6th/927th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron Receive Secretary of Defense Maintenance Award Published Nov. 7, 2009 By Captain Shane O. Huff 927th Air Refueling Wing Public Affairs Office MACDILL AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. -- The 2009 Secretary of Defense Maintenance Awards program was recently held in Phoenix, AZ. The Secretary honors six field-level military maintenance organizations for outstanding performance. The awardees are two from each category of small, medium, and large organizations and are chosen from active and reserve organizations that peform unit or field-level maintenance. The 6th/927th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron was a recipient of the Secretary of Defense Field-Level Mainteance Awards for small organizations. They provide on-equipment maintenance for 16 KC-135R/T aircraft. The squadron clearly excelled during this past year: lengthy deployments to 9 different locations, 3,225 sorties, 17,795 flight hours, and offloading more than 186 million pounds of fuel, all while integrating a newly transformed Air Force Reserve Command unit and achieving several Air Mobility Command best maintenance indicators. The reserve unit increased the squadron's flying hours and sortie commitments by more than 35 percent.