VANCE AIR FORCE BASE — When severe weather is on the horizon, Team Vance jumps into action to develop a contingency plan for evacuating all aircraft to safer locations.

1st Lt. Anne-Marie Czyznik, an instructor pilot in the 3rd Flying Training Squadron at Vance is from Dayton and organized Team Vance participation.

Enid News & Eagle

The 26 members of Undergraduate Pilot Training Class 22-02 at Vance Air Force Base received their wings Nov. 5 at their graduation ceremony in the base auditorium.

Events this week are focused on thanking and supporting veterans and their families. The city of Enid declared Nov. 9 to be POW and MIA Day in Enid.

Those in attendance at Operation Yellow Ribbon's ribbon-tying ceremony were asked — nay, challenged — to show their support for America’s combat veterans, service members and first responders by tying yellow strands of ribbon throughout town — on cars, utility poles, trees, fences, storefronts and the like.

ENID, Okla. — Salvation Army of Enid is seeking sponsors for its Spruce Up a Life program to help brighten Christmas for families in need.

ENID, Okla. — Nominations for the 2021 Pillar of the Plains award are open for submission.

FAIRCHILD AIR FORCE BASE, Wash. — Flight suits are made different — just like the airmen who wear them.

While Team Vance may best be known for training student pilots, an airman in a flight suit rarely is the first person a civilian meets when they enter the base for the first time.

Fifteen new pilots received their wings Oct. 8 at Class 22-01 graduated at Vance Air Force Base.

A Vance Air Force T-6A Texan II will be inspected before it is returned to service after being involved in an incident Thursday.

Each year, instructor pilots from the pilot-training bases gather for flying competition, leadership seminars and lots and lots of team building.

ENID, Okla. — In August 1980, when Sandi Ott travelled to her first active-duty assignment, she drove into Northwest Oklahoma wondering where all of the trees were, much less where Enid was.

Nick Vance Matthews visited Vance Air Force Base for the first time to attend the base’s 80th anniversary celebration Sept. 17.

Nineteen members of Class 21-15 AU received their wings Sept. 17, 2021, during their graduation ceremony in the Vance Air Force Base auditorium.

Class 21-15 was the first group of students to graduate from the Accelerated Path to Wings (XPW) program at Vance.

Smiling families, community members and Air Force personnel gathered at Enid Woodring Regional Airport on Friday evening to join Vance Air Force Base in celebration of its 80th anniversary.

Maj. Floyd E. Welsh, as property officer, had the responsibility of evaluating property no longer needed by the military. An Enid Army Flying Field folder crossed his desk as one of the installations considered for permanent closure due to the decreased need for pilots. Welsh put the folder in his desk drawer where it remained for two years, according to Oklahoma Historical Society.

As a kid, I would run barefoot around the house with my digital camera shooting photos of my three dogs — the best models in the family.

Team Vance Airmen held a 24-hour vigil to honor prisoners of war and those service members still missing in action Sept. 1-2 in recognition of POW/MIA Remembrance Day.

In 1995, Vance Air Force Base faced permanent closure, but the residents of Enid kept that from happening.

❝All of those C-17 missions you saw coming out of Afghanistan, one-third of those people came out of Vance Air Force Base. We are doing absolutely incredible things to make sure we keep our advantage on the world stage. We are working hard to do that every day.❞ — Col. Jay A. Johnson, 71st Flying Training Wing commander at Vance AFB  

❝I saw the smoke from my school building.❞ — Senior Airman Nicholas Figueroa, 71st Security Forces Squadron (SFS) member at Vance Air Force Base. He was 9 years old living in Manhattan when the Twin Towers fell.

Col. Eileen Collins graduated Undergraduate Pilot Training at Vance in 1978. She was one of the first four women to go through the program and was the first female T-38 instructor pilot, according to a March 2021 interview between Collins and Taylor Watson with the Daedalians, a fellowship of military aviators.

To provide realism, audible “gunshots” may be heard twice Thursday in the Med Group — at approximately 7:10 a.m. and again at 1:30 p.m.

Twenty-four students received their wings Aug. 27 when Class 21-14 AU graduated from Undergraduate Pilot Training at Vance Air Force Base.

From the first class of aviation cadets that arrived at Enid Army Air Field on Dec. 16, 1941, to the classes today, Undergraduate Pilot Training has seen changes to aircraft, simulators, syllabus and more.

Three women at Vance Air Force Base have embraced that equality, overcome adversity and achieved the highest enlisted rank — chief master sergeant.

❝That farm was their livelihood, and Ernest, as patriotic as he was, knew that selling it to the Army would mean ending the family tradition of running that farm.❞ — Chief Master Sgt. Kristy Earls, 71st FTW command chief

The airmen leading the charge on Undergraduate Pilot Training 2.5 for the 71st Flying Training Wing at Vance Air Force Base shared their success and challenges with more than 100 airmen, Guardians and soldiers during a summit hosted by the AFWERX Las Vegas Hub, June 22-25.

Maj. Steven Hatcher retired from active duty during a ceremony held at 1 p.m., Friday, July 23, in the 3rd Flying Training Squadron auditorium at Vance Air Force Base.

Vance Spouses' Club is putting out a vendor call for its Holiday Marketplace, as the annual event returns to Chisholm Trail Expo Center Nov. 13 following a virtual run due to COVID-19 in 2020.

Gone were the days of gazing skyward or smelling the air. I was trained to think of the atmosphere as a fluid, with flows and eddies comparable to the ocean. 

LITTLE ROCK AIR FORCE BASE, Ark. — The 314th Airlift Wing hosted three first assignment instructor pilots (FAIPs) from Vance Air Force Base at Little Rock Air Force Base June 22 to highlight and share a new way forward in the pilot training process, which ultimately bridges the gap between Undergraduate Pilot Training (UPT) and the Formal Training Unit (FTU) at the 314th AW.

Vance Air Force Base is requiring everyone to wear masks indoors, following rules set out in a Department of Defense directive.

Last month, Lt. Col. Kenyatta Ruffin, past 71st Operations Support Squadron commander, helped honor his childhood role model, retired Brig. Gen. Charles E. McGee, one of the original Tuskegee Airmen.

Master Sgt. Angela Dewberry retired from active duty during a ceremony held June 29, in the Greven Crosswinds Club at Vance Air Force Base.

ENID, Okla. — Repair or replacement of aging dormitories at Vance Air Force Base is among the provisions authored by U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe and included in the fiscal year 2022 National Defense Authorization Act.

Col. Paul Miller assumed command of the 71st Mission Support Group from Col. Anthony Smith in a ceremony July 1 in Hangar 129.

Chaplain (Maj.) David Dziolek retired from active duty during a ceremony held June 4 in the Greven Crosswinds Club, at Vance Air Force Base.

Eighteen civic leaders from Air Mobility Command, Scott Air Force Base, Illinois, visited Vance Air Force Base on June 16-18.

❝I grew up here in Enid, watching T-37s and T-6s fly, and it was always something that I thought was very cool, but never seemed realistic ... but I fell in love with it.❞ — 2nd Lt. Bartolozzi

Legislation has been introduced in Congress to provide $10 billion to help clean up contamination at the so-called “Filthy Fifty” military bases across the country.

Usually I write about our superstar pilots in the skies, but for a day, I got to live the life of one.