46ª Brigata Aerea
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The 46ª Brigata Aerea “Silvio Angelucci” (Eng. “46th Air Brigade”) is the largest air transport association of the Italian Air Force . The brigade is on the Pisa ( Tuscany stationed) and transport aircraft of type Lockheed C-130 J and Alenia C-27 equipped J.
assignment
In terms of troops, the air transport brigade is subordinate to a support command in Rome-Centocelle (Comando delle Forze di Supporto e Speciali) . Since January 12, 2016, most of the operations have been carried out by the European Air Transport Command in Eindhoven, the Netherlands .
The brigade takes on air transport tasks with its aircraft within a European framework and for all Italian armed forces , unless this is carried out by other associations (e.g. flight readiness in Rome-Ciampino , transport association in Pratica di Mare ). In particular, it supports the Folgore paratrooper brigade in Livorno . Some of the C-130J are also used for air refueling . In addition, she can work on behalf of civil authorities, e.g. B. in disasters or forest fires .
Units of the brigade also take on parts of the pilot training and aircraft maintenance .
organization
The brigade emerged from a previous bomber squadron (46º Stormo) . In Italy , squadrons that have three or more flying groups (in squadron strength ) or special additional units can be raised to brigade level.
The 46th Air Transport Brigade is divided into three units at regimental level , which are further subdivided into groups:
- Reparto Volo (Flying Union with three squadrons)
- 2º Gruppo (11 (K) C-130J)
- 50º Gruppo (10 C-130J-30)
- 98º Gruppo (12 C-27J)
- Gruppo Servizi di Supporto (loading)
- Gruppo Efficienza Aeromobili (maintenance)
- Centro Addestramento Equipaggi (training)
- 446º Reparto STO (Technical Support)
- Gruppo Controllo Spazio Aereo (flight operations, flight planning)
- Gruppo Telematico e Meteo (weather and telecommunications, technology)
- Gruppo Rifornimenti (spare parts warehouse)
- 546º Reparto SLO (logistic support)
- Gruppo Impianti (Infrastructure)
- Gruppo Autotrasporti (road transport)
- Gruppo Sanitario (medical services)
- Gruppo Servizi Vari (fire brigade, supplies, supplies)
In addition to staff and administrative departments, the brigade command is responsible for the operations center and the security group (Gruppo Difesa) , which guards the military part of the airport and defends it if necessary, also against terrorist attacks with weapons of mass destruction .
history
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On February 15, 1940, the 46th bomber squadron (46º Stormo Bombardamento Terrestre) with the flying groups 104 and 105 was set up at Pisa airport . The squadron was equipped with Savoia-Marchetti SM.79 aircraft . In early 1942 it was restructured into a torpedo bomber formation that was deployed across the Mediterranean against the British Royal Navy . During the fight against the British pedestal convoy , u. a. First Lieutenant Silvio Angelucci, after whom the 46th Air Transport Brigade is named today. After an armistice came into force on September 8, 1943 , the remaining aircraft were taken over by the 132º Gruppo ( Carlo Emanuele Buscaglia ). Until 1945 this group fought against German forces that had occupied Italy after the armistice. On July 1, 1944, a new air transport squadron was set up in southern Italy, whose two flying groups 2 and 98 operated with a wide variety of aircraft in Italy and the Balkans.
The air transport squadron stationed at the Rome-Centocelle military airfield at the end of the war was transferred to Pisa in 1949 . There it took over the names and traditions of the 46º Stormo, which was set up at the same location in 1940, and initially received 45 Fairchild C-119 G aircraft . The 50º Gruppo was set up in 1963 with another 22 C-119Js. In the early 1970s, 50º Gruppo received 14 aircraft of the type C-130 E / H Hercules , the other two groups were equipped with aircraft of the type Aeritalia G.222 . The Italian Air Force received a total of 52 copies of the G.222, five of which were operated on behalf of civil protection (including as fire fighting aircraft in the G.222 SAA and SAMA versions) and a few others for special purposes (calibration, electronic warfare, four G .222 RM and two G.222 VS / GE) were stationed at the Pratica di Mare military airfield .
The rapid increase in foreign deployments by the Italian armed forces since the end of the Cold War soon showed that the few worn out C-130E / H Hercules and the many short-haul transporters of the G.222 type no longer met the requirements. Especially with the 50º Gruppo (Hercules) the readiness for action sank to a critical level. For this reason, the Italian government decided not to participate in the Airbus A400M , the introduction of which would have come too late. Instead, they opted for the direct successor of the previous machines, namely the Lockheed Martin C-130J Hercules II and the Alenia C-27 J, because of the many technical similarities (commonality) are also promoted by the manufacturers. Of the new C-130J, 22 aircraft were procured for the 2º and 50º Gruppo, 10 of them in the extended version J-30, and twelve aircraft of the C-27J for the 98º Gruppo. Although the brigade has significantly fewer transport aircraft than in the past, the actual transport capacity and, above all, the operational readiness has increased.
Aircraft of the 46ª Brigata Aerea have been in service on all continents since 1954, including Antarctica , where two Italian research stations were regularly supplied from New Zealand in the 1990s . During the Suez Crisis , an airlift was set up between Naples and Abu Suweir in Egypt in 1956 and 1957 in support of the United Nations Emergency Force . A tragic mission took place in 1961: During the United Nations operation in the Congo , the brigade's planes provided most of the air transport there. After three soldiers had already been killed in an air accident near Luluabourg in February 1961, a bloodbath broke out at Kindu airport on November 11th when around 80 Congolese rebels broke into the UN canteen there and 13 soldiers from the 46. Air transport brigade cruelly killed. In the same month, four other crew members of a C-119 died in another accident in the Congo. In the years that followed, various humanitarian flights were carried out in North and East Africa as well as in the Near and Middle East and Southeast Asia. The most tragic accident in the history of the air transport brigade occurred on March 3, 1977, when a C-130H flew into Monte Serra in poor visibility : In addition to the five crew members, a naval officer and 38 candidate officers of the Accademia Navale died . From 1982 to 1984 the brigade supported a peace operation in Lebanon . From 1991 the use of this type increased by leaps and bounds. On September 3, 1992, a G.222 of the 2º Gruppo was shot down by two 9K31 Strela-1 surface-to-air missiles on a humanitarian mission while approaching Sarajevo , killing the four crew members. In 1994, because of the genocide in Rwanda, several aircraft from the brigade flew to Kigali in order to evacuate Italians and other foreigners there with the support of special forces . After the turn of the millennium, the brigade was able to achieve a very high level of operational readiness thanks to the new aircraft.
On November 23, 2009, a KC-130J crashed near Pisa, killing all five people on board. In November 2013, aircraft from the 46ª Brigata Aerea were dispatched to the Philippines , where they undertook evacuation and transport tasks on site for several weeks after Typhoon Haiyan .