Airlift effects

During the lead up to one of these missions, it was found that both 84WG and 86WG were duplicating some operational planning work and were independently reporting to the Commander Air Lift Group (ALG). “It turned out the two Wings were doing the right thing in responding to the requirement, but they hadn’t effectively liaised with each other,” GPCAPT Peter Wood, Officer Commanding 84WG and Director of the AMCC told us. “That was the catalyst to move forward with a lot of discussion about establishing a central tasking agency. So out of that was born the AMCC, the idea being that ALG and air mobility fixed wing in general has one central tasking agency.”

The concept was for a system where all tasks required of ALG, whether they be short notice humanitarian missions or long range exercise support requests, would be referred to the AMCC for fleet planning purposes. “The idea was that we have a central point with the appropriate subject matter experts to look at the various assets we’ve got and what they’re doing, to look at the effect that’s required, and to come up with the most effective and efficient asset to satisfy that task,” GPCAPT Wood continued. “We look at all the platforms we’ve got, at all the tasking that’s going on, and then receive instructions as to what is priority.”

Task prioritisation guidance comes from the Director General Air Operations (DG AIR) at RAAF Air Command, while DG AIR effectively receives his instructions down two reporting lines; from the Chief of Joint Operations at Headquarters Joint Operations Command (HQJOC) in Bungendore; and from the Chief of Air Force (CAF) for the RAAF’s daily ‘raise, train and sustain’ business.

The establishment of the AMCC also allowed ALG and its subordinate Wings to consolidate some headquarters functions and realise other efficiencies. “We didn’t create any new positions, in fact we saved some,” explained GPCAPT Wood. “We created it out of elements of HQ 84WG and HQ 86WG, and we made it as streamlined as possible – it’s actually quite a lot smaller than you would imagine.”

Structure

The AMCC is physically located at RAAF Richmond alongside the headquarters of ALG, and 84 and 86WGs. The centre itself resembles a small air operations centre – a large room with wall-mounted displays, and a few rows of computers.

Structurally, the AMCC comprises personnel with aircrew and loadmaster experience, as well as a civilian component as well. “The centre is basically split up into a timeline,” explained GPCAPT Wood. ”We’ve got a plans area which looks a long way ahead – anywhere from six weeks to 12 to 18 months. For example, we’ve known for a long time Pitch Black is going to happen this July, and there’s going to be movements of people and equipment up to Darwin, and we’ve agreed up front we’re going to provide X number of C-17 and C-130 hours.

For periods from four days to about six weeks out, humanitarian missions and other emergencies not withstanding, plans are transferred over to the operations area and they do all the detailed planning. And then between one and three days out, it’s transferred to our execution area to monitor the task being executed.”

Tying all the planning together is a mission support cell (MSC) which books crew accommodation, seeks all the required airport approvals, and books all fuel and other consumables associated with a task. “They do that to take a lot of the workload off the squadrons, and they then hand the squadron a package which shows where they’re staying, all the refuelling organised, etc. The MSC is a very important part of the organisation that provides a lot of essential control, and they have contacts all over the place and can very rapidly organise things all over the world. We don’t run 24/7 as we don’t have the manning and staff to do that, but we do have the capability to crank up for that if necessary when the next big crisis, whatever that is, may happen.

“In many ways, the AMCC is a subset of the overall AOC in Bungendore,” GPCAPT Wood added. “We provide their air mobility expertise, and we provide tasking and control of air mobility assets once it’s agreed what we’re going to do by the appropriate authority.”

Advice is provided to the AMCC on medium to long term aircraft availability out to a year ahead by the squadrons via the two Wings, and takes into account scheduled servicing and ongoing deployments, but is always subject to change due to maintenance periods being delayed or brought forward, or an unscheduled service or safety check is required. In these cases, AMCC will re-analyse its aircraft availability and priorities, and if necessary get guidance on what tasks get dropped off the list.

“It’s a very complex process that Air Command goes through on an annual basis to divide up the relevant ROE (rates of effort) for air mobility platforms amongst all the customers that are there,” GPCAPT Wood explained. “We might have agreed hours given to activities in good faith that happen to all fall on the same week, but then not have enough physical assets to do it, so we need a prioritisation decision made a fair way out. So the AMCC is about allocating airplanes to tasks, it’s not about generating the forces. It’s about, on this particular day we have

‘X’ number of assets available and ‘Y’ number of tasks.

“On a monthly basic DG AIR provides us with an air operations directive which prioritises effort to all FEGs (Force Element Groups). It will tell us what are our priorities for each month, and we task airplanes accordingly. But occasionally we’ll do all that long range planning, but then there’s a tsunami or a cyclone or something like that, so sometimes everything you’ve got planned goes straight out the window. We then have to quickly provide advice as to what we can provide to the operation coming up, and what effects that will have on other tasking that has already been agreed.

“We forecast based on logic and experience on what we expect to have available, but you can’t possibly think of every contingency. If we expect to have 10 C-130s available in three weeks time, we’ll plan on 10 and I’ll task 10. Fortunately, the great majority of tasks we do satisfy, but if we get there and we don’t have the 10, then something’s going to have to drop off, or if we’ve got more than 10, we might be able to offer something to someone who we’d previously told we couldn’t support, or we might have an extra trainer or something like that.”

“Occasionally we’ll do all that long range planning, but then there’s a tsunami or a cyclone or something like that, so sometimes everything you’ve got planned goes straight out the window.”

For a typical short notice task such as a regional humanitarian mission, the AMCC is involved very early on in the planning process. Notification of the event would initially go to HQ JOC for first response. Planning teams would be assembled and consultations would begin with other agencies while Government decides how it wants to respond. While the Air Operations Centre (AOC) at JOC will already have an idea of what the disposition of all airlift assets are, AMCC would have pre-emptively provided an update of that picture and what response options can be offered.

“For example, we might have one or two C-17s available at Amberley and a couple of crews, as well as X number of C-130s and crews at Richmond,” said GPCAPT Wood. “There are already written procedures in place as to what our response times are but we can often exceed that and respond earlier, so we’ll quickly give the AOC advice as to what our response options are and how quickly we can go. The AOC, in planning with JOC, gives that advice to government, and reasonably quickly a decision will be made as to how we’re going to respond, and a task will come out.”

Executive orders and instructions from the Chief of Defence Force (CDF) accompany the task, and from there discreet direct tasks are formulated. And, particularly with short notice humanitarian tasks, there are often many other agencies involved such as non-government organisations like Care Australia or the Red Cross, or Aero-Medical Evacuation (AME) may be required, or other ADF assets or people may be required to go, so there is much prioritising and planning to be done at the AOC level.

“If it’s something really big, we’ll look at detaching a couple of AMCC people down to JOC,” said GPCAPT Wood. “But with the communications facilities we have now, that may not be necessary. Certainly recent history has shown that, something might happen one evening, and we’ll have airplanes in the air the following day going to agreed places with agreed loads on them.”

From AMCC, the tasks go straight to the operating unit. The Wings are cut out of the tasking chain as they, on behalf of the Commander, have already generated the forces. The units have previously agreed to give AMCC the assets, and can be tasked in accordance with direction given from DG AIR.

AMCC also needs to be aware to only task aircraft to places they know they can go. For short notice operations in particular, they may have to get advice at the Wing level as what issues may be associated with going into an unfamiliar airstrip. “For example,” explained GPCAPT Wood, “What are the issues with taking a C-17 to Port Moresby like we had to for the flood relief in 2008. We’ve got a big load and the ideal platform, but what are the issues with going to this particular airfield. We have some expertise within the AMCC on that, but the real expertise lies within 86WG and the squadron, so we need to make sure we don’t commit to something the unit can’t do, and we haven’t already told very senior people in Canberra that we’re on the way.”

ALG and the AMCC are acutely aware that they can never have enough airlift, hence their desire to make their systems more efficient and effective. “No one’s got enough airlift, even the USAF who often uses contracted airlift,” explained GPCAPT Wood. “It’s always going to be a very much prioritised juggle, particularly when you’ve got a regularly deployed number of assets almost on the other side of the world – it limits even more the number of assets we’ve got here to do the business we need to do. And particularly when you’ve always got in the back of your mind that the next big thing that comes up the phone’s going to ring, and the way you get there fastest is by air mobility. So we’ve got to be able to respond at very short notice to any of those sorts of tasks that come up.”

Customer Relations

Consequently, part of AMCC’s job is customer relations, occasionally having to explain to a customer that, although they planned in good faith to have an aircraft, something else has come up and their requirement won’t be able to be met because of operational imperatives.

“When we cut a mission, we cut a promise at the same time,” stressed the Commander of ALG, AIRCDRE John Oddie. “When we cut a mission it can have big affects – it’s a more demanding and more complex customer environment than it was in the past, so our service has to be more assured. So rather than just focussing on what we can do, we’re focussing more on what we can provide to others.

“We’re working around the notion of air mobility being a service-centric approach rather than a traditional approach which is very aircraft-centric,” he added. “The old approach has got us to a point, but if we want to go to a next step of productivity and efficiency, we will need to drive a service-centric approach. This allows us to better match our aircraft to the effects we want to deliver. We then need to work out how to synchronise that with our terminal services and the various airfields we operate in and out of, and what are we going to do with other parts of the defence transport system.

“Around that is building our relationship with customers which is built around mutual understanding of concepts, of cost, and of benefits working together. If we can create that sense of mutual understanding, we can end up joining the whole value chain. This is all part of the ADF’s SRP (Strategic Reform Program) – and people get it!”

“What we need to get away from is someone coming up and asking for two C-130s,” GPCAPT Wood added. “We will ask them to tell us what effect they want and in what time, and we’ll look at all the various pieces of the puzzle and come back with how we think we can best meet that effect. Our customers will generally not be aware of all the competing priorities that are going on, and sometimes what we come up with may not make much intuitive sense to them. But we need to explain that this is the best asset we’ve got to achieve the effect they want in the time they want it.”

Future

As AIRCDRE Oddie suggests above, the establishment of the AMCC has, in many ways pre-empted many of the efficiencies the ADF as a whole is striving to achieve through its ambitious $20 billion SRP. It means using its few but highly capable assets smarter and more efficiently.

The planned annual flying hours for the RAAF’s aircraft are set well in advance, and sufficient crews and support personnel are in place to support these budgeted hours, so it is very difficult to just ramp up and maintain higher rates of effort (ROEs) for extended periods in order to meet customer requirements.

“Under our own reform program, what we have to do is look at our customers and what we’re moving,” AIRCDRE Oddie said. “What ALG is all about is – we fly important people and stuff to tough places on time – that’s our unofficial motto. That idea is about saying that we care about the people we’re moving, we recognise the place we’re going, and we’re committed to the quality in that service.

“As we get more efficient in what we’re doing, we wouldn’t look at dropping our ROE,” added GPCAPT Wood. “Rather, we’d more likely be looking at satisfying some more of the tasks that we’re not currently satisfying, unless a decision is made at a higher level to reap those as savings and drop our ROE in the future. We are really all about trying to make the most efficient use of whatever ROE we’re given.

“In the KC-30,we’ve got this phenomenal capability coming down the line and we haven’t had anything like it before, so we have to get to grips fairly rapidly as to how to most effectively and efficiently use an airplane that carries that many people and that much stuff, that far and that quickly. The C-17 introduction has already proven that, once people know it’s here and flying around, they want to be able to use it.”

“We were formerly a very C-130-centric organisation – the weight of airlift rode on the ‘Herc’s’ shoulders with just a few 707s and a couple of small squadrons of Caribous on the edges,” AIRCDRE Oddie continued. “Now we’re going into a world where we recognise the value of networking the way we see all the systems contributing. Apart from the C-17 and the King Air, all of our air lift assets now overlap each other in what they can do, so the challenge for us is to find each and exploit each system’s sweet spot.”