Suicide is the symptom.
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| Reprint courtesy of Air Force Magazine |
But the data to the right here is quite alarming. Almost half of all deaths [69 of 151] in the Air Force from August 2016 to August 2017 was caused by a self-inflicted injury. [Raise your hand if you just learned that half of the people that die in the Air Force committed suicide]
What prompted me to write about this subject now is that there have been two suicides in the same Aircraft Maintenance Squadron at Holloman Air Force Base in the last month. I don't have any details on the motivation for those events and I'm certainly not going to speculate. However, any time there is a suicide in the aircraft maintenance community it affects me; even more so in one of these recent cases. I feel a myriad of emotions: frustrated, concerned, despondent, and helpless.
I served 20
years in the Air Force, including the year captured in the stat. I had no
idea suicides accounted for half the deaths. I mean, just watching the
aircraft maintenance environment over the years made me tell my children in no
uncertain terms that they would be making a grave mistake joining the Air
Force. Knowing what I know now, I believe it even more.
This brings me to my point: We have a suicide problem.
While the problem isn't exclusive to aircraft maintenance that is the culture I'm going to focus on for a few reasons. For one, I'm a maintainer. Second, both suicides in the last month at Holloman were aircraft maintainers, the latter an Airman that I worked with.
While I was at Holloman from about 2016 through 2017 the 54th AMXS was averaging one suicide every 6 months. We also had at least one attempt that was more than just talking about it. This was an actual, violent episode that left the Airman severely disabled. It's important to note that that wasn't the whole base, just one squadron. And actually, in the case of two of the suicides it was the same AMU.
At the time I knew 2 per year was bad, but doing some quick crew chief math [read: I'm bad at math] if every base was averaging 2 per year, and there are 94 active duty bases that comes to 188 suicides per year. Since there were only 69 suicides in that same period, Holloman is clearly an outlier.
So, Holloman is worse than the Air Force average, but how is the Air Force average? Let's have a look.
It's interesting to note that the Air Force trended with the national average for suicide, and in 1999 was much better. However, in 2014 it went up sharply and there it stayed through at least 2017 [the last year of data].
So, what happened in 2014? Well lots of things really. But mainly it was the implementation of mandatory bull-shit PME, and a 40,000 cut to personnel.
In my research to properly answer this question I found this article by Mike Benitez where he shows remarkable insight into the reality of aircraft maintenance. I recommend you read his article in its entirety. However, if you don't, I've quoted a few salient points here:
"The Air Force cut 40,000 personnel, including 9,000 experienced aircraft maintainers — despite the fact that aircraft maintenance required per-flight hour had risen 62 percent since 1991. This marked the beginning of a startling disconnect between aircraft maintenance and flight operations that has been seen in virtually every fighter squadron over the past decade. With fewer people, even maximum efforts by aircraft maintenance squadrons to fill a flying schedule fell below the minimum requirement for flying squadrons to sustain readiness. This led to over-worked aircraft maintenance squadrons, resulting in burned-out and fed-up aircraft maintainers."
Yup. [It's worth noting that 1/4 of all the people cut were maintainers]
"When it comes to aircraft, the Air Force is in an efficiency paradox. It has too many types of aircraft to maintain but too few planes to cut anything, and is too slow at replacing an aging fleet. Since 1991, the service has been on a fleet recapitalization schedule that is going to take over 100 years. The Combat Air Forces Reduction Plan tried to address this in 2010 when it slashed 246 older fighter jets from the inventory to fund a smaller, more capable force. However, reducing the number of fighters increased the burden on each one remaining. This is what drives operations tempo — one of the driving reasons for poor retention."
Yup.
Look I can keep quoting his article, but it's so good I recommend you read the entire series yourself. It will help show how the services [and the Air Force in particular] painted themselves into a corner with which there isn't an obvious way out of.
Moreover, last I checked we are 1,300 fighter pilots short of what we need. Which means we can't stop flying, especially in pilot training programs.
I've already gone over ad nauseum how this resource starvation breeds yes men and careerists, I'm not going to rehash those points.
What we are seeing now, with these alarming upticks in suicides is the beginning of the breaking point for aircraft maintenance. Gone are the days where the most patriotic will brag on social media 'Our guys will get it done. We don't know the definition of failure in aircraft maintenance.'
The Air Force as a collective institution has been blind and deaf to the effects their decisions are making at the lowest levels in aircraft maintenance.
Here's a test for the maintenance readers: Are you surprised people feel so hopeless that they are ending their lives?
I am alarmed at how frequent the suicides and attempts are becoming, but I am not surprised it is happening.
So, what can be done about it? Who thinks we need some resilience training?
Maybe. But probably not.
Take a look at this graphic to the right. It's a bit crude but it's the best way to explain my point.
Everyone has a different threshold for stress, and really that tolerance ebbs and flows a bit. But the important thing to understand is everyone has a different breaking point. The point of resiliency training is an attempt to train Airmen to increase their threshold. Resiliency on the graph is represented by the orange horizontal line. That's where people will buckle under their combined stress load. Now what that break looks like will be very different from person to person. If someone is a few months away from separating, their breaking point might be the 'I have zero fucks to give' mentality. Or, perhaps some people's breaking point might be thoughts of self-harm. Regardless, when all the stresses of life pile up and exceed someone's tolerance it gets bad. The Air Force focuses on increasing your tolerance. I think that is just a fraction of what the Air Force could do to curb suicides.
The blue bars represent cumulative stress. I've broken it into three categories between Home Stress (Bottom Dark Blue) [relationship, kids, or even loneliness], Life Stress (Middle Blue) [health, free-time, money] and Work Stress (Top Light Blue) [work hours, performance, treatment].
Some people come to work with quite a bit of home and life stress. Kind of represented by the first bar. But they arrive at work and work stress is also through the roof. The person feels trapped, hopeless. They've exceeded their resilience. Maybe their work stress is feeding their Home Stress. Maybe the constant 12+ hours, weekend duty schedules [at one time I had 3 7 levels so every 3rd weekend they were on the duty] is alienating their spouse. Or the extended shifts are taking away their gym time, so they failed a PT test.
However, look at the two bars on the right. Both have the same amount of home and life stress. But one has reduced work stress. And because of that reduced stress, they are keeping it together.
We can stop suicides. It takes people of moral courage to place the emotional well-being of their subordinates above their own career.
Look, I'm not saying Airmen don't mismanage their lives. That they aren't responsible for their Home and Life Stress. I'm not saying that.
What I'm saying: As a leader in the Air Force, you are responsible for the stress you subject your people to. When I said above I had 3 7 levels for weekend duty? I put myself and the other section chiefs on weekend duty as the 7 levels. It wasn't the most popular decision with the other section chiefs [Except for Kenny Brooks my ride or die assistant], but the 7 levels went from weekend duty every 3 weeks to every 2 months. We all have the power to turn off stupid, stressful things. Because what you don't turn off, could be the straw that breaks the camel's back and sends one of your Airmen over the edge. And while you'll find a million reasons that suicide was his decision and not your fault, I'm telling you now if you didn't make it your mission to remove stress from your people in a small way you share the blame.
I've seen Airmen lose a 244 for a piece of CTK equipment and spend 12 hours looking for it because it was a 'lost tool.' We have brought in entire AMUs because the hangar floors are dirty. We have been reckless with people's sleep to the point of risking their lives for training missions. When we do these things. These petty, arbitrary, and worthless things; we destroy our people's faith in their leadership and in their unit. They feel hopeless. And because they are in the military, they feel trapped.
It is time. In fact, it is long past fucking time. The world of aircraft maintenance is struggling. Instead of placing more burden on them, it's time every leader at every level uses their authority to remove obstacles and distractions.
These are people's children. Some are barely out of high school. When a parent hands their child to the Air Force, they trust the Air Force to look out for them. To take care of them. How many maintainers in the service right now would want their son or daughter to join the Air Force? Not a fucking one.
I'm not perfect, as anyone that has worked for me can attest. I have said some terrible things, and I've made some people very stressed out. I wish someone had sat me down and explained all of this about 16 years ago. The best I could do is figure it out eventually and serve my people the best I could. I believe by sheer luck I never had someone kill themselves under my supervision. I honestly don't know how I would reconcile that event against my behavior.
There's an old adage that when someone joins the military they write a blank check to the United States Government for any amount up to including their life. While that's true, most people in non-kinetic occupations don't expect to die in the course of, or as a result of, their daily duties.
When someone in combat dies it's usually sudden and violent, I compare it to a terrible car accident. One minute they are alive, the next they have passed.
What we are seeing in aircraft maintenance is the slow erosion of our people's psyche. They are being used up over years and years. Until eventually some of them can't give anymore and they die. This is like watching someone die of a slow, wasting disease.
I get we all swore an oath to lay down our life for our country. But sometimes we don't have to die.
Every effort, by every person should be to support maintenance and get them healthy again. Or else there will be more suicides, and I for one cannot stand to bear another.
Join us on our Facebook page to contribute to the discussion so we can all understand what it is like in maintenance in today's Air Force.
Note: In the course of writing this article I learned there were two suicides at Luke Air Force Base since the New Years, and 2 additional suicide attempts at Holloman since the most recent suicide.
Second note: 1 day after writing the last note I learned there was a 3rd suicide at Holloman.
While the problem isn't exclusive to aircraft maintenance that is the culture I'm going to focus on for a few reasons. For one, I'm a maintainer. Second, both suicides in the last month at Holloman were aircraft maintainers, the latter an Airman that I worked with.
While I was at Holloman from about 2016 through 2017 the 54th AMXS was averaging one suicide every 6 months. We also had at least one attempt that was more than just talking about it. This was an actual, violent episode that left the Airman severely disabled. It's important to note that that wasn't the whole base, just one squadron. And actually, in the case of two of the suicides it was the same AMU.
At the time I knew 2 per year was bad, but doing some quick crew chief math [read: I'm bad at math] if every base was averaging 2 per year, and there are 94 active duty bases that comes to 188 suicides per year. Since there were only 69 suicides in that same period, Holloman is clearly an outlier.
So, Holloman is worse than the Air Force average, but how is the Air Force average? Let's have a look.
 |
| Reprint courtesy of Air Force Magazine |
So, what happened in 2014? Well lots of things really. But mainly it was the implementation of mandatory bull-shit PME, and a 40,000 cut to personnel.
In my research to properly answer this question I found this article by Mike Benitez where he shows remarkable insight into the reality of aircraft maintenance. I recommend you read his article in its entirety. However, if you don't, I've quoted a few salient points here:
"The Air Force cut 40,000 personnel, including 9,000 experienced aircraft maintainers — despite the fact that aircraft maintenance required per-flight hour had risen 62 percent since 1991. This marked the beginning of a startling disconnect between aircraft maintenance and flight operations that has been seen in virtually every fighter squadron over the past decade. With fewer people, even maximum efforts by aircraft maintenance squadrons to fill a flying schedule fell below the minimum requirement for flying squadrons to sustain readiness. This led to over-worked aircraft maintenance squadrons, resulting in burned-out and fed-up aircraft maintainers."
Yup. [It's worth noting that 1/4 of all the people cut were maintainers]
"When it comes to aircraft, the Air Force is in an efficiency paradox. It has too many types of aircraft to maintain but too few planes to cut anything, and is too slow at replacing an aging fleet. Since 1991, the service has been on a fleet recapitalization schedule that is going to take over 100 years. The Combat Air Forces Reduction Plan tried to address this in 2010 when it slashed 246 older fighter jets from the inventory to fund a smaller, more capable force. However, reducing the number of fighters increased the burden on each one remaining. This is what drives operations tempo — one of the driving reasons for poor retention."
Yup.
Look I can keep quoting his article, but it's so good I recommend you read the entire series yourself. It will help show how the services [and the Air Force in particular] painted themselves into a corner with which there isn't an obvious way out of.
Moreover, last I checked we are 1,300 fighter pilots short of what we need. Which means we can't stop flying, especially in pilot training programs.
I've already gone over ad nauseum how this resource starvation breeds yes men and careerists, I'm not going to rehash those points.
What we are seeing now, with these alarming upticks in suicides is the beginning of the breaking point for aircraft maintenance. Gone are the days where the most patriotic will brag on social media 'Our guys will get it done. We don't know the definition of failure in aircraft maintenance.'
The Air Force as a collective institution has been blind and deaf to the effects their decisions are making at the lowest levels in aircraft maintenance.
Here's a test for the maintenance readers: Are you surprised people feel so hopeless that they are ending their lives?
I am alarmed at how frequent the suicides and attempts are becoming, but I am not surprised it is happening.
So, what can be done about it? Who thinks we need some resilience training?
Maybe. But probably not.
 |
| Graphic courtesy of my wife |
Take a look at this graphic to the right. It's a bit crude but it's the best way to explain my point.
Everyone has a different threshold for stress, and really that tolerance ebbs and flows a bit. But the important thing to understand is everyone has a different breaking point. The point of resiliency training is an attempt to train Airmen to increase their threshold. Resiliency on the graph is represented by the orange horizontal line. That's where people will buckle under their combined stress load. Now what that break looks like will be very different from person to person. If someone is a few months away from separating, their breaking point might be the 'I have zero fucks to give' mentality. Or, perhaps some people's breaking point might be thoughts of self-harm. Regardless, when all the stresses of life pile up and exceed someone's tolerance it gets bad. The Air Force focuses on increasing your tolerance. I think that is just a fraction of what the Air Force could do to curb suicides.
The blue bars represent cumulative stress. I've broken it into three categories between Home Stress (Bottom Dark Blue) [relationship, kids, or even loneliness], Life Stress (Middle Blue) [health, free-time, money] and Work Stress (Top Light Blue) [work hours, performance, treatment].
Some people come to work with quite a bit of home and life stress. Kind of represented by the first bar. But they arrive at work and work stress is also through the roof. The person feels trapped, hopeless. They've exceeded their resilience. Maybe their work stress is feeding their Home Stress. Maybe the constant 12+ hours, weekend duty schedules [at one time I had 3 7 levels so every 3rd weekend they were on the duty] is alienating their spouse. Or the extended shifts are taking away their gym time, so they failed a PT test.
However, look at the two bars on the right. Both have the same amount of home and life stress. But one has reduced work stress. And because of that reduced stress, they are keeping it together.
We can stop suicides. It takes people of moral courage to place the emotional well-being of their subordinates above their own career.
Look, I'm not saying Airmen don't mismanage their lives. That they aren't responsible for their Home and Life Stress. I'm not saying that.
What I'm saying: As a leader in the Air Force, you are responsible for the stress you subject your people to. When I said above I had 3 7 levels for weekend duty? I put myself and the other section chiefs on weekend duty as the 7 levels. It wasn't the most popular decision with the other section chiefs [Except for Kenny Brooks my ride or die assistant], but the 7 levels went from weekend duty every 3 weeks to every 2 months. We all have the power to turn off stupid, stressful things. Because what you don't turn off, could be the straw that breaks the camel's back and sends one of your Airmen over the edge. And while you'll find a million reasons that suicide was his decision and not your fault, I'm telling you now if you didn't make it your mission to remove stress from your people in a small way you share the blame.
I've seen Airmen lose a 244 for a piece of CTK equipment and spend 12 hours looking for it because it was a 'lost tool.' We have brought in entire AMUs because the hangar floors are dirty. We have been reckless with people's sleep to the point of risking their lives for training missions. When we do these things. These petty, arbitrary, and worthless things; we destroy our people's faith in their leadership and in their unit. They feel hopeless. And because they are in the military, they feel trapped.
It is time. In fact, it is long past fucking time. The world of aircraft maintenance is struggling. Instead of placing more burden on them, it's time every leader at every level uses their authority to remove obstacles and distractions.
These are people's children. Some are barely out of high school. When a parent hands their child to the Air Force, they trust the Air Force to look out for them. To take care of them. How many maintainers in the service right now would want their son or daughter to join the Air Force? Not a fucking one.
I'm not perfect, as anyone that has worked for me can attest. I have said some terrible things, and I've made some people very stressed out. I wish someone had sat me down and explained all of this about 16 years ago. The best I could do is figure it out eventually and serve my people the best I could. I believe by sheer luck I never had someone kill themselves under my supervision. I honestly don't know how I would reconcile that event against my behavior.
There's an old adage that when someone joins the military they write a blank check to the United States Government for any amount up to including their life. While that's true, most people in non-kinetic occupations don't expect to die in the course of, or as a result of, their daily duties.
When someone in combat dies it's usually sudden and violent, I compare it to a terrible car accident. One minute they are alive, the next they have passed.
What we are seeing in aircraft maintenance is the slow erosion of our people's psyche. They are being used up over years and years. Until eventually some of them can't give anymore and they die. This is like watching someone die of a slow, wasting disease.
I get we all swore an oath to lay down our life for our country. But sometimes we don't have to die.
Every effort, by every person should be to support maintenance and get them healthy again. Or else there will be more suicides, and I for one cannot stand to bear another.
Join us on our Facebook page to contribute to the discussion so we can all understand what it is like in maintenance in today's Air Force.
Note: In the course of writing this article I learned there were two suicides at Luke Air Force Base since the New Years, and 2 additional suicide attempts at Holloman since the most recent suicide.
Second note: 1 day after writing the last note I learned there was a 3rd suicide at Holloman.