TIME magazine recognizes Airman in top 100

by Maj. David Small
National Media Outreach Office

4/29/2010 - NEW YORK (AFNS) -- TIME magazine editors have named Chief Master Sgt. Antonio D. Travis to the 2010 TIME 100, the magazine's annual list of the 100 most influential people in the world for his efforts after the Haiti earthquake.

Chief Travis was one of the first U.S. military members on the ground at the Toussaint L'Ouverture International Airport in Port au Prince, Haiti, only 30 hours after the earthquake and less than 12 hours after the nation's president requested U.S. assistance. The chief led a team of special tactics Airmen from the 23rd, 21st and 123rd special tactics squadrons.

With his team of combat veterans, Chief Travis led the largest single-runway operation in history, using hand-held radios to control thousands of aircraft. Their air traffic control tower was a card table set up next to the airport's runway.

"Twenty-eight minutes after touchdown, we controlled the first air landing followed immediately by a departure, and we did not slow down for the next 12 days," said Chief Travis, who hails from Nelson County, Ky.

After establishing control of the airfield there, his team orchestrated an orderly flow for incoming aircraft and dealt with the constraints of the inadequate airfield, which potentially could have limited relief operations. Facing 42 aircraft jammed into a parking ramp designed to accommodate 10 large planes, untangling the gridlock was the first of many seemingly insurmountable challenges necessary to facilitate the flood of inbound relief flights.

In the dawn of the U.S. response to the Haitian crisis, Chief Travis coordinated with Miami FAA officials via text messaging on his Blackberry. His ingenuity paid massive dividends as priority aircraft transited the small airport, delivering lifesaving water, food and medical supplies in support of the U.S. Agency for International Development-led international humanitarian effort.

From chaos, Chief Travis established order as his combat controllers reduced a four-hour hold time in the air on day one to less than two hours on day two and less than 15 minutes by day three.

For 12 days, 24 hours a day, the airfield team ran the international airport in Port au Prince. Together with more than 200 other Airmen from Hurlburt Field, Fla., they tirelessly ensured the safe and effective control of more than 4,000 takeoffs and landings, an average of one aircraft operation every five minutes, and enabled the delivery of 4 million pounds of humanitarian relief to the people of Haiti.

Without computers or electricity, Chief Travis and his team controlled as many as 250 aircraft a day, exceeding the normal capacity of the airfield by 1,400 percent without a single incident. By Jan. 25, his team was able to hand operations over to Air Force air traffic controllers with a portable control tower.

While directing the airfield operations, Chief Travis also supervised a group of pararescuemen, or PJs, and medical technicians who augmented a search and rescue team from Virginia. These teams were credited with 13 technical rescues and 17 additional saves. Additionally, the special tactics Airmen he led surveyed nearly 100 sites for use as potential humanitarian relief supply delivery sites. His teams' technical expertise and unflagging commitment ultimately led to successful air deliveries by C-17 Globemaster IIIs of humanitarian aid including more than 150,000 bottles of water and 75,000 Meals Ready to Eat that was subsequently delivered to earthquake victims by helicopter.

Chief Travis is the chief enlisted manager of the Air Force Special Operations Training Center at Hurlburt Field, Fla. He served seven and a half years in the Marine Corps before transferring into the Air Force as a combat controller in 1993.

As a senior combat controller, he has supported combat, combat support, humanitarian and search and rescue operations throughout the United States, Pacific and European theaters and many austere locations across the globe.

Chief Travis is married to the former Andrea Lawrence of Bardstown, Ky. Their children are Brittany, 21; Amanda, 19; and Emily, 15.

Like Army Rangers and Navy SEALS, Air Force Special Tactics Airmen are an elite force of special operators. They are combat controllers, who conduct tactical airfield operations and close air support; PJs, who conduct combat search and rescue; special operations weathermen, who provide tactical weather forecasting and environmental reconnaissance; and tactical air controllers, who integrate close air support into special operations missions.

TIME's full list and related tributes of all those honored appear in their May 10 issue, available on newsstands April 30 and online.

The list, now in its seventh year, recognizes the activism, innovation and achievement of the world's most influential individuals. As TIME's managing editor Rick Stengel has said of the list in the past, "The TIME 100 is not a list of the most powerful people in the world, it's not a list of the smartest people in the world, it's a list of the most influential people in the world. They're scientists, they're thinkers, they're philosophers, they're leaders, they're icons, they're artists, they're visionaries. People who are using their ideas, their visions, their actions to transform the world and have an effect on a multitude of people."