AMMO (US Air Force) IYAAYAS
AMMO is also a commonly used abbreviation for ammunition.
The Munitions Systems Specialist career field(AFSC 2W0X1, previously 461X0), commonly referred to as AMMO, is the weapons and explosives branch of the U.S. Air Force.
Career field description
AMMO is responsible for maintaining the Air Force's entire munitions stockpile. Various duties include shipping and receiving, building, testing, operating, protecting, inspecting, storing and performing maintenance on all types of munition systems, both conventional and nuclear. AMMO personnel also operate and maintain a wide variety of equipment and electronic gear, from 40 foot tractor-trailer combination vehicles and all terrain 10,000 pound forklifts, to small arms weapons, to AGM-65 guidance testing units and computer databases. AMMO troops often work daily with many versions of F-4, F-15, F-16, F-22, F-117, B-1, B-2, B-52, A-10, and AC-130 aircraft, along with rarer opportunities to support aircraft from sister services, such as the A-6, F-14, F-18 and AV-8, as well as aircraft from foreign services.
Upon graduation from Air Force Basic Military Training at Lackland Air Force Base, San Antonio, Texas, airmen assigned to the field attend a 9 week tech school at Sheppard Air Force Base, Texas. Upon graduation from tech school, the new AMMO specialist is sent to their assigned duty station. Airmen assigned overseas may take a two week leave prior to departure.
Isolation
Due to security and obvious safety concerns with the possibility of millions of pounds of explosives accidentally cooking off and damaging a large portion of a base's facilities, the bomb dump is usually well isolated from the rest of base. At some bases, such as Andersen AFB in Guam, the ride to work can take as long as twenty minutes, compared to a 4 or 5 minute commute for people in most other career fields.
Specific jobs
AMMO has nine separate and distinct working areas within the career fieldand these are:
Equipment Maintenance - "Trailer Shop" - the hub of all maintenance on the job-specific trailer equipment that is unique to AMMO, such as the MHU-141 and the MHU-110.
PGM - Precision Guided Munitions, or "Missile Shop" - maintenance of missiles and guided bomb packages.
Flightline Delivery - Line delivery drivers are dispatched by Munitions Control and are responsible for the safe and expedient handling and delivery of munitions to aircraft. Drivers are also held responsible for the accounting of their movements and their transactions via radio and paper logs. Personnel in this field are often referred to as "Line Swine".
Conventional Maintenance - This office is responsible for unguided munitions, dealing with everything that their base's aircraft can carry, from chaff and flares to cannon ammunition and regular unguided "dumb bombs".
Munitions Control - The nerve center. Nothing happens without the controllers knowing since they are the office that dispatches workorders to all other areas. Supervision relies heavily on good controllers to give them quick, efficient reports of what's happening. Controllers tend to be higher ranking and senior AMMO personnel, and have diverse backgrounds in AMMO.
Storage and Handling - Works closely with Inspection and Conventional to deliver large quantities of raw materials for both inspections and bomb build exercises. Storage troops will often be found driving 18-wheel tractor trailers and forklifts, ranging in capacity from 2 to 25 tons, transporting various munitions items for the respective clientele.
Inspection - All munitions items at various times need to be inspected for safety and compliance with technical instructions. Specialized NCOs and Airmen called Munitions Inspectors accomplish this. Inspectors attend an Inspector school, which lasts approximately 3 weeks and most times is conducted at the AMMO Schoolhouse, located at Sheppard AFB, Texas.
CAS/AFK - Sometimes labeled as separate areas, CAS stands for Combat Ammunition System. CAS troops (used to) perform inventories, keep storage plans, and update movements of munitions within the storage area. Since the implementation of CAS 1.0, which is an online program instead of a database, troops from all the shops now work with CAS directly. There is no longer a CAS shop.
Notes: Ammo troops are not limited to working in one shop their entire career. They move from shop to shop. In some cases a troop works all nine areas in a career, and sometimes may work only one or two.Sometimes these areas may be merged together in accordance with the mission of that base. Flightline delivery and Equipment Maintenance are sometimes one shop; and Conventional Maintenance and PGM are sometimes merged into one shop.Sometimes larger Munitions Flights have specialized shops like Plans and Training/Mobility.
Duty stations
AMMO personnel can be assigned anywhere in the world.
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