Calling him an “ordinary airman” who stepped up “to make a difference,” Lt. Gen. Norman Seip, 12th Air Force boss, presented the Airman’s Medal last week to Maj. Trace Steyaert at Ellsworth AFB, S.D. On June 10, 2007, Steyaert had rescued a swimmer caught in a rip tide and unable to swim back to shore at Thinker’s Beach near Monrovia, Liberia, where the major had deployed to support a US Army unit. Steyaert is with the 28th Logistics Readiness Squadron at Ellsworth. (Ellsworth report by A1C Abigail Klein)
The use of a military counter-drone laser on the southwest border this week—which prompted the Federal Aviation Administration to abruptly close the airspace over El Paso, Texas—will be a “case study” on the complex web of authorities needed to employ such weapons near civilian areas and the consequences of agencies…

