The 2006-07 season of Operation Deep Freeze has just concluded, and it “has been a record setting year,” said Lt. Gen. Chip Utterback, Joint Task Force-Support Forces Antarctica commander. Personnel from the active 62nd Airlift Wing and Air Force Reserve Command 446th AW, both based at McChord AFB, Wash., flew C-17s in 57 missions from New Zealand to McMurdo Station, Antarctica, carrying more than three million pounds of cargo and 2,700 passengers; then ferrying from McMurdo to New Zealand, more than 720,000 pounds of cargo and 2,600 passengers. It was the C-17’s first ODF appearance. Old timers from the New York Air National Guard’s 109th Airlift Wing flew their ski-equipped LC-130s for 430 missions, moving nearly 11 million pounds of cargo and 1,000 passengers throughout Antarctica.
In the wake of a major Chinese military shakeup, the head of U.S. Space Command warned of China’s “breathtakingly fast” advances in space during visits to Japan and South Korea. Gen. Stephen N. Whiting’s trip to the Indo-Pacific is his first overseas visit since taking command of SPACECOM in January.