thedrifter
03-10-07, 06:33 AM
The end of an era: Sun sets on the Moonlighters squadron
Published Sat, Mar 10, 2007
By LORI YOUNT
lyount@beaufortgazette.com
843-986-5531
The walls, stripped of polka dots, are now white, and the purposeful cacophony of Marines preparing jets for flight has dulled to a slightly melancholy hum inside the headquarters of the Moonlighters at Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort.
The squadron's dozen two-seater F/A-18 Hornet jets are gone, as are about half the Marines as Marine All-Weather Fighter Attack Squadron 332 prepares for deactivation at the end of the month, taking the air station down to six Hornet squadrons as the Corps spreads out its planes and people.
But especially to the Marines who call themselves Moonlighters, VMFA(AW)-332 isn't just any squadron -- it's a close-knit family that faced the rigors of Iraq and whose proficiency in performance there won it national recognition as a fighter squadron.
"The bond the Marines have is what makes us better than the rest," said Chief Warrant Officer Mario Valle, who heads up maintenance and has been with the squadron since May 2004. "When they chose us to be deactivated ... the Marines understood, but we don't feel it's fair they chose us. They voted us VMFA of the year."
At the end of 2005, base officials announced the squadron, which was commissioned in 1943 in Cherry Point, N.C., and has been stationed in Beaufort since 1993, would be decommissioned forever. But Marine officials later decided to place the squadron in "cadre status," a type of hold, until the new fighter jet, the Joint Strike Fighter, comes on line in about five years.
For now, almost two-thirds of current Moonlighters are transferring to different units in Beaufort, while the squadron lies in wait to rise up again with the new plane, when a new crop of aircraft crew and pilots will take over.
TO IRAQ AND BACK
Many Marines came to the Moonlighters to prepare for a seven-month deployment to Camp Al Asad, Iraq, from July 2005 to February 2006, just as Staff Sgt. Michael Casazzas did.
"Everyone came together at the right time," said Casazzas, who supervises checking all flight safety equipment. "It set the bar high -- extremely high."
The Moonlighters supported ground troops from the air and helped provide security for Iraq's western border and for historic public events, such as elections in December 2005. During the deployment, the Moonlighters flew more than 2,500 combat missions with more than 6,000 mishap-free flight hours and dropped more than 160,000 pounds of ordnance. Though pilots and weapons systems officers come back with the awesome airborne footage of bombings, they are quick to recognize the dozens more Marines stuck on the ground who make the flight possible. For every hour of flight, it takes almost 15 hours of maintenance and behind-the-scenes work, Casazzas said.
"We always had the jets we needed 24 hours a day," operations officer Maj. Dave "Frek" Phillippi said. "It was a phenomenal effort. We got the engine firing on all cylinders."
BACK TO REALITY
Squadron commanding officer Lt. Col. Samuel Kirby came to the Moonlighters in April with one mission -- to put them down.
"I walked into this squadron, and they were absolutely on a crest. They were extremely tight," he said, sitting behind his desk with his office door open because there is no longer enough noise outside to drown out conversation. "I knew I wasn't the CO with them in Iraq, and there's an intimacy because of that, but I had a mission. I told them that this isn't as glamorous a mission. I tried to foster and keep that tightness in Iraq but wanted to keep the mission" of shutting down the squadron.
Even with a mass exodus of squadron members after the holidays, Kirby said he's proud of how the remaining ones have stayed focused on the mundane details of accounting for and transferring people and equipment elsewhere.
During the last week of flight operations at the end of February, there were only 115 Moonlighters remaining out of the squadron's deployment strength of 240 Marines.
The Moonlighters no longer have any Hornets on their hands, but a jet decorated in Moonlighter lore remains as a spare at another Beaufort-based squadron for deactivation ceremonies. The markings include a ring of polka dots on the nose, a leftover from when the squadron's name was the "Polkadots" in the 1950s before changing to "Moonlighters" in the 1960s.
The rest of the Hornets have been taken to new homes in squadrons in Beaufort and nationwide, including two Kirby helped fly out to the West Coast last month, bringing an end to the squadron's flight missions.
FINAL DAYS
Military personnel are often transferred in and out of units, but moving on from the Moonlighters will be particularly difficult because of the unusually low amount of turnover since the news of deactivation in late 2005 and because of the bond formed among all, Valle said.
"I'm going to miss the Marines," he said. "For the last three years, you know the person from your left of you, to the right of you. Now you've got to earn the trust of others around them. It's very hard to gain that trust. We put lives on the line every day."
Weapons systems officers like Capt. Lindsay "Pants" Nelson are even more nervous. By the time the squadron re-activates in five to 10 years with the one-seater Joint Strike Fighter, she said she might be out of a job unless rumors of designing a model with a back seat come true.
"We'll miss being here, but it's for the overall good of the Marine Corps," she said of the squadron's deactivation. "We're kind of a smaller part of a bigger project."
Kirby said it was a relief to learn the Moonlighters weren't going to be dissolved but put on hold for a new aircraft.
"It's a nice thing to think about this squadron isn't gone forever," he said. "But these Marines' future lies with the other squadrons they go to."
But as Kirby knows, what goes around comes around. He was an A-6 Intruder pilot with the Moonlighters in Cherry Point for four years until 1993, when the squadron moved to Beaufort to become a Hornet squadron. The commanding officer who took the Moonlighters to Iraq before him, Lt. Col. David Wilbur, was a pilot with him at the time.
The squadron has already survived one deactivation decades ago when it stood down for almost seven years between World War II and the Korean War.
Kirby said he looks forward to reuniting with Moonlighters past and present the last weekend of March, which will be filled with banquets and golf tournaments, for the squadron's official transition to "cadre status" at 3:32 p.m. March 30. And he plans to be back when VMFA(AW)-332 is reactivated.
"If I'm not in the grave, I will be here," he said. "And maybe one of the captains we've got now can be commanding officer."
After all, the squadron still has work to do, Valle said. The Moonlighters are 1,000 mishap-free flight hours from setting a Corps record of 110,000 hours.
"Because there's not an end of the Moonlighters, we're not done," Valle said.
Ellie
Published Sat, Mar 10, 2007
By LORI YOUNT
lyount@beaufortgazette.com
843-986-5531
The walls, stripped of polka dots, are now white, and the purposeful cacophony of Marines preparing jets for flight has dulled to a slightly melancholy hum inside the headquarters of the Moonlighters at Marine Corps Air Station Beaufort.
The squadron's dozen two-seater F/A-18 Hornet jets are gone, as are about half the Marines as Marine All-Weather Fighter Attack Squadron 332 prepares for deactivation at the end of the month, taking the air station down to six Hornet squadrons as the Corps spreads out its planes and people.
But especially to the Marines who call themselves Moonlighters, VMFA(AW)-332 isn't just any squadron -- it's a close-knit family that faced the rigors of Iraq and whose proficiency in performance there won it national recognition as a fighter squadron.
"The bond the Marines have is what makes us better than the rest," said Chief Warrant Officer Mario Valle, who heads up maintenance and has been with the squadron since May 2004. "When they chose us to be deactivated ... the Marines understood, but we don't feel it's fair they chose us. They voted us VMFA of the year."
At the end of 2005, base officials announced the squadron, which was commissioned in 1943 in Cherry Point, N.C., and has been stationed in Beaufort since 1993, would be decommissioned forever. But Marine officials later decided to place the squadron in "cadre status," a type of hold, until the new fighter jet, the Joint Strike Fighter, comes on line in about five years.
For now, almost two-thirds of current Moonlighters are transferring to different units in Beaufort, while the squadron lies in wait to rise up again with the new plane, when a new crop of aircraft crew and pilots will take over.
TO IRAQ AND BACK
Many Marines came to the Moonlighters to prepare for a seven-month deployment to Camp Al Asad, Iraq, from July 2005 to February 2006, just as Staff Sgt. Michael Casazzas did.
"Everyone came together at the right time," said Casazzas, who supervises checking all flight safety equipment. "It set the bar high -- extremely high."
The Moonlighters supported ground troops from the air and helped provide security for Iraq's western border and for historic public events, such as elections in December 2005. During the deployment, the Moonlighters flew more than 2,500 combat missions with more than 6,000 mishap-free flight hours and dropped more than 160,000 pounds of ordnance. Though pilots and weapons systems officers come back with the awesome airborne footage of bombings, they are quick to recognize the dozens more Marines stuck on the ground who make the flight possible. For every hour of flight, it takes almost 15 hours of maintenance and behind-the-scenes work, Casazzas said.
"We always had the jets we needed 24 hours a day," operations officer Maj. Dave "Frek" Phillippi said. "It was a phenomenal effort. We got the engine firing on all cylinders."
BACK TO REALITY
Squadron commanding officer Lt. Col. Samuel Kirby came to the Moonlighters in April with one mission -- to put them down.
"I walked into this squadron, and they were absolutely on a crest. They were extremely tight," he said, sitting behind his desk with his office door open because there is no longer enough noise outside to drown out conversation. "I knew I wasn't the CO with them in Iraq, and there's an intimacy because of that, but I had a mission. I told them that this isn't as glamorous a mission. I tried to foster and keep that tightness in Iraq but wanted to keep the mission" of shutting down the squadron.
Even with a mass exodus of squadron members after the holidays, Kirby said he's proud of how the remaining ones have stayed focused on the mundane details of accounting for and transferring people and equipment elsewhere.
During the last week of flight operations at the end of February, there were only 115 Moonlighters remaining out of the squadron's deployment strength of 240 Marines.
The Moonlighters no longer have any Hornets on their hands, but a jet decorated in Moonlighter lore remains as a spare at another Beaufort-based squadron for deactivation ceremonies. The markings include a ring of polka dots on the nose, a leftover from when the squadron's name was the "Polkadots" in the 1950s before changing to "Moonlighters" in the 1960s.
The rest of the Hornets have been taken to new homes in squadrons in Beaufort and nationwide, including two Kirby helped fly out to the West Coast last month, bringing an end to the squadron's flight missions.
FINAL DAYS
Military personnel are often transferred in and out of units, but moving on from the Moonlighters will be particularly difficult because of the unusually low amount of turnover since the news of deactivation in late 2005 and because of the bond formed among all, Valle said.
"I'm going to miss the Marines," he said. "For the last three years, you know the person from your left of you, to the right of you. Now you've got to earn the trust of others around them. It's very hard to gain that trust. We put lives on the line every day."
Weapons systems officers like Capt. Lindsay "Pants" Nelson are even more nervous. By the time the squadron re-activates in five to 10 years with the one-seater Joint Strike Fighter, she said she might be out of a job unless rumors of designing a model with a back seat come true.
"We'll miss being here, but it's for the overall good of the Marine Corps," she said of the squadron's deactivation. "We're kind of a smaller part of a bigger project."
Kirby said it was a relief to learn the Moonlighters weren't going to be dissolved but put on hold for a new aircraft.
"It's a nice thing to think about this squadron isn't gone forever," he said. "But these Marines' future lies with the other squadrons they go to."
But as Kirby knows, what goes around comes around. He was an A-6 Intruder pilot with the Moonlighters in Cherry Point for four years until 1993, when the squadron moved to Beaufort to become a Hornet squadron. The commanding officer who took the Moonlighters to Iraq before him, Lt. Col. David Wilbur, was a pilot with him at the time.
The squadron has already survived one deactivation decades ago when it stood down for almost seven years between World War II and the Korean War.
Kirby said he looks forward to reuniting with Moonlighters past and present the last weekend of March, which will be filled with banquets and golf tournaments, for the squadron's official transition to "cadre status" at 3:32 p.m. March 30. And he plans to be back when VMFA(AW)-332 is reactivated.
"If I'm not in the grave, I will be here," he said. "And maybe one of the captains we've got now can be commanding officer."
After all, the squadron still has work to do, Valle said. The Moonlighters are 1,000 mishap-free flight hours from setting a Corps record of 110,000 hours.
"Because there's not an end of the Moonlighters, we're not done," Valle said.
Ellie