Test Wing leaps 'Back in the Saddle' with focus on safety, teamwork, fitness

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  • By Laura Mowry
  • Staff Writer
Members of the 412th Test Wing started the new year off with a focus on safety, teamwork and fitness at the wing's annual "Back in the Saddle" event Jan. 3.

Briefings highlighted the importance of working as a team, recognizing human limitations and resiliency, as well as identifying and mitigating risk while carrying out the flight test mission of delivering capabilities to the warfighter.

In the spirit of football legend Vince Lombardi, the 412th Test Wing gathered together as a team and got back to the basics.

"Every year, Vince Lombardi, head coach of the Green Bay Packers would start the year with the big picture and get his team back to the basics," said Lt. Col. Todd Ericson, chief of safety, Air Force Flight Test Center.

"He would say, gentleman this is a football."

"That's exactly what we did. We got back to the basics of flight test and the basics of our business," Ericson said.

With the start of a new year, Back in the Saddle provided an opportunity for the squadrons and Combined Test Forces of the center to focus on safety before resuming the flight test mission.

Back in the Saddle 2012 recognized that the human element is involved in every aspect of the flight test mission and that the human error rate is the most variable part of the test mission, yet also the most resilient and adaptable.

The briefings focused on mitigating the human element and factors associated with system design and the overall test mission.

"We all exist here to execute the flight test mission. Risk is a fundamental basic to us in the flight test community," Ericson said. "We take on that risk, accomplish the mission, and accept risk that we don't want to pass on to the operational community."

This year's Back in the Saddle event aimed to increase mission success in 2012, while decreasing the chances of error that result in a mishap.

A top priority of the briefings was highlighting the importance of risk identification.

"Risk identification is most important. If you fail to identify risk, you're unable to mitigate it," said Col. Dawn M. Dunlop, commander, 412th TW.

Dunlop reiterated the importance of learning from the past as the 412th Test Wing prepares for another successful year of flight test.

"I ask you as we move forward to take a look at historical lessons learned. Watch your assumptions and do not just use what has worked previously," Dunlop said.

"We cannot become so focused on the test requirements and mitigating those risks that the secondary, tertiary risks become very significant risks that we have not thought about."

The briefings reminded wing members that risk is not only the probability that something will happen, but also the severity of the consequences should it come true. Everyone was reminded of the importance of designing safety and test plans with options to mitigate the consequences.

Rather than following the tradition and including guest speaker presentations, throughout the day, members of the 412th Test Wing listened to briefings and stories from AFFTC squadrons and CTFs detailing lessons learned from various ongoing projects.

"We had several briefings on what we like to call near-misses. These are events that resulted from human error or oversight that could have resulted in a mishap, but didn't," said Lt. Col. Ericson.

"It's easy to talk about the near-misses because nothing resulted from them and by highlighting them, the Air Force Flight Test Center Safety Office aims to prevent others from making similar mistakes and thus preventing a future accident."

Brig. Gen. Robert C. Nolan II, commander, Air Force Flight Test Center was also in attendance and put the briefings into perspective.

"You are the most important resource at the Air Force Flight Test Center. You are what keep our mission moving forward and you are what will influence the future of the United States Air Force," Nolan said.

Nolan emphasized the importance of safety, giving everyone the goal of arriving safely to the next Back in the Saddle event, scheduled for 2013.

The culmination of the Back in the Saddle event was the two-mile run on the historic Edwards flightline.

"Today was a huge message from Test Wing Commander," said Chief Master Sgt. Chris McCollor, command chief, 412th Test Wing. "Today was all about safety, wingmen, and being together as a team."