Reflections on the team spirit that fuels the Air Force

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Old guys like me like to tell “war stories” about their military service, stories you never heard about on the news; I am no different.

Like hundreds of thousands of military members, in 1976 I was chosen to serve a one-year “remote” tour of duty—that means that you don’t take your family with you, only your uniforms and very few personal items. 

Located 200 miles west of Elmendorf Air Force Base (aka the Fort) in Anchorage, Alaska, Sparrevohn Air Force Station defined “remote.” There was no commercial radio, television, or daily newspapers, very few visitors, and there are no towns nearby. About 65 men called this place home for a year.

There was a lower camp with a gravel runway, large power plant and warehouse to store needed supplies. The top camp housed the radars that monitored the skies for incoming enemy aircraft.

This site and many others like it are gone now, replaced by newer, less labor-intensive technologies.

It was the Christmas season, and the Alaskan weather had prevented any aircraft from landing for nearly two weeks. So we hadn’t got any mail or supplies; nothing came in and nothing went out.

So here it was Christmas Eve; everyone was down in the dumps, but we all got together for an impromptu party at the little club. Well, one drink led to another and soon it was getting late and off to our rooms we went: no Santa and no reindeer.

“Doc” was the site medic, and I didn’t notice him at the party; he didn’t drink but he always hung out with the rest of the guys. Much like the paramedics of today, this guy was connected to the hospital at the Fort and could get his medical orders from the doctor on duty at any hour of the day or night.

My phone rang about 6 a.m. on Christmas morning, waking me out of a sound sleep. One of my duties was the airfield manager, so I shook my head to clear it up a little bit and answered the phone.

It was the operations center, and the guy on the other end told me to get the airfield ready because a C-130 would be landing as soon as we were ready to pick up a guy who had a severe medical emergency.

So now I realized where the Doc had been the night before; he had been tending a very sick man whose gall stones had broken and were causing him some excruciating pain.

He needed to be taken to the Fort for an emergency operation as soon as possible.

The cooks were busy preparing our Christmas spread and when they heard what was going on, they quickly put together a breakfast and several thermoses of coffee for the bulldozer operators who were clearing snow and ice from the runway.

Our commander and first sergeant sprang into action and got on the phone to the Fort: Could they bring some mail with them? After some haggling with the rescue aircraft operations center, our commander contacted the Rescue Squadron commander and when he heard our story, he gave the order to bring several pallets of waiting cargo including our mail out with them. 

This wasn’t how things usually worked; regulations stipulated that rescue planes didn’t haul freight. This meant that several people who had counted on having Christmas day off were now pressed into service to help some fellow airmen on a remote site. 

Several hours later, the runway was finally ready, the aircraft landed. The back door opened, and we offloaded several pallets of mail, packages, and cargo.

Over 20 years, I had eaten Christmas and Thanksgiving dinners in many chow halls around the world, but this one was very special. The air crew joined us, and as we all ate, the commander thanked them profusely for bringing us the mail and we all gave them a big hand.

The poor mail clerk was swamped; a few good men were recruited to help him sort all the mail, and in short order the guys were opening weeks-old letters, and stale home-baked goodies were being passed out on both lower and upper camps. 

The military has many rules and regulations, but this time senior leadership seemed willing to be flexible and allow freight to be put on a rescue aircraft. This was the kind of spirit that made me proud to be in the Air Force; it was one huge team, no one forgot we were out here, and they would pull out all the stops to take care of us if we got sick so far from civilization.

Ron Fink writes to the Sun from Lompoc. Send a letter for publication to letters@santamariasun.com.

This article appears in May 29 – Jun 8, 2025.