Airmen deployed from Holloman AFB, N.M., finished building the Air Force’s largest deployable hangar at Bagram AB, Afghanistan, last week, reports Capt. Michael Meredith. A nine-person team from Holloman’s 49th Material Maintenance Group worked on the 225-foot by 70-foot hangar from Oct. 22 through Nov. 5. It will house three HH-60 Pave Hawk combat search and rescue helicopters instead of the normal one aircraft per hangar. MSgt. Samuel Tran, team leader, said, “This is basically two and half shelters grafted together, and this is the largest one like it in the Air Force.”
Gene Smith, Former POW and AFA Chair, Dies at 91
Jan. 19, 2026
Lt. Col. Richard “Gene” Smith, who overcame five and a half years as a prisoner of war in the notorious Hanoi Hilton from 1967 until 1973, died Jan. 16. He was one day short of his 91st birthday.
