Reservist Teaches Aircrew How To Return With Honor

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Kimberly Erickson
  • 403rd Wing Public Affairs
KEESLER AIR FORCE BASE, MISS. --  On a muggy mid-afternoon in late July, an instructor observes a group of students gathered in a small huddle, calibrating bulky, olive green radios resembling something straight out of the movie Patton.

"Alright," he says in a gravelly voice, "I'm going to send you a set of coordinates. I want you to use the map I've given you to locate the pickup point."

For his students, this refresher class focuses on navigational skills dictating the outcome of a life or death situation.

For Tech. Sgt. Wes Bonin, one of 23 Air Force Reserve Survival Evasion Resistance and Escape instructors, it's just another day at the office.

Sergeant Bonin trains more than 200 aircrew members in the 403rd Wing, in addition to active duty aircrew members from all military branches at Keesler Air Force Base, Miss.

"As the base SERE specialist, I provide refresher training for pilots based on the initial survival training they received through the formal survival schools," Sergeant Bonin said. "Every three years, we highlight the essential tasks necessary to survive in combat or operations other-than-war scenarios."

Sergeant Bonin also teaches combat survival, local area survival, combat water survival, conduct after capture, contingency SERE indoctrination and emergency parachute training.

"I prepare aircrew for operational areas where they could become isolated from friendly forces, detained by a government, held hostage or as a prisoner of war," he said.  He also prepares them for environmental and political obstacles they may encounter. 

The classroom instruction is discussion-based and reinforced with field training.

"Aircrew review the skills needed to live off the land in survivor scenarios with limited access to resources," Sergeant Bonin said. "Part of that is understanding how to use the mission-essential survival equipment they are provided."

Using latitude and longitude coordinates, aircrew members identify locations on a map using radios during the field training portion of CST.
 
"Beyond equipment familiarization, we use the radios in land navigation," Sergeant Bonin said.

If aircrew members are grounded, they navigate to a specific pick up point, and coordinate their own rescue, using CST knowledge, experience and equipment.

"In today's deployed environment, these radios are essential for personnel recovery," Sergeant Bonin said.

This course teaches them how to survive and be rescued in any environment, under any condition using radios and land navigation equipment, Sergeant Bonin said.

Sergeant Bonin brought 10 years of active duty SERE experience with him when he joined the Air Force Reserve in 2009.

"A lot of life support personnel can teach what he teaches, but Sergeant Bonin's finesse and experience bring credibility to his instruction," said Lt. Col. David Price,  53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron navigator. "Having a SERE specialist teaching refresher training has a brought a lot to the wing."

For some, waking up every day and looking forward to what you do is dream-job material, Sergeant Bonin said.

"I get to do things most people can only hope to do on weekends, jumping out of planes and spending a lot of time outside," he said. "SERE is the only career where being an outdoorsman is your job."

With the SERE motto being, "Return with Honor," Sergeant Bonin said he is well aware of the gravity of his role. 

"It really hits home when you deploy and find yourself working personnel recovery," he said. "When you talk to someone who's either been a captive or shot down and it's clear that what you taught them helped drive their survival and recovery, that's what makes it all worth it."