Airmen set up staging facility in Bulgaria

  • Published
  • By 2nd Lt. Tracy Giles
  • 86th Airlift Wing Public Affairs
PLOVDIV, Bulgaria (AFPN) --  Airmen from the 86th Aeromedical Evacuation Squadron set up an active mobile aeromedical staging facility here for Exercise Cooperative Key 2003.

The squadron is one of four in the Air Force capable of the task.

“Some of us have prior real-world (staging facility) experience in (operations) Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom, but most of us are experiencing this for the first time,” said Capt. Lisa Ciesko, the facility’s team chief.

The “patients” for the exercise are primarily active-duty Bulgarian military servicemembers, and evacuation aircraft are flown by the Lithuanians and Bulgarians.

Servicemembers from Moldova, Canada and the U.S. Air Force Reserve also supported the facility.

“It’s challenging because not every country does things the same way we do,” Ciesko said. “Exercises like (this) help us learn how to work together with foreign countries and develop a greater understanding.”

The staging facility is a forward-deployed basic medical facility housed in a small, three-section tent. It is used to treat battlefield patients before they are evacuated by air to a larger hospital with more capabilities, she said.

“I deployed with a (facility team) out of Pope Air Force Base, N.C., to Pakistan during Operation Enduring Freedom,” said Staff Sgt. Marc Nelson, medical technician for the facility.

Facility workers both in Pakistan and here were able to set up communication with air evacuation command and control officials and start accepting patients within 30 minutes of hitting the ground, he said.

“I love this work,” Nelson said. “It’s getting into the nitty-gritty and down in the dirt near the action. We get to work closely with the aircraft and load patients.”

He said his team will be “100-percent more prepared” if it comes down to setting up a real-world facility in the future.

Exercise Cooperative Key 2003 is based on a fictitious scenario in which NATO and partner-nation air forces deploy about 1,700 servicemembers and more than 70 aircraft in a multinational task force to support humanitarian operations.