A 40-Year Tale:

The 653rd Combat Logistics Support Squadron at Warner Robins Air Logistics Center, Robins AFB, Ga., has fallen prey to Air Force personnel reductions and will end its more than 40 years of worldwide battle damage repair activity beginning this summer and ending in September 2009, reports Holly Birchfield. Air Force Materiel Command decided to cut the CLSS at each logistics center, as part of its overall personnel reduction. Among numerous tales from its start as the 2955th CLSS in 1967, 653rd airmen were part of the team that literally dug a C-17 airlifter out of the sands of Afghanistan and repaired it enough for flight back to California.