Alabama Aviation Center and L-3 Army Fleet Support establish a formal alliance
Dr. Vicky Ohlson, Interim President of Enterprise State Community College, and Mike Barbee, Vice President/General Manager of L-3 Army Fleet Support signed a Memorandum of Understanding between Enterprise State Community College and L-3 Army Fleet Support. L-3 Army Fleet Support, (AFS) has provided quality aviation maintenance support to the United States Army Aviation Center of Excellence and United States Air Force at Fort Rucker, Alabama for more than a decade. AFS proudly supports its primary customer, the Aviation Center Logistics Command (ACLC) in providing safe and reliable helicopters to train U.S. Army and Air Force aviators in a realistic and challenging training environment.
AFS maintains a highly experienced, trained and dedicated workforce. Whether maintenance on the flight lines, managing supplies at the warehouse, or ensuring quality across the contract, AFS employees are the key to success. They take pride in the work they do to support Fort Rucker, their nation, and local communities.
“We are very proud to collaborate with an outstanding academic institution like ESCC,” Mike Barbee said at the signing. “Much of our work force, principally aircraft mechanics, received their Airframe and Powerplant (A&P) training and certification through ESCC’s Alabama Aviation Center. So in reality AFS and ESCC have been informally linked for quite some time. This MOU we’re signing today both formalizes and improves that collaboration between the two. And we both benefit from this collaboration. For ESCC, they get industry feedback and recommendations on curriculum, as well as increased employment pathways for their graduates.”
“Together, the two organizations have historically worked to train and employ a qualified workforce for the maintenance and repair of the Army’s fleet of aircraft at Fort Rucker. Today, through the signing of an official memorandum, we strengthen that relationship so that together we can continue to fulfill this critical mission,” said Dr. Vicky Ohlson. “Only with the help of our industry collaborators, like L-3 AFS, will we be able to accomplish this task. This is what makes today’s event so important. In establishing a formal alliance, we jointly commit to help each other meet the aviation maintenance workforce challenges of today and the future. I am very excited that the leadership of ESCC, the AAC, and L-3 AFS share this common goal and I look forward to seeing how our cooperation shapes the success of Army Aviation at Fort Rucker and changes the lives of the students we serve.”