ORI postponed to next summer

  • Published
  • By Tech. Sgt. Veronica A. Aceveda
  • 512th AW Public Affairs
DOVER AIR FORCE BASE, Del. --  The Operational Readiness Inspection, originally scheduled for October 13 to 20, has been postponed to the summer of 2008. 

The Liberty Wing's Commander Col. Ronald A. Rutland said the new ORI date depends on a decision currently being made at Air Mobility Command headquarters. "The bottom line is it's not out of site, and we must continue to prepare and train for our wartime readiness." 

Many Liberty Wing units had issued mandatory annual tour dates to be used for the May Operational Readiness Exercise; however, May's ORE has now been pushed to August.
 
Lt. Col. Joy Mann, the 512th Airlift Wing's performance planner, advised section chiefs to still use that prescheduled time frame in May to train.
 
"Since Airmen were already expecting to be here anyway, it's an excellent opportunity for units to focus on their mission essential tasks," she said.
 
METS are essentially checklist items that list what's expected of a unit down to every minute detail. Along with base METS applicable to all Air Force specialty codes, each unit has career-field specific METS as well. 

"We already know our jobs and what to do," said Maj. Bob Shelton, the Plans and Programs deputy chief, who provides council to Team Dover on how to ace the ORI exam. "What we need is practical experience on how to operate in a chemical environment, so we can continue to do our jobs in a crisis situation." 

ORIs are conducted to evaluate and measure the ability of a unit to perform in wartime, during a contingency or a force sustainment mission, according to Air Force Instruction 90-201, Inspector General Activities. 

"The ORI is an opportunity to show the Air Mobility Command evaluators that Dover's Airmen are the best at what they do," said Col. Merril Alligood, 436th Operations Group command and ORI commander for Dover Air Force Base. (Master Sgt. Melissa Phillips, 436th PA, contributed to this story)