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Kiowas beef up border security

The first of three-dozen upgraded and overhauled OH-58 Kiowa helicopters are scheduled to arrive on the U.S. border with Mexico this month to boost the National Guard’s support to the U.S. Border Patrol in Operation Jump Start, the Army announced in a press release.

The reconnaissance and surveillance helicopters, most of which are from the Vietnam War era, are being refitted at the Mississippi Army National Guard’s 1108th Aviation Classification Repair Activity Depot at the Trent Lott National Guard Training Complex near the Gulf of Mexico.

Other Kiowas are being worked on at the National Guard’s three other aviation repair depots in California, Connecticut and Missouri, the release said.

Unique to the National Guard, the four sites have wrung decades more service out of the relatively low-cost Kiowas than the aircrafts’ originally projected 20-year lives.

For the border mission, where the Kiowas will help boost the Border Patrol’s ability to spot and interdict those who traffic in people and drugs, the aircraft are being upgraded with a half-dozen 21st-century law enforcement devices.

According to the release, the upgrades include radios that enable National Guard soldiers to communicate with Border Patrol agents and other civilian law enforcement officers; moving maps that show pilots and passengers exactly where they are; radar altimeters that give the exact height above the ground during flight; night-vision equipment; and 2 million candlepower spotlights.

Higher skids are being fitted to raise the height of the helicopter. The aircraft are being rewired, fitted with new monitors and mechanically scrutinized from their rotor blades to their undercarriages.

The soldiers of the 1108th have juggled deployments to Operation Iraqi Freedom and recovery from Hurricane Katrina — which damaged troops’ homes and the hangar where they work — in addition to their contribution to the border mission.

Up to 6,000 National Guard soldiers and airmen are assisting the Border Patrol on the nation’s Southwest border at any given time. President Bush announced Operation Jump Start in May 2006 and the effort could last two years.