Mobility Airmen Transport Medics, Supplies in COVID-19 Fight

April 9, 2020 | BY Air Force Tech. Sgt. James Hodgman

Air Force Reserve mobility airmen from California answered an urgent request to deploy medical personnel to New York to help combat COVID-19.

Within a few hours of notification April 5, an aircrew from March Air Reserve Base took to the sky in a C-17 Globemaster III transport jet, bound for Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, New Jersey.

A crew from March's 452nd Air Mobility Wing departed with Air Force Reserve medics from the 940th Air Refueling Wing at Beale Air Force Base, the 349th AMW at Travis Air Force Base and the 452nd AMW at March.

''It's important to get our reservists out the door quickly to help combat the spread of COVID-19 and take care of Americans,'' said Brig. Gen. Stacey Scarisbrick, Air Force Reserve Command Force Generation Center commander.

Air Force Reserve Command mobilized more than 120 doctors and nurses, along with respiratory technicians, who were flown to New Jersey for further in-processing with the U.S. Northern Command's Joint Forces Land Component Command.

The medical professionals were slated for follow-on movement to New York City's Jacob K. Javits Convention Center, a 2,910-bed field hospital, which is one of the largest in the United States.

''California is stepping up to help our fellow Americans in New York and across the country who are being impacted the hardest right now by the COVID-19 pandemic,'' said California Gov. Gavin Newsom.

The governor announced April 6 that the state would loan 500 state-owned ventilators to the states most affected by COVID-19, starting with New York, which had more than 122,000 cases of the virus as of April 6.

Air Force Command Chief Master Sgt. Derek Crowder of the 60th Air Mobility Wing, said the country must come together to fight COVID-19 and that Travis Air Force Base is ready to help the nation in any way.

''It doesn't matter if you're an active-duty airman, civilian or a reservist — we are here to answer the call at a moment's notice,'' he said. ''We are in this together, and we will get through this together."

(Air Force Tech. Sgt. James Hodgman is assigned to the 60th Air Mobility Wing.)