Teaching and mentoring -- the opportunity to share knowledge built over a long military career -- is what attracted Patrick Lindy to the job of a Logistics Assistance Representative for the Aviation and Missile Command.
"The best thing I like about being a LAR is working with Soldiers. I like to be out in the field working, training and developing young minds," Lindy said about a job where he gets to work side-by-side with junior Soldiers solving real-time issues with Army aircraft.
"This is the time when Soldiers work one dimensional. That is, they are programmed to use the book. But the utilization of the book is based on the task going according to plan. What happens when the aircraft changes the rules? That's usually when LARs get the call to assist, train and pass on useful knowledge. It's the best part of what LARs do."
Home stationed at Fort Drum, New York, Lindy is now on a six-month deployment in support of a Theater Aviation Brigade at Camp Buehring, Kuwait as the AMCOM Cargo/Utility Helicopter LAR. He provides technical and logistical support to aircraft and their subsystems, which is everything from electrical, hydraulic, propulsion, flight controls and more as well as providing support for anything related to the aircraft interface, which includes special tools, test equipment and support equipment.
"One minute I can be updating the command's web-based aircraft status report," Lindy said. "The next minute I could be rushing out to spend a 12- to 15-hour day trouble shooting a flight control rigging issue with Soldiers on the flight line at a forward operating base that on average sees two to five rockets a week and the flight line seems to be the magnet to which they land. This is just one example of what I do as a LAR in the span of a normal duty day."
Lindy also regularly briefs the brigade's aviation maintenance officers and commanders.
"I work with them on ways to improve maintenance procedures and how to maximize equipment availability at remote locations," he said.
It's a challenging job that keeps Lindy on the move. Lindy especially enjoys the opportunity to work and train Soldiers.
"One of my responsibilities is working with Soldiers on new tasks in the technical manual that they may be unfamiliar with or on applying training to a task," Lindy said.
Lindy's extensive aviation maintenance background include 11 years of military service and 11 years as a contractor with three of the four aircraft platforms -- UH-60 Black Hawk, CH-47 Chinook and OH-58 Kiowa Warrior -- currently in use by Army aviators. He has also had training with computers utilizing the automated logbook system currently fielded by the Army (ULLSA). In his civilian career, working in contract maintenance and on maintenance road teams across the U.S. has helped improve his experience.
Lindy was working as a mechanic for a contractor when a friend of his, who had at the time about 20 years as an AMCOM LAR, told Lindy he could put his experience to work in supporting Soldiers by becoming a LAR. Lindy then met a few LARs at Fort Drum and decided they were doing the kind of work that he would enjoy.
"I saw what they were doing -- assisting and training Soldiers, trouble shooting aircraft and providing in-depth research on repairs to the various aircraft assigned to the brigade -- and that was what I wanted to do. That was the point where I knew I wanted to become a LAR," Lindy said.
Although he may appear to be on his own during a deployment, Lindy is one of many deployed LARs who rely on an AMCOM team of item managers, program managers and logistics managers back at the AMCOM headquarters on Redstone Arsenal to get the job done. He also works with LARs and unit commanders in other theater locations to ensure that needed parts are expedited from one location to another.
"The process we have set up gives the commanders the ability to increase their readiness rate by repairing the aircraft in a shorter time period," Lindy said.
Just like Soldiers, LARs deploy. Lindy has deployed four times, in 2008-09 to Iraq, in 2010-11 and in 2013-14 to Afghanistan, and now in Kuwait. Like a Soldier, they, too, have to address the difficulties of family separations.
"For me, it's a little bit different as I have an autistic son and a wife who is a true trooper when it comes to juggling our son's needs, the home issues, maintenance requirements that always happen while I am gone and emergency situations that you can't be there for," he said.
The stresses of the job can get to a LAR, just like they do to a Soldier.
"There are the nights when you're trouble shooting aircraft and the bad guys decide to drop rockets on the airfield. Or, on nights when you do get to sleep, the rockets drop so close to where you sleep it knocks everything off the walls," Lindy said. "It's what we do and what we signed up for. It's not a 40-hour-a-week job. You're on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week. For me, it's why I like the job."
For Lindy, a successful aviation LAR is someone who has a well-rounded and extensive knowledge of mechanical and electrical skills that fit multiple aircraft as well as the logistics knowledge about how to get parts delivered quickly when and where they are needed.
"You have to be able to think outside the box when it comes to meeting challenges," he said.
"You also have to have a thick skin. As a LAR, we are AMCOM to the commanders and the brigade's aviation maintenance officers and the Soldiers in the field. If something doesn't go right, the LAR is the one who hears about it. The LAR must be the liaison and relay actions back to higher headquarters and to the program managers so that they can get the information commanders need to make decisions that usually always affect mission readiness. And, when necessary, the LAR has to be able to say 'No.' It's not the answer they may like, but it comes down to safety. On the other side, a LAR must be able to tactfully challenge or question things when headquarters makes decisions that they don't agree with. They have to be able to articulate their position in a way that both parties can see each other's point of view."
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