With at least 129,000 cases of COVID-19 recorded in the UK, keeping service members stationed at RAF Lakenheath, a Royal Air Force base that houses the largest detachment of US Air Force aircraft in the UK, has required extensive measures.
Some of those measures include the typical basics: making and distributing masks, converting to telework and marking out social distancing spaces in public places. But others involve some unique problems faced by the jets they fly out of Lakenheath.
Inside an F-15 Eagle’s cockpit are dozens of knobs, switches and dials used to control the advanced fighter, track the location of both the airplane and its adversaries, and to select and fire weapons if need be. Now, with the highly infectious COVID-19 coronavirus in danger of being spread by contact surfaces, all of them have to be cleaned.
"It's a good measure to help prevent spreading the disease to our aircrew," USAF Staff Sgt. Daniel Solis-Reyes, 494th Aircraft Maintenance Unit (AMU) crew chief, said in a Friday news release. "We don't want to bring anything back to the squadron, so we make sure to properly dispose of any of the items we use."
"Basically everything a pilot would touch, we're wiping down and cleaning," Senior Airman Daniel Smalls, 492nd AMU crew chief, said in the release.
Set about 60 miles north of London in the English county of Suffolk, RAF Lakenheath is home to some 27,000 airmen and their families. Just a few miles away is RAF Mildenhall: once the logistics and intelligence hub for US Air Force operations in the region, its forces are now slated for dispersal to other air bases.
The Pentagon maintains two squadrons of F-15 Eagles at Lakenheath, including the C, D and E variants of the jet. While designed as an air superiority fighter, some versions, such as the F-15E, have been designated “Strike Eagles” and modified to carry air-to-ground munitions.
Air Force Magazine reported that severe limitations have been placed on air crews during the pandemic, providing just enough time in the air to keep their routines fresh. Flight ops are limited to the base’s immediate area, and the two F-15 squadrons are rotating weeks on and off duty, decreasing their sorties by roughly half.
However, Air Force officials at Lakenheath have adopted other measures to protect staff as well. The first cases of COVID-19 were detected at the base in mid-March, and officials quickly set up a quarantine facility for detected cases as well as drive-thru testing and a testing hotline for those who suspect they may have the virus. The service has also accelerated the renovation of old dormitories on the base to serve as additional quarantine housing.
Washington Headquarters Services, a Pentagon administrative support agency, reported on April 9 that RAF Lakenheath had repurposed some of its social functions, such as the base’s Arts and Crafts Center, for making cloth masks for personnel and their families, as well as homemade mask kits with enough materials to make 10 masks and instructions on how to do so.