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AES tests mettle during quarterly skills challenge

By Lisa Terry McKeown, Editor / Published July 27, 2006

Members of Team 3 push their limits to bring their patient back to the squadron after their ruck march. All of the teams battled the heat and each other?s times to complete the squadron challenge?s events. (U.S. Air Force photo/Lisa Terry McKeown)
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Members of Team 3 push their limits to bring their patient back to the squadron after their ruck march. All of the teams battled the heat and each other?s times to complete the squadron challenge?s events. (U.S. Air Force photo/Lisa Terry McKeown)

Team 2 completes their load-in with securing four patients into a C-130. Each team had to overcome the same scenario and load the same patients at the C-130 Mock. (U.S. Air Force photo/Lisa Terry McKeown)
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Team 2 completes their load-in with securing four patients into a C-130. Each team had to overcome the same scenario and load the same patients at the C-130 Mock. (U.S. Air Force photo/Lisa Terry McKeown)

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POPE AIR FORCE BASE, N.C. -- It's a challenge the 43rd Aeromedical Evacuations Squadron commander Col. Judith Schaffer puts to her Airmen once a quarter and every quarter her squadron proves they have what it takes.

The 43rd AES Challenge is a chance for the Airmen to put their skills to the test. The events are different every quarter and sometimes the events help to choose who will be chosen to represent the squadron at the Air
Force Rodeo.

July 14, three teams went head to head in three separate events. Each seven-member team consisted of an AES medical crew, a communications specialist and a medical service corps officer. They had to load an aircraft under tight time constraints; make it through a timed ruck march with equipment and a patient; and keep a jerry can filled with water from
touching the ground while running the squadron's obstacle course.

The winning team received a two day pass from Colonel Schaffer. Not to go unacknowledged for their hard work despite the heat, the colonel also gave one day passes to the two other teams.

The members of the winning team were: Capt. Kerry Barshinger, Capt. Sharon Frazier, Capt. Keith Vollenweider, Staff Sgt. Kristina Aponte, and Senior Airmen Wesley Williamson, Nikolaus Falcon and Christianna Nowell.