By: Janina Lamoglia 

Fleet Readiness Center Southwest (FRCSW) has once again demonstrated its ability to surpass expectations, exceeding its targeted production goals by four aircraft. This marks the eighth consecutive year the command has exceeded aircraft production targets. This remarkable success demonstrates the tireless dedication and hard work of the entire team, especially the artisans on the production floor, who continue to rise to every challenge.

Production Director Dave Kelly, in his message to the workforce, emphasized the significance of this achievement and the exceptional leadership that contributed to it. 

“This is the 8th straight year you broke down barriers, provided the leadership and direction to the workforce, and exceeded all key indicators of successful production execution against budgeted cost, strict adherence to delivery schedules, and unrelenting delivered quality.” said Kelly.

Specific accomplishments from the past year include the completion of 144 aircraft against a target of 140, with the majority sold at or below budgeted cost and 94% meeting required turnaround times. Some of the highlights include completing the last F/A-18 center barrel aircraft (RA52) and last legacy F-18 (RQ99), inducting the first F-16 for PSSR, and completing eight Super Hornet SLM events — “all earlier than planned and well under budgeted cost,” Kelly noted.

In addition to these successes, FRCSW’s Helicopter Program continued its record of excellence with FY24 seeing the program push its record streak of on time deliveries to 172 consecutive MH-60 deliveries since mid-2022. The Propeller Program also exceeded expectations, completing all E-2D and MV-22 aircraft under required timelines, while simultaneously sending artisans to support critical fleet in service repairs (ISR) needs across the globe. The Services team achieved another milestone by completing FRCSW’s first F-35 Air Show at Miramar and preparing for FY25 production at a new detachment in Yuma, AZ. Additionally, FRCSW artisans travel the globe to complete repairs. In 2024, they command completed over 3,300 in-service repairs on 16 different TMS aircraft all around the world.

The Voyage Repair Team played a vital role by performing essential repairs to West Coast-based aircraft carriers and aviation-capable vessels, including U.S. Coast Guard cutters. The LM2500 program, involved with the] maintenance and repair of the General Electric LM2500 Marine Gas Turbine engine delivered 18 maritime engines, eight more than planned for NAVSEA. This year also saw FRCSW set a record low overdue Work In Progress (WIP) metric, with 0% overdue among the 55 aircraft in flow.

FRCSW Commanding Officer CAPT. Luis “Rick” Rivera commended the team’s dedication and leadership, acknowledging the significant impact these efforts have on supporting the fleet. 

“Our success is built on the dedication and expertise of the men and women at FRCSW,” said CAPT. Rivera. Their work is essential to ensuring the operational readiness of our naval forces.” 

As FRCSW looks toward FY25, the team is confident in continuing this legacy of excellence. 

“FRCSW is truly blessed to have true leaders in charge of the aircraft and engines production department. I am very proud of you all as we look forward to FY25, which I’m sure will be full of new challenges and which I am very confident we will again overcome together.” Kelly said in closing.
 
 

By: Janina Lamoglia 

Fleet Readiness Center Southwest (FRCSW) is the Navy’s premier West Coast aircraft repair, maintenance, and overhaul organization specializing in Navy and Marine Corps aircraft and their related systems. The command has officially added the F-16 Falcon to its workload, marking a significant milestone in the facility’s ongoing mission to sustain Naval Aviation. Known for its expertise in maintaining Navy and Marine Corps aircraft, FRCSW now provides critical F-16 support to the US Navy squadrons of Naval Aviation Warfare Development Command (NAWDC) and Fighter Squadron Composite 13 (VFC-13).

“The addition of the F-16 workload demonstrates FRCSW’s adaptability and commitment to serving all branches of the armed forces,” said Jacob Weintraub, FRCSW MRO-E Division Head. “It’s an exciting opportunity to expand our support and showcase the high-caliber skills of our artisans and engineers.”

Preparing for this new workload required a series of infrastructure upgrades and targeted training to ensure the workforce could meet the specific demands of the F-16 platform. “Because this is the first-ever Navy depot-level induction of an F-16, we’re essentially building the process as we go,” Weintraub explained. “We’ve had to draft qualification letters to certify our artisans, engineers, and quality assurance staff to ensure compliance. These early efforts are setting the foundation for the program’s success.”

The team has also faced unique challenges, including adapting to Air Force processes, integrating specialized tools, and resolving logistical hurdles. “One of the biggest challenges we encountered was learning the Air Force’s Enhanced Technical Information Management System (ETIMS) for technical data, which is very different from the Navy’s system,” said Brian Trout, FRCSW Deputy Program Manager. “We overcame this by leaning on our former Air Force employees to train the team and creating step-by-step guides to bridge the gap.”

While the F-16 shares some structural similarities with legacy Navy aircraft, its smaller size and distinct maintenance needs required a tailored approach. For example, the first F-16 aircraft to arrive required an immediate wing replacement due to known structural issues—a repair completed using FRCSW’s in-service repair (ISR) capabilities. “This project has been a mix of discovery and innovation,” Trout said. “Every day, the team makes progress while finding solutions to unexpected challenges.”

The F-16 workload also aligns with the Department of Defense’s initiative to enhance joint-service collaboration, enabling FRCSW to contribute to a stronger, more integrated military aviation community.

“We’re proud of the groundwork we’re laying with this first aircraft,” Weintraub added. “Our goal is to create a predictable, efficient process that benefits every F-16 that comes through FRCSW in the future.”

As the first F-16 aircraft arrived at the facility, FRCSW remains focused on its commitment to operational excellence, ensuring that every aircraft it services is mission-ready. With the addition of this workload, FRCSW continues to solidify its role as a key player of aviation sustainment across the armed forces.

In celebration of the upcoming holiday season, Fleet Readiness Center East (FRCE) civilian, military and contractor personnel have come together to support a collection benefitting Toys for Tots, a nationwide, not-for-profit organization that collects and distributes toys to families in need during the holidays.

Each holiday season, FRCE employees help make the season brighter for children in Eastern North Carolina by donating new, unwrapped toys for those who may not otherwise receive gifts. This year, the command collected over 500 toys, 88 bicycles and $500 in monetary donations to give to the cause.

For many members of the workforce, supporting the Toys for Tots Program has become a cherished tradition — a meaningful way to give back and ensure that every child experiences the joy of receiving a gift during the holidays. Staff Sgt. Matthew Jensen, the H-53 program assistant at FRCE, said helping coordinate this year’s collection has been a rewarding experience.

“Helping out with Toys for Tots is one of those things that makes me even more proud to be a Marine,” said Jensen. “Even though I’ve been donating to the program since I was a kid, this is the first year that I’ve been able to help with the actual collection part of it. Having the opportunity to make someone’s Christmas better has been awesome and I am so grateful to have been a part of something so special.” 

The goal of the Marine Corps Reserve Toys for Tots Program is to spread the joy of Christmas by ensuring children have presents to open on Christmas morning. According to their website, Toys for Tots has distributed 677 million toys to 301 million deserving children since the program’s creation in 1947.

Some of the command’s employees have taken the drive a step further by organizing group collections, streamlining the process for everyone involved. The F-35 aircraft line, for example, pools monetary donations every year to purchase bicycles, which are then given to the cause. F-35 Branch Head Ike Rettenmair said he started this tradition among the F-35 team about five years ago to encourage his teammates to support the program.

“I’ve always donated to Toys for Tots, even back during my time in the Marine Corps,” said Rettenmair. “I’m the type of person who loves to give rather than receive gifts, especially during this time of year. My biggest motivation is simply helping kids in need. Not everyone is as fortunate as we are and I think we sometimes lose sight of that, which is why I started the group collection. It’s a great way to motivate folks to donate to a good cause.”

Last year, Rettenmair’s team donated nearly 40 bicycles to the Toys for Tots Program. This year, they collected 63 to donate to children in need. Rettenmair said every year, their goal is to donate more than the previous year.

“Our goal is to always donate more than we did last year,” said Rettenmair. “Every child should have a bicycle but, unfortunately, not everyone can afford them, which is why we’ve made it a tradition in our office. It’s something we look forward to every year.”

Other teams within the depot have also organized group collections. Production Controllers Lauren Day and Courtney Skinner, who led the Engines, Lift Fan and Dynamic Components Division’s group collection, developed a plan to pool monetary donations to purchase as many toys as the money could buy.

“We reached out to everyone we could in this division, and we probably spoke with around 500 people to see if they were interested in contributing,” said Day. “We mainly collected money to purchase toys, but we also accepted toys. We wanted to do everything we could to help.”

Skinner emphasized that the goal goes beyond simply giving children gifts; it’s about making the holidays memorable for families in need. She said each gift they purchased was carefully selected with the hopes of bringing joy and excitement to the children who receive them.

“I really enjoy how we are giving to the less fortunate and bringing joy to little kids,” said Skinner. “I have a child myself and I know what it feels like to see her face light up on Christmas morning, so helping give that same sense of happiness to other children feels really good. We even had my daughter give us ideas of what kinds of toys to buy. That way, we knew we were picking out toys that kids actually want.”

The division’s group collection efforts raised $2,309 in monetary donations, which allowed them to purchase 184 toys for children in need. Skinner said seeing everyone come together to support the program was inspiring.

“This is my first year helping with the group collection and it’s been nice to see everyone come out and donate their hard-earned money to this cause,” Skinner said. “It was such a fun and enlightening experience. We are both so thankful for the generosity of the people here at FRC East who helped make this happen.”

Whether the donations at FRCE come individually or as a group, in the form of bikes, toys or monetary donations, Jensen said the most rewarding aspect of supporting Toys for Tots lies in the impact the donations have on children in the community.

“Growing up, my mom and dad would take us shopping every year so we could pick out a toy to put in the Toys for Tots collection box,” said Jensen. “And now, my wife and I take my son to pick out a toy to donate just like my parents did with me. Seeing this side of it – collecting more than just one toy to put in the donation box – and the impact we can make with an entire semi-truck filled with toys has been very gratifying.”

FRCE is North Carolina's largest maintenance, repair, overhaul and technical services provider, with more than 4,000 civilian, military and contract workers. Its annual revenue exceeds $1 billion. The depot provides service to the fleet while functioning as an integral part of the greater U.S. Navy; Naval Air Systems Command; and Commander, Fleet Readiness Centers.

Following the delivery of the depot’s final AV-8B Harrier in September, Fleet Readiness Center East (FRCE) recently completed its last F402 engine maintenance event, delivering the finished product to the fleet Oct. 28.

FRCE has supported the Harrier and its engine since 1973, beginning with its assignment of the AV-8A Harrier and F402 engine workload. The legacy Rolls Royce Pegasus F402 turbofan engine features a vectored thrust system that enables the AV-8B Harrier’s short take-off and vertical landing capability. Since 1991, FRCE has serviced 1,046 F402 engines, returning an average of 32 engines to the fleet every year.

FRCE Commanding Officer Capt. Randy Berti said the command’s F402 team’s efforts have not gone unnoticed within the Harrier community.

“I am very proud of FRC East’s long history of supporting the Harrier and its engine,” said Berti. “To consistently produce high-quality engines that have, in turn, helped extend the Harrier’s lifespan is a remarkable achievement, one that every member of the team should take pride in. Their expertise, commitment and teamwork have not only ensured the Harrier’s continued success, but also played an important role in our support of the warfighter.”

The milestone was celebrated with an informal ceremony Sept. 19 in the command’s AV-8 hangar. During the ceremony, Berti and leaders from the AV-8B Weapon Systems Program Office (PMA-257) recognized members of the depot’s Harrier and F402 teams, both past and present, for their efforts in supporting the legendary aircraft and its engine throughout the years.

Production Support Director Chris Day, who has worked with the F402 for nearly 30 years, emphasized that the team's accomplishments reflect the strong work ethic and high standards that have always been the foundation of the depot's service to the fleet.

“I can’t begin to express how proud I am of this team and their many accomplishments,” Day said. “While we’ve encountered our fair share of challenges, our success is a direct result of this team’s hard work and dedication to supporting the warfighter.

“Like many others here, I have quite the history with this engine,” he continued. “I started working on F402 engines back in March of 1993 when I joined the Marine Corps. After about seven years, I got out and began my career at FRC East as a mechanic in the F402 shop.”

One of the team’s recent successes was a marked reduction in turnaround times achieved over the past five years, said Steven Lupton, who served as the supervisor for the F402 Engine Disassembly, Assembly and Test Shop supervisor until his recent transition to the supervisor of the Fuel Controls Shop.

“Back in 2019, our average turnaround time for this engine was 484 days,” said Lupton. “This year’s average is 366 days, so we are seeing over a 100 day decrease in turnaround time. Now, part of this is because the major inspection activities, like the thousand-hour inspections, weren’t needed as the aircraft won’t need to fly for another thousand hours with the platform sundowning.

“But that’s not the only reason our turnaround times have gone down,” said Lupton. “Our team has been working on these engines for quite some time now. They are well-versed in this engine’s maintenance needs, especially because a lot of them worked on the F402 during their time in the service. They know exactly what they’re doing so it doesn’t take as long as it would for someone who, say, just started out.”

Maintaining those reduced turnaround times became increasingly challenging as the platform aged, due to supply constraints and other logistical demands, Day noted. With some parts no longer readily available from the original equipment manufacturer, the engineering teams at FRCE and Naval Air Systems Command (NAVAIR) were often called upon to help develop repair procedures that allowed the depot to continue providing warfighters with the highest-quality products. 

“As the engine got older, we had to develop more repairs,” explained Day. “The engineers with the AV-8 Fleet Support Team have, time and time again, helped develop repairs and refine processes so we can ensure the product we put back into the engine was capable and suitable for continued service.”

Chris Gosnell, Fleet Support Team AV-8 Propulsion Sub-Team lead, said the cross-disciplinary F402 team at FRCE has been developing solutions to the fleet’s needs for decades. One of the team’s most memorable milestones came in 2001, he said, when the Marine Corps’ Harrier community experienced multiple groundings within a 15-month period, leaving 110 aircraft without engines. As a result, the F402 team was tasked with coming up with a functional resolution.

The team not only solved the issue, but also had enough output to produce spare engines while and assisted the fleet customer with a cost savings of more than $32 million that year. These actions earned the team the 2002 NAVAIR Commander’s Award for Supporting the Warfighter for their impact on warfighter readiness, effectiveness and satisfaction.

“A lot of people rely on FRC East to be productive and responsive to the fleet’s needs,” said Gosnell. “For us to have been able to help identify the root cause and implement the fixes is a testament to all who have worked on the program and is an accomplishment that I hold near and dear to my heart.”

The delivery of the final F402 engine to the fleet marked the end of the F402 team at FRCE, one that has supported the workload for 51 years; however, the depot will continue to support specific F402 components, Day said.

“We will still perform maintenance on a few F402 engine components, like the gearbox and fuel metering unit, because those items can by changed out at the squadron level,” said Day. “We want to make sure we can keep up the Naval Supply Systems Command demands and keep inventory healthy until 2027. And, of course, we want to make sure we can continue to support our fleet and international allies, like the Spanish and Italian navies.”

Day said the majority of the team’s members will transition to support the command’s other service platforms, including the fifth-generation F-35 Lightning II.

“Their skills translate to other areas within the depot,” said Day. “Some will go to other shops within the engine branch while others will transfer over to F-35 components. There are similarities between what we do with the F402 engine and the F-35 lift fan. As a matter of fact, like the F402, the lift fan itself is Rolls-Royce product. With those similarities, crossing some of those people over into F-35 components just made perfect sense.”

While the transition will change day-to-day activities for some of the depot’s employees, Gosnell said it’s for the best as its replacement will increase the fleet’s ability to defend the nation.

“It’s been a long time since I first walked through these doors back in January of 1989. I have been on the F402 team since the beginning of my career here, so watching the AV-8 program sundown and transition to F-35 is bittersweet for me,” Gosnell said.

“Every frontline fighter has as service life,” he continued. “There comes a point in time where the fleet needs to bring a specific capability to the fight that their current aircraft simply can’t support. Even though the AV-8 is an extremely capable aircraft, its successor programs, like the F-35, are not only newer and faster, but most importantly, more capable in today’s environment.”   

FRCE is North Carolina's largest maintenance, repair, overhaul and technical services provider, with more than 4,000 civilian, military and contract workers. Its annual revenue exceeds $1 billion. The depot provides service to the fleet while functioning as an integral part of the greater U.S. Navy; Naval Air Systems Command; and Commander, Fleet Readiness Centers.