http://youtu.be/OqYF6nJkROc
Occupying more than 2 million acres of land across five southern New Mexico counties, White Sands Missile Range is the Department of Defense’s largest land based test range facility. The site conducts weapon systems testing for all branches of the military as well as allied countries and private industries.
Originally founded in 1945 as White Sands Proving Ground, the missile range is home to the Army’s first rocket launch complex as well as the Trinity Site where the first nuclear test was conducted as part of the Manhattan Project during World War II, ushering in the Atomic Age.
U.S. Army Col. David Cheney II assumed command of the White Sands Test Center in June. Col. Cheney said the Test Center employs a wide variety of people doing everything from mining asteroids for water and rocket fuel to conducting pad abort tests that evaluate how well a launch escape system protects the crew of a spacecraft in an emergency.
“We have scientists here, we have all kinds of engineers. Every flavor of engineering is used here at White Sands Missile Range," Cheney said. "We also rely heavily on technicians and folks that aren’t engineers or maybe don’t have a graduate degree or even an undergraduate degree but are very technically savvy and maybe went to tech school and they’re helping integrate new equipment onto vehicles and doing modifications so… it really runs the gamut.”
Engineers like Test Officer Henry Sedillo, who works with customers looking to conduct tests at the site. Sedillo said after stints at NMSU and in the workforce, he attended Doña Ana Community College to pursue an associate’s degree in electronic technology and worked as a student co-op at White Sands.
“I was going for my degree but I wasn’t sure where it was going to lead me. I knew what I wanted to do and I kind of was leaning towards running my own business at one time but then when I started to work at White Sands I started to realize there was more out there than just electronics," Sedillo said.
After finishing community college, Sedillo returned to NMSU to continue his education, earning a bachelor’s degree in engineering technology and master’s in industrial engineering. He said that education has allowed him to grow as an employee in his work with missiles.
“For such missile systems like the Patriot system where it’s a missile air defense system, we are able to shoot down enemy targets, enemy missiles, enemy airplanes and that is directly affecting our soldiers out in the field," Sedillo said.
Col. Cheney said the Test Center is also refocusing its efforts toward testing weapons like directed energy, which use high-powered microwaves or lasers to take down enemy targets.
"You really need direct energy to be able to address some of those threats because they’re very inexpensive like the Katyusha rockets we’re facing in Afghanistan. Those don’t cost very much and they can launch a whole bunch of those at us in a ripple and you need a technology that can address those threats very quickly and accurately and move on to the next threat and that’s what direct energy gives, that’s the potential," Cheney said.
White Sands employs more than 2,300 military and civilian personnel along with more than 2,600 contractors at the site. As one the region’s largest employers, the missile range has a daily estimated economic impact of more than $3 million on employment and nearly $5 million on spending in the region.
Col. Cheney has been decorated with numerous awards and medals including the Bronze Star. But he said beginning his military career with more education in science, technology, engineering and math would have helped.
“I didn’t have the STEM background that I needed. I was an aviator, had a business degree from college and then got into aviation maintenance and then later aviation logistics and then the Army asked me ‘Hey, we want you to do something totally different and figure out how to do Army acquisition work’ and that’s when I got a master’s that was a little more technical," Cheney said. "I had to work really hard to get here and it would have been a lot easier for me if I would have had that STEM background.”
As a commander, Col. Cheney said he values a workforce that understands the success of each mission depends on the entire range working as a team.
“They’re that large and there’re that many different complexities to the test and it requires hundreds of people out there throughout the test event and it’s everything from fuel delivery people to people that help secure the range from people that might be driving through the roads or setting up road blocks or launching the missile, launching the targets, making sure the power, the communications, the network systems are all working. I mean everybody’s important," Cheney said.
White Sands officials said testing weapon systems to ensure they work as intended is helping secure the safety of every soldier, sailor, airman and marine on the battlefront.
