19th Fighter Squadron runs at high tempo Published March 16, 2009 By Airman Jack Sanders 3rd Wing Public Affairs ELMENDORF AIR FORCE BASE, Alaska -- The 19th Fighter Squadron stays busy maintaining their high operations tempo with multiple of challenging assignments. It seems the 19th Fighter Squadron members have their hands in any nook and cranny they can squeeze them into. With all of the work they've been doing, they're quite busy. The 19th, which is comprised of only 24 aircraft -- all F-15 C models, is getting ready for a large number of operations. "We have participated in Red Flag Alaska last October, and we have another one coming up in April; we've got Northern Edge coming up in June," said Lt. Col. Scott Ward, the director of operations for the 19th Fighter Squadron. The 19th participated in Cobra Gold this past February. Cobra Gold is a cooperative engagement in Thailand with the Thai, Japanese, Indonesians, Singaporean, and US armed forces focused on maintaining and improving military relationships among the nations where they worked with the Thai military as well as the U.S. Marine Corps for the aerial portion of the exercise. The operation took two weeks with travel. Now that the 19th is starting to recuperate from Cobra Gold, they are getting ready for their next assignment Red Flag-Alaska taking place in April. While at Red Flag-Alaska, they will be flying offensive counter air and defensive counter air missions supporting the exercise. From getting ready to be in Red Flag-Alaska to ORE and sitting alert in the Combat Alert Cell, the 19th's Ops tempo is really moving. "Our ops tempo is extremely high. Our guys are busy all the time," said Ward. With all that they have going on Elmendorf's only F-15 squadron seems to be stretched. When there were two F-15C squadrons things tend to slow down a little more, said Ward. "With two squadrons you have a squadron that can generate while the other gets ready to go," he said. That's a luxury the 19th doesn't have. The squadron still makes time to participate in all of the Polar Force exercises though. The Polar Force exercises are operational readiness exercises, which are done in preparation for the operational readiness inspection occurring in June. "Our mission is to deploy and employ combat air power," said Ward. That's exactly what the 19th has been doing, and will continue to do.