maintainers have had to adapt from using traditional multimeters to plugging in ruggedized laptops to decipher complex error codes and software faults. The integrated mission system, advanced radar and automated flight controls of the HH-60W mean that legacy avionics specialists are practically learning a brand-new career field on the fly.”

With the older model, maintainers built a bench stock, which kept high-demand parts on hand to promptly fix maintenance faults.
 
“With a legacy fleet, maintainers know exactly which parts break most often and have decades of built-up spares,” Stoddard explained. “With a new platform, the supply pipeline is in its infancy. Because the HH-60W is a new airframe, military logistics systems are still building data to predict which parts will fail under real-world, harsh Alaskan conditions.”

Diagnostics for the Whiskey are greatly streamlined, and solid-state electronics greatly simplify avionics.

“The HH-60W features an incredibly robust Integrated Vehicle Health Management System, which acts as an on-board flight data recorder and diagnostic brain constantly monitoring the health of the engines, rotors and gearboxes in real-time,” Stoddard said. “When the helicopter lands, maintainers simply download the diagnostic data. The system points directly to the exact sensor, bearing or wire that is out of tolerance virtually eliminating the guesswork of aircraft troubleshooting.

“Rather than wrestling with miles of complex, spliced wire bundles characteristic of the legacy Golf, the HH-60W uses modular avionics cards and standardized digital data buses,” Stoddard continued. “If a mission computer or communication system fails, technicians can frequently solve the issue by simply sliding out the bad module and plugging in a new one. Systems like the Forward Looking Infrared and target-tracking sensors are heavily integrated into the software, allowing for automatic, digital self-calibration rather than tedious, manual physical alignments on the cold flightline.” 

Stoddard underlined the magnitude of the modernization milestone.

“As the 176th Maintenance Group officially transitions to the advanced HH-60W Jolly Green II, they aren't just retiring a machine, they are closing the chapter on a legendary sentinel. Keeping these legacy Golf tails mission-ready for their final hours in the sub-zero Arctic was an extraordinary, human-powered engineering triumph.”