Hawaii Wing questions

[Eclipse]

So I noticed that a CC in Maui won member of the year for PCR, which considering the size and
scope of some of the wings in PCR, that's saying something: 
http://www.mauinews.com/page/content.detail/id/560977/Commander-for-Maui-Composite-Squadron-earns-top-region-honor.html?nav=15

But that got me to wondering just how the heck HIWG is able to stay in touch and operate so far from CONUS.

Google says it's ~2500 miles from San Diego, which is the nearest spot(is) geographically to the islands.  A 172 has about 800 miles of range, and
a 182 about 1000 miles, not to mention this is an over water flight, so presumably we're not flying CAP planes to get there - that's got to run into a
fair amount of commercial flying every year, not to mention that a Group/Wing/Region CC is not likely to travel in either direction for an evening's
meeting, or even something that is planned for a single day.

How did the airplanes get there?  Boat?

How about inter-island commutes.  Are helicopters and little planes a way of life, or is it ferries and personal boats?

Considering my wing has people who won't drive 2 hours for something, I'm just honestly curious how HIWG is able to function.

[lordmonar]

There are only 9 squadrons/flights and most of them are on Oahu.

[Ned]

As a former PCR staffer, I can certainly say that both HIWG and AKWG represent geographical challenges.  I can't even imagine trying to do it before we had email and realtively cheap telephonic communications.

You are right that corporate aircraft do not routinely move between Hawaii and the mainland.  Such a thing requires either shipping them, or more commonly, fitting them with ferry tanks to extend their range.  Neither is a cheap or easy proposition.

But from a region standpoint, at least, staff coordination really isn't that much different.  Email reports are email reports; conference calls are conference calls whether the participants are in the same time zone or not.

Signifcant practical issues arise for things like cadet compeitions.  This year PCR did a "virtual drill competition" with simultaneous proctored written exams and the posting of the drill performance on YouTube for judging.  (This is the simplified version, there were a number of precautions taken to minimize gaming of the system.)

I'll let actual HIWG folks speak to inter-island transportation, but I understant that corporate aircraft play a signifcant role.  There are also commercial aircraft connections, of course.

PCR is a big place, and even the CONUS wings have to do a lot of travel to activities in their own states.  As a CAWG guy, it is not uncommon for us to have to drive 300-400 miles for things like NCO schools or encampments.  It's just how the big states roll, I guess.

I'm sure the SER has many of the identical issues concerning travel to/from and within Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands.

And coincidentally, the NCAC is currently working out the logistical issues of representing the overseas squadrons.

Turns out the world is a big place, too.

[Spaceman3750]

I still think we should strip ARCHER out of the airvans (when they die a natural death or get cannibalized anyways) and turn them into giant people movers. HIWG sounds like they could really benefit from one.

[sardak]

You can save yourself some swimming by leaving from places other than San Diego, even Reno-Honolulu is a shorter flight.

San Diego  Honolulu SAN-HNL - 2271 nm
Reno  RNO-HNL - 2235 nm
Los Angeles  LAX-HNL - 2221 nm
Santa Barbara  SBA-HNL - 2156 nm
San Francisco  SFO - HNL - 2084 nm

Source: http://www.gcmap.com/  which is a sweet site to experiment with flight distances.

Mike

[a2capt]

GA aircraft ferry flights typically launch from Oakland to make the trip to Oahu.

I'm going for encampment in a couple weeks, from the San Diego area, the commercial flight is a tad bit shorter from SFO than LAX, but of course, I have to spend an hour and a half over California to do that.

Such is the hub and spoke system of airlines.

[AlphaSigOU]

2446 statute miles (2125 nautical miles) from Kwajalein (PKWA) to Honolulu (PHNL). I'll be helping staff the Hawaii Wing encampment in about a couple of weeks.

[AirDX]

Well, we have electricity in our grass shacks now, so we stay in in touch by telephone and e-mail, just like everyone else.   

I'm the Wing/SE, and I talk to the region SE routinely... my cell has free nationwide long distance, just like yours probably does.  We also use text messages pretty successfully.  Same goes for between the islands.  The Wing/CC lives on Kauai, but we talk/text/e-mail as needed.  Probably no different than anyone else in the country in terms of staying in touch.

Our airplanes were ferried out here.  We got a new 182 a couple of years ago.  IIRC, we sent a guy (or two) to the factory to accept it, then fly it to California where it was fitted with ferry gear and a contract pilot flew it over the water to here.

As far as communications within the Wing, we use our state (and in the case of Kauai, county) funding to fly liaison flights for CAP business between the islands.  For example, we have a wing staff meeting on Saturday, and the Wing CC will fly over along with some other wing staff from Kauai; the wing Director of Communications is also a squadron/CC at Kona on the Big Island, he may fly over; Hilo or Maui may bring a plane with wing staff over as well.  We try to combine things where we can, bringing in a bird for a hundred-hour or annual inspection or any other needed work during the Wing staff meeting or another activity.

We just got a grant for a teleconference system which is installed at Wing HQ; that will be in use for those that want to dial into the meeting as well.

Mission-wise, during state-wide events, we use HF or VHF to communicate to the squadrons from Wing HQ, or cell phones/e-mail/text messages.  We found during a couple of actual events (the tsunami warning last year for example) that when the POTS and even voice calls on cell phones aren't going through, text messages still work great.  Finally, we have the option of putting up the airborne repeater.  We have spot about 50 NM SE of Honolulu that, when the highbird parks there at 10,000 feet, we find we can reach everywhere in the state, with the exception of Hilo, on the back side of the Big Island.

BTW, our geographic breakdown is as follows:

Oahu: 1 Wing HQ, 2 squadrons, 1 flight
Kauai: 1 Squadron
Maui: 2 Squadrons (Kahului and Kihei)
Big Island: 2 Squadrons (Hilo and Kona)

The Hawaii Air National Guard has been awesome in supporting our cadets.  Every month they load up cadets in a C-17 or KC-135 and bring them to Oahu for glider orientation flights.  Our glider is located at Dillingham airfield on the North Shore of Oahu.  HIANG brings the cadets over on Saturday morning, they fly the glider all day, then spend the night in the Wing HQ building, which is set up for temporary billeting.  Sunday the HIANG takes them home.  HIANG also brings cadets over for things like the color guard competition or last month's Wing awards banquet.  At the banquet I was seated with with HIANG commander BG Stan Osserman and State Deputy Adjutant General is BG Joseph Kim and his wife, they are first-rate supporters of our program.

MG Wong, the State Adjutant General, is good to us too - just wrote a letter to HQ making a case to get us a multi-engine aircraft, and he's got us two GIIEP units.  The State Civil Defense agency really liked the GIIEP images we got them of flooding on Kauai a couple of months ago... so cha-ching! keep the money coming.

Any other inter-island travel is via commercial airline.  There is no passenger ferry service. 

We spend a fair amount of money flying folks to meetings in CONUS.  Obviously not a lot, it's expensive.  Then we all break down and shell out of our pocket to go to things like RSC or NSC or any of the other specialty schools.

Our geographic situation is a hassle sometimes, but it is what it is, so we make it work. 

[Eclipse]

Very interesting, thanks for the detail.

I was reading abut the transportation situation and saw that the ferry deal is a hot potato, even though it would seem like a natural fit.

[a2capt]

Superferry looked like it could have been fun.. 'H-4'

OTOH, the logistics of wheel well critters crawling onto other islands, the people convinced the catamarans were going to chop up fish, etc. 

Sigh..  Ton of expense, down the drain.

[Capination]

Hawaii is more challenging than Puerto Rico and USVI due to the distance. Ferry flights from PR/USVI to CONUSA are just 1,000 miles and always make a refueling stop in Providenciales-PLS (Turks and Caicos) which is half the trip to Fort Lauderdale (entry point). So our aircrafts do not need special fittings. We and SER use email and phone calls to keep in touch. Commercial flights to/from FL are not that expensive ($250 if you get the deals). So we do receive visits from SER very often. With six repeaters our CAP radios cover the whole wing including USVI. Some of our radios can reach Maxwell (though I do not know the details, not an expert in comms). Flights to USVI are just 50 mins to St. Thomas and 70 mins to St. Croix. It is always a challenge to move personnel between PR and USVI. Other than that, is business as usual: 700 cadets and 400 seniors, 21 units in 5 Groups, only 3 Cessnas, 5 or 6 real SAR/DR mission per year, monthly SAR/DR exercises, and lots of CD and HS flights due to our location. PR's real challenge is language, Spanish and English are both offical languages in PR but English is spoken only by in or around 50% of the PR population.

Anyone coming to PR in the near future? Contact the PR-Wing and we'll fix something. CAP's a big family, we are your cousins from abroad.

Maj. Ed Barreto

[AirDX]

Superferry looked like it could have been fun.. 'H-4'

OTOH, the logistics of wheel well critters crawling onto other islands, the people convinced the catamarans were going to chop up fish, etc. 

Sigh..  Ton of expense, down the drain.

Our loss is the Navy's gain.  They've picked them up for the bargain price of $35 million for the pair, and they've now been renamed the USNS Guam and USNS Puerto Rico. 

http://www.defense.gov/releases/release.aspx?releaseid=15255

[Private Investigator]

AirDX,

Thanks for sharing.   :clap:

[Майор Хаткевич]

Anyone coming to PR in the near future? Contact the PR-Wing and we'll fix something. CAP's a big family, we are your cousins from abroad.

Maj. Ed Barreto

I work in E-commerce and I dislike that line VERY much.

Puerto Rico is not a country, at least not according to the USPS.

Often I'll see orders come in shipping to the Country of Puerto Rico, and a customer wondering why they get charged an international rate! 

I usually tell them to try and plug in PR for state, and a miracle happens! They get charged US rates.

[AlphaSigOU]

Anyone coming to PR in the near future? Contact the PR-Wing and we'll fix something. CAP's a big family, we are your cousins from abroad.

Maj. Ed Barreto

I work in E-commerce and I dislike that line VERY much.

Puerto Rico is not a country, at least not according to the USPS.

Often I'll see orders come in shipping to the Country of Puerto Rico, and a customer wondering why they get charged an international rate! 

I usually tell them to try and plug in PR for state, and a miracle happens! They get charged US rates.

Works the same for mailing stuff to the Marshall Islands (MH), Federated States of Micronesia (FM) and Palau (PL) - it's domestic USPS rates. Except for us in Kwaj and Roi-Namur; we get to use the wonderful APO/FPO military mail system!

[FlyTiger77]

we get to use the wonderful APO/FPO military mail system!

You are just in the wrong hell-hole. Last year in Iraq, I would get mail/packages from CONUS through the APO in 7 days or less.

[Capination]

Anyone coming to PR in the near future? Contact the PR-Wing and we'll fix something. CAP's a big family, we are your cousins from abroad.

Maj. Ed Barreto

I work in E-commerce and I dislike that line VERY much.

Puerto Rico is not a country, at least not according to the USPS.

Often I'll see orders come in shipping to the Country of Puerto Rico, and a customer wondering why they get charged an international rate! 

I usually tell them to try and plug in PR for state, and a miracle happens! They get charged US rates.

You are more than welcome to dislike that line. Nobody is arguing that Puerto Rico is a country. I used the word "abroad" as in far; away from one's home; beyond the boundaries of the continent; out of CONUSA. Many CAP members visit Puerto Rico year round, I was just inviting them to call us and we can meet and have some pizza and locally brewed beer. If you stop by, pizza and beers are on me. Have a good one bud! 

[Майор Хаткевич]

Being from Abroad myself, I took it to mean outside of the US.

Outside of CONUS to me is simply not abroad.

I'll have to look you up for that pizza and beer if I'm ever down south however!

[AlphaSigOU]

we get to use the wonderful APO/FPO military mail system!

You are just in the wrong hell-hole. Last year in Iraq, I would get mail/packages from CONUS through the APO in 7 days or less.

We 'inmates' of Kwajatraz Federal Penitentiary only get a mail plane twice a week. ATI DC-8-62 Combi on Tuesdays and Thursdays PHIK-PKWA and back. Every second week of the month the Thursday flight is dropped and we get a C-17 on Saturday.

[a2capt]

I wish I knew your email address 3 years ago when I visited PR. I tried to contact two units in the San Juan area, and just people in general. Never got a single bite, using information from Wing/Unit web sites, the NHQ unit locator ..  nada.

No bueno. I really wanted to visit a meeting or two, while I was there for about 10 days.

Though I did meet many cadets at NCC last year...