Supply and Services of the RAAF (1971)

By Air Vice-Marshal C. G. Cleary

An equipment assistant uses a fork lift to store cases at a RAAF Base

The supply of all Air Force matérlel, the movement of personnel and equipment, and the provision of works and catering services are the responsibility of the Supply and Equipment Branch of the RAAF.

SUPPLY

Essentially, supply is the process of determining what is required, acquiring the assessed need and distributing it in time to those who will use it. In relation to Air Force supply, however, this definition is deceptively simple. RAAF supply managers are faced with the task of controlling an inventory of nearly three-quarters of a million separately identified supply items.

There are many elements of information about each item which should be known: for example, its essential identifying data, application, cost, supply source, past consumption history and forecast usage, and various accounting and other management control codes.

Air Force supply, therefore, operates against a background of a continuous updating and manipulation of many tens of millions of separate pieces or fields of information. The source of supply is both Australia and overseas and, by the very nature of the inventory, many items of supply have long production lead times. When equipment and supplies are received, they must be distributed to RAAF bases in Australia and South-East Asia in sufficient time to provide the high degree of support required for training and operational commitments in both peace and war. In all these activities, the objective is to make the optimal use of financial and other resources to provide an effective supply system capable of responding quickly to new and changing situations.

The materiel requirements of the RAAF may be considered conveniently as either capital or maintenance. Capital requirements are those new or additional aircraft, weapons, vehicles, telecommunications and other ground support systems and equipment needed to equip the RAAF to fulfil its roles. Planning for the introduction of new aircraft and major systems and equipment must, in most cases, begin some years in advance of the required m-service target date. During the process, the requirement is developed from the conceptual phase to a detailed specification statement.

Those products which may meet the requirement are then evaluated and finally the supplier is selected. The whole process is characterised by exhaustive cost effectiveness studies, and full opportunity and encouragement is given to Australian industry to supply the requirement, either wholly or in part.

Maintenance requirements are those needed to sustain the force and they include, for example, spare engines, aircraft avionic fitments, repair and overhaul parts and fuels and lubricants. For many years, recognition has been given to the value of delegating to depots and units the responsibility for provisioning supplies readily available from commercial sources catering essentially for the civil market.

This is largely achieved by means of period contracts, arranged through the Department of Supply, against which units may order their requirements. The range of supplies available through period contracts is wide indeed, and includes, for example, fuels and lubricants, industrial gases, hand tools, motor transport and works plant spare parts, and foodstuffs. Nevertheless, the greatest proportion of the RAAF's inventory, in terms of both individual supply items and value, is not available from these sources and is provisioned centrally.

It is in the fields of central provisioning and distribution that the system of electronic data processing adopted by the RAAF is now proving of substantial benefit. The depth of the E.D.P supply record extends down to all depot and unit stocks and equipment in use; thus, at any time a complete knowledge of Service-wide assets is available to RAAF supply managers.

The assessed maintenance requirements for the support of new aircraft and systems can be screened against existing assets; if they are sufficient, no immediate new procurement is necessary.

A medical orderly checks stocks in the sick quarters dispensary at RAAF Base, Darwin

When the asset of any particular item falls to or below a level determined by past consumption, future forecast effort and the expected lead time for that item, a computer-produced review is provided for procurement consideration by management. This method has the very great advantage of selectivity and provisioners can confine their attention to those supply items for which there is an apparent need for replenishment procurement.

As the support requirements for new aircraft or systems are received, an initial range is distributed to the operating units. Under an E.D.P. supply system now being introduced progressively, subsequent usage of parts by the units automatically generates issue instructions by the E.D.P. Centre to the appropriate stores depot to replenish the units' stocks. Under this system, specific requisitioning by units is confined to controlled items and abnormal or one-time requirements.

The responsibility for the timely and economical transportation of equipment and personnel throughout the RAAF is vested in A.M.S.E. Branch. This responsibility is discharged through the RAAF Movements Organisation, whose activities are coordinated by the Movements Co-ordination Centre and whose tentacles reach throughout Australia and to Vietnam, Malaysia and Singapore. RAAF equipment and RAAF personnel and their dependants are moved world-wide by all modes of transportation and the RAAF administers the movement of Army and Navy personnel by Qantas charter flights between Australia and Vietnam.

In 1970, the RAAF Movements Organisation moved over 11,000,000 lb of cargo and 2,500 passengers by Hercules aircraft and over 19,000 passengers by Qantas charter aircraft, between Australia and South-East Asia. During the same period some 23,000,000 lb of equipment was transported into the RAAF's bulk stores depots and about 25,000,000 lb of like equipment was transported from the depots, to RAAF user units.

The nature and extent of the RAAF's transportation task is such that only by adopting modern techniques can the organisation meet its commitments in a timely and economical manner. To this end the RAAF is well to the fore in the use of containers and modern aircraft cargo handling equipment. For example the RAAF recently unloaded 60,000 lb of Phantom F4 equipment from a United States Air Force Starlifter aircraft in under nine minutes.

The Directorate of Works of the Supply and Equipment Branch has wide professional engineering responsibilities for the construction of airfields, accommodation, and engineering support and training facilities for the RAAF.

The continuing equipment of the RAAF with modern aircraft and systems has brought with it a need for works facilities of ever-increasing design complexity. Most of the earlier engineering support facilities have had to be replaced, expanded or modernised, new runways built, and existing runways lengthened and reconstructed in concrete or asphalt. Practically all hutted living accommodation has been replaced with permanent buildings designed to modern standards, and married quarters are being built to progressively better standards in numbers fast approaching the goal of accommodating all who seek them. The Directorate of Works is responsible for planning, detailing and processing these works.

No. 5 Airfield Construction Squadron, which is equipped and trained for the rapid construction of jet airfields, recently completed major extensions to the runway and aprons at Amberley, Queensland, and is currently employed on the construction of an airfield at Learmonth, Western Australia.

The catering service of the RAAF is responsible for providing approximately 35,000 meals each day from a ration scale specially designed for the Australian forces.

Additionally, the catering service has the responsibility for in-flight rationing and special hospital and dietary feeding.

The RAAF trains its own catering staff at a Catering School located at Wagga, New South Wales.

The School teaches all aspects of catering, including basic and advanced cooking, hospital cooking and steward services.

The significant number of former RAAF members who graduated from the School during their period of service and now occupy, in civilian life, some of the highest posts in Australia as catering administrators and chefs is a measure of the high standards set by the School.

The RAAF also possesses a fleet of modern, highly specialised, mobile catering units which are uplifted to operational areas, as required, by RAAF transport aircraft.

A full catering service can be provided within hours of the arrival of the units at their destination.

Corporal Allan Williams (Carina Heights, Brisbane), a member of the catering section of No. 7 Stores Depot at Drayton, on the outskirts of Toowoomba, looks proud of his handiwork-a tray full of cream buns.