Submitted Photo A B-52H Stratofortress assigned to the 69th Bomb Squadron takes flight during Global Thunder 25 exercise at Minot Air Force Base on Oct. 24. While Minot AFB personnel were involved in the exercise they were asked to send jets and personnel overseas for an overseas mission. U.S. Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Trust Tate.

MINOT AIR FORCE BASE – Personnel at Minot Air Force Base were involved in two significant events taking place at the same time recently.

Col. Jesse Lamarand, commander of the 5th Bomb Wing, said a Global Thunder 25 exercise was conducted over two weeks in October and in the middle of it, they were requested to generate fully loaded jets to send them overseas.

The result was Minot AFB personnel were doing an exercise while simultaneously transitioning several hundred airmen for a different mission of rapid-response force.

“Your support enables us to do that,” Lamarand told members of the Minot Area Chamber EDC’s Military Affairs Committee at its Nov. 7 meeting.

Global Thunder 25 is an annual command and control exercise to train U.S. Strategic Command forces and assess joint operational readiness. Personnel with the 5th Bomb Wing and also 91st Missile Wing at Minot AFB were involved in that exercise.

U.S. Central Command confirmed in early November that B-52 bombers from Minot AFB’s 5th Bomb Wing had deployed to the Middle East.

Central Command’s area of responsibility includes 21 nations and stretches from Northeast Africa across the Middle East to Central and South Asia, according to command information.

U.S. Air Forces in Europe announced recently that four B-52s deployed to RAF Fairford in the United Kingdom for a Bomber Task Force. Those planes were from Barksdale AFB, Louisiana.