Aerospace Ground Equipment Management\u27s Impact on Home-Station Sortie Production

Since the Air Force began its evolution into an Expeditionary Air Force, much effort has been expended in attempt to optimize the compositions of each Air Expeditionary Force (AEF) and the manner in which an AEF deploys. Air Force plans were previously based upon deploying 24-ship Unit Type Codes (UTC), although a 12-ship deployment is more prevalent in today\u27s environment. In an effort to eliminate the anomalies between planned and actual deployment composition, the Air Staff directed in 2002 that all fighter UTCs be right-sized to reflect current, planned requirements (Headquarters United States Air Force, 2002), The directive stipulated the development of UTCs in a building block fashion so that a squadron would be poised to deploy one lead package of aircraft, with potential follow-on packages. This plan would make it possible for an entire UTC to be tasked to one organization, while allowing the unit to continue limited operations at home station (Headquarters United States Air Force, 2002). Given these deployment requirements, reduced numbers of Aircraft Ground Equipment (AGE) will remain to support the aircraft remaining at home-station. This research consists of a discrete event simulation to determine an effective manner in which to manage the remaining support equipment to maximize sortie production capabilities by varying the AGE management concepts, quantity of AGE remaining on-station, and the number of aircraft remaining on-station