Air Force communications personnel took a hard look at their operations and made changes that took “help me” response times from 30 minutes to around “instantaneous,” says Capt. Jeff Devine Jr., information systems flight commander for the 386th Expeditionary Communications Squadron. The unit pulled all their customer service centers into one location and installed an overhead electronic display—with numerous screens visible to all technicians—showing every critical comm system. The result, says Devine, is that comm sometimes shows up before the customer knows there’s a problem. And that, he explained, means the chance of shutting down air operations is very low.
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…
