Airmen from the 36th Contingency Response Group at Andersen AFB, Guam, and sailors from the US Naval Base Guam will sail to Wake Island, where they will assess the damage to the island and airfield operations following Super Typhoon Ioke. Two C-17 airlifters from Hickam AFB, Hawaii, had airlifted to Hawaii all 188 people on the island before the storm hit. Wake Island commander, Air Force Capt. Nate Harris, said island personnel had prepared facilities “as best we could.”
The Air Force on March 12 awarded contract modifications worth a combined $2.4 billion to Boeing to procure an undisclosed number of E-7 Wedgetail as part of the program's engineering and manufacturing development phase and continue work on the airborne battle management aircraft’s radar.