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Reader question: Does the 179th Airlift Wing of the Ohio Air National Guard still provide fire protection for Mansfield Lahm Regional Airport now that the unit no longer has a flying mission? I know there was a $13 million spent on a new base fire station a few years ago. If they still are, that’s great. If not, does the city have to provide service beyond mutual aid?
MANSFIELD — The huge C-130s are gone from the hangers and the flight line at Mansfield Lahm Regional Airport, being replaced by computers and other components as the 179th Airlift Wing transitions into a cyber warfare unit.
But the Ohio Air National Guard unit’s fire department remains on duty — and will do so for the foreseeable future.
That’s good news for the 179th, better news for airport operations and great news for the City of Mansfield, which depends on the unit for firefighting and crash/rescue efforts at the busy airport and elsewhere around a rapidly growing north side of the city.
“The firefighting unit will remain and construction of the new fire station will be completed,” 179th Airlift Wing Commander Col. Darren Hamilton told Richland Source this week during a meeting on the base with Col. Ken Kmetz, the wing vice commander, and fire Chief Wesley Blair.
Hamilton said construction of the new $13 million fire station is expected to be completed by the summer of 2023, “depending on materials.”
“That (fire station) was planned seven years ago and it will replace one of the oldest buildings on the base,” he said.
The 179th has maintained full-time firefighters at the airport since 1989, a presence worth about $3.4 million in annual salaries at this point.
The recent decision by the National Guard Bureau to keep two dozen full-time firefighters and a firefighting fleet valued at $3.3 million on duty at Lahm is music to the ears of Mansfield fire Chief Steve Strickling and Mike Moore, airport operation supervisor.
“It’s very important to us for a host of reasons,” Strickling said.
“First and foremost, as long as the (179th) keeps crash/fire and rescue capability for aircraft, it negates the need for the city to duplicate that effort,” the chief said. “They are handling airport firefighting operations for us.
“We would have to train about one-third of our personnel on fire crash rescue at a significant cost to the city,” the chief said.
Strickling points to the fact the MFD has no station close to the airport, which is the site of a growing industrial base.
He said the presence of the 179th firefighters — and an “automatic” mutual aid contract with the city — provides greater protection and lowers insurance costs for the businesses and companies in the area.
“We are not only six-plus minutes away, but we have railroad tracks that cut through the north end of the city that can delay our response,” Strickling said.
“It was going to be a significant blow to the city if we lost (the 179th firefighting capability),” the chief said.
Strickling, who had firefighters training with members of the 179th on Wednesday at Milliron Recycling, said the relationship with the military unit will become even stronger.
“Our plan is to train more with them and assist them with their training on structure fires,” the chief said.
Blair, whose full-time force of state employees is augmented by 26 part-time, i.e. drill-status, firefighters, said his department responded to 130 mutual aid requests last year and that tempo will only increase.
“We can be at these sites up here well before the city,” Blair said, standing near one of his unit’s newer vehicles, a 1,500-gallon Rosenbauer Panther AARF truck valued at around $700,000, which can rapidly apply the aqueous film forming foam crucial in fighting aircraft fires.
The 179th has five to seven firefighters on duty around the clock. The firefighters work schedules that provide for 24 hours on duty, 48 hours off.
If the 179th had been forced to close its firefighting efforts, it would have curtailed the capabilities of the airport without a significant and costly firefighting investment from the city, according to Moore.
For example, it’s likely the airport would have lost its FAA “Part 139 certification,” a huge blow to an airport that is rapidly growing in terms of activity.
“That would mean we would not able to accept commercial air service,” Moore said, including charter services that being visitors to the city. “We have to maintain a certain level of aircraft rescue and firefighting to keep that certification.”
Without that certification, such flights would have to land in places like Akron, Cleveland, Columbus or Youngstown.
“It would hinder what we could bring in,” Moore said.
Hamilton and Kmetz pointed to the difficulties experienced in Springfield, Ohio, when the decision was made to shut down firefighting efforts at Springfield-Beckley Municipal Airport when the 178th Fighter Wing lost its F-16 aircraft.
The city had to take over those operations and an effort may be underway to resume the OANG firefighting.
Kmetz, who began his career with the 179th as a firefighter in 1986, said, “I think the National Guard Bureau realized keeping the fire department here is a good thing for the community, the base and for the National Guard.”
