The HC-130J super hercules officially entered operational service with the us coast guard on 2 july as part of a unique double ceremony held at Cgas Elizabeth City, North Carolina. After the super hercules officially entered service, Capt. John Hardin, one of the first coast guard aviators to fly the hc-130J, assumed command of the air station.
The first order of business at the ceremony was to decommission the Coast Guard’s HC-130J Aircraft Project Office, or APO, and turn the aircraft over to the operational fleet. The APO, established in 2003, developed operations and maintenance procedures, trained crews, and performed operational evaluations with the gleaming white, orange, and blue-painted HC-130Js.
The APO crews had not just been flying around the base flagpole with its new aircraft. Shortly after being established, the unit hauled an MH-68 helicopter from the west coast of the US, where it was used in drug enforcement missions, back to its home station in Jacksonville, Florida. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, the HC-130J crews performed yeomanlike service delivering relief supplies to residents of Louisiana and Mississippi.
Coast Guard Program Executive Officer and Director of Acquisition Programs Rear Adm. Ronald Rábago noted, “The HC-130J is so much more capable than our first Hercules, the C-130B. It is critical that the new technology in the J is ready for the Coast Guard mission. The six HC-130Js are standing watch now and are already saving lives.”
Indeed. A special guest at the ceremony was Roger Brake, the first person to be saved by the HC-130J. On 4 June, Brake’s sailboat started taking on water and quickly capsized off the North Carolina coast. The sixty-year-old Brake had no time to send out a distress call—or grab his vessel’s emergency locator beacon—before jumping overboard. He spent two hot days in his life raft with no food or water.
The crew of a passing cruise ship notified the Coast Guard after spotting the capsized sailboat 102 miles south-east of Cape Lookout. Brake recalled he “absolutely couldn’t believe it” when the HC-130J appeared overhead. The Super Hercules crew orbited until Brake was picked up by one of Elizabeth City’s HH-60J helicopters.
Three of the HC-130Js have been fully missionized through a partnership between Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company and Lockheed Martin Maritime Systems and Sensors Company. Modifications to the aircraft were completed at the Aeronautics facility in Greenville, South Carolina. Plans call for installing mission kits in the other three Coast Guard HC-130Js.
The heart of the missionization package is a fully automated system that provides realtime information to the crew during search and rescue, maritime surveillance, or interdiction missions. This system includes automatic identification and direction-finding capabilities; a new long-range, multimode radar; an electro-optical and infrared, or EO/IR, sensor turret that provides both imagery and target data; an advanced open architecture mission system processor; and an extensive communications suite.
Inside the aircraft, the two sensor operators sit side by side at a workstation on the flight deck. This station includes a large display screen for each operator, a secondary screen, keyboard, trackball, and other equipment. A smaller version of the sensor operator display, located on the co-pilot’s side of the cockpit instrument panel, allows the flight crew to see exactly what the sensor operators have located or are tracking.
All of the electronic boxes for the mission equipment are located along the sides of the fuselage or in the ceiling-mounted rack known as the hog trough. Putting the boxes out of the way enables the HC-130J to keep its full cargo-carrying capability for large items such as airdroppable rescue kits.
Two observers look out the large paratroop door windows that are standard on all C-130J aircraft. This station has been enhanced on the HC-130J with mission lighting, upgraded communications, and a padded shelf under the window that holds binoculars or enables the observers to rest their arms while scanning during missions that can last as long as sixteen hours.
Outside, the HC-130J is easily recognizable with its large belly-mounted radar and fairing, elecro-optical/infrared, or EO/IR, system turret under the nose, and antennas for the aircraft’s multiple HF, UHF, and satellite-based radios on both the top and bottom of the fuselage.
The mission kit is a stand-alone system that has been added to the baseline aircraft. It has its own computer-based integrated logistics support system and provides maintenance and operator technical manuals in digital format to allow for customer changes. The manuals are the source data for organizational-level maintenance and operations and include all safety recommendations. Training is conducted on-aircraft, in the classroom, and through individual computer-based training.
With the operational declaration for the HC-130Js, the 1970s-vintage HC-130H aircraft based at CGAS Elizabeth City have been reassigned. Two of the aircraft have been transferred to CGAS Clearwater, Florida. One aircraft will remain at the Coast Guard’s Aircraft Repair and Supply Center, co-located at Elizabeth City, to become a flying test bed for modifications and upgrades that are being considered for the newer HC-130Hs that will remain in the fleet for some time. The remaining two aircraft have been put into long-term temporary storage.
At the ceremony, Capt. Jim Martin, the last commander of the HC-130J APO, was awarded the Meritorious Service Medal for his work in bringing the HC-130J to full operational capability and in developing the test plan for the missionized aircraft.
In his closing remarks, Rábago gave the sea services’ highest praise to the APO. He turned to Martin and said, “Bravo Zulu* to you and your entire team.”
*Well done
Jeff Rhodes is the associate editor of Code One.
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