Deployed Misawa Armament Airmen guarantee weapons release

  • Published
  • By Tech. Sgt. Phillip Butterfield
  • 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing Public Affairs
JOINT BASE BALAD, Iraq --  If the weapons don't leave the aircraft or the gun doesn't fire when the pilot pushes the button, mission failure has occurred. In order to keep this from happening a highly trained crew of Airmen from the 332nd Expeditionary Maintenance Squadron's Armament Flight toil daily to guarantee weapons release and mission success.

The Armament Flight at Joint Base Balad, Iraq, inspects and maintains the alternate mission equipment and ammunition loading systems, including the 20 mm cannons, missile launchers, bomb racks and the equipment used to load munitions to the aircraft, which allows the F-16 Fighting Falcons assigned here to perform their mission.

"Without the Armament flight, all AME and loading systems would have to be sent off station for repair and scheduled maintenance," said Master Sgt. Steven Anastos, 332 EMXS AF flight chief, a native of Phoenix, Ariz., deployed from Misawa Air Base, Japan. "This would negatively impact mission capability by reducing the types of missions that the F-16s could perform."