An official website of the United States government
Here's how you know
A .mil website belongs to an official U.S. Department of Defense organization in the United States.
A lock (lock ) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .mil website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Aviation Coordination Command draws down at Tyndall

  • Published
  • By Mary McHale
  • AFNORTH Public Affairs
TYNDALL AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. --  Operations at the Aviation Coordination Command established at the 601st Air and Space Operations Center to support the Deepwater Horizon cleanup efforts in the Gulf of Mexico have wrapped up, according to 601st AOC officials.

"We have drawn down operations completely as of today," said Lt. Col. Mark Gutcher, 601st AOC Combat Operations directorate chief of Requirements and Exercises. "Senior leadership decided there is no longer a need to continue manning the ACC as air operations over the oil spill are at a level to where our support is no longer needed."

Colonel Gutcher said the command was established to assist the Coast Guard with centralizing and ensuring safe and efficient air operations in the temporary flight restriction area established in the oil spill region. It was initially led by Coast Guard Capt. Mike Emerson, the ACC's first director.

"We were here to support the Coast Guard," said Colonel Gutcher, who assisted with setting up the ACC. "We helped track what was flying - both scheduled and unscheduled. We constantly pushed out a tremendous amount of real time information to the incident command posts - every pilot flying knew what they were going to see in the airspace they were flying in. They had tremendous situational awareness."

Manned by both military and civilian representatives, the aviation experts worked daily overseeing the operations of a variety of aircraft that included up to 135 flights on a daily basis - from fish and oil spotters to spray flights, oil platform helicopters and military aircraft.

According to Maj. Edward Keller, a 601st AOC strategy planner who worked on the operations assessment team for DWH at the ACC, a total of 4,942 flights were managed during the 57 days the ACC stood up for an average of 87 per day.

Colonel Gutcher said coordination and tracking of such a large variety of aircraft was the main challenge.

"We had government and non-government aircraft and a diverse group of pilots operating over the Gulf and our working relationship with the Coast Guard went very well."

"It was truly a total team effort," said Col. Randy Spear, 601st AOC commander. "Everyone came together committed to cooperation and safe, efficient mission accomplishment in the assigned airspace."

As the efforts went on here, Adm. (Ret.) Thad Allen, National Incident Commander, paid a visit to meet with the ACC and 601st members and also conducted a press conference.

Coast Guard Capt. James Sommer, who subsequently took over as ACC director, said Admiral Allen was very pleased with the "very deliberative processes of planning, scheduling and executing an air response the operation made possible."