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    maintenance guys on the line have done just a superb job in
    making do with what they have; taking parts off of broken
    jets, minimizing the number of jets that we have on the
    ramp, getting them home. Quite often we will fly 48 sorties
    out of here in the day without a single broken jet on the
    ramp, with probably an OR [operational readiness] rate
    upwards of 95 percent on our sorties, which, for those
    uninitiated, is considerably a very high number.
    
    S: What about the support of the KKMC community to the F-16s
    that are here?
    
    E: The KKMC community has done an excellent job. Both Colonel
    Van Meter [William C.], the wing commander, and Colonel
    Radcliff [Roger], the DO, have helped us, giving us
    everything we have needed. We brought with us some unique
    problems that the A-10 community has not had to face before;
    i.e., the A-l0 with its high mounted engines does not have
    the FOD [foreign object damage] problems. The F-16 is
    basically a huge vacuum cleaner very close to the ground, so
    we have had to impress upon them the importance of getting
    the ramp swept every day. As you know, this part of the 
    world is very dusty with a lot of blowing sand and rocks, so
    it is a constant vigil to keep the ramp clean.
    
    They didn't have a place to put us, obviously. We brought
    in 175 people. They pitched a couple of extra rooms of
    tents for us. We got plenty of places to house our people,
    and we got extra places for the occasional pilot that breaks
    down and has to spend the night. We fit quite well into the
    KKMC community.
    
    They were very happy to see us because our 172 people put
    them over the magic number of 2,000, which allowed them to
    have a second chow hall. That eased some considerable
    
    

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