Story posted Thursday, January 28, 2010
Resident Pilot Part Of Haiti Relief
By TOM ROBB Journal & Topics Reporter
Elk Grove native U.S. Air Force Squadron Cmdr. Capt. Gina Stramaglio took off from Port-au-Prince the day of the quake just before it hit and returned the next day. On her return to Haiti, she medevaced out a young girl with two broken legs to Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., but not before being diverted to Jamaica because her landing gear malfunctioned.
When a devastating earthquake struck Haiti earlier this month, 34-year-old U.S. Air Force Squadron Cmdr. Capt. Gina Stramaglio of Elk Grove Village had just taken off from Port-au-Prince.
The death toll from the quake is estimated in the hundreds of thousands.
Stramaglio quickly returned to Port-au-Prince bringing doctors and supplies in and victims out.
The 458th Air Lift Squadron she commands has been continuing those missions daily since the quake and will continue for at least the next month if not longer.
Stramaglio might have been on the ground in Haiti herself when the quake struck had a routine operational change at the last minute not sent her to nearby Santo Domingo.
She would have stayed at the Montana Hotel in Port-au-Prince that collapsed in the quake.
After the quake, Stramaglio's squadron was put on alert. She flew supplies in on her small C-21 jet usually used for special operations forces missions, VIP and medical transports and medevaced patients out.
On her first trip back to Haiti just after the quake, she described the skies over the island as chaotic, filled with aircraft of all types from all over the world trying to land supplies in the crippled single runway Port-au-Prince airport.
Once on the ground, chaos continued. The air traffic control tower was deemed unsafe after the quake causing controllers to run flight operations from the ground. Haitian ground controllers were in charge of aircraft approaches but U.S. military personnel were controlling landings.
Challenges continued on Stramaglio's first medevac mission out with a young girl who broke both her legs in the quake. The landing gear did not retract after take off from Haiti and Stramaglio was forced to divert her flight to Kingston, Jamaica.
In Kingston, she met another pilot trying to get clearance to land in Haiti with 19 desperately needed Haitian doctors among a long back log of planes.
Breaking regular protocols, Stramaglio made a call to Central Command headquarters in Florida and got the doctors' plane quick clearance to land.
After repairs to Stramaglio's plane were complete, she brought the young girl to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, for treatment.
Stramaglio is no stranger to difficult flying conditions. Since earning her spot as an Air Force pilot in October 2001 she has had 12 deployments of three to six months each to Iraq and Afghanistan since 2004, flying over 350 combat missions on all types of aircraft including airborne refueling tankers.
One of Stramaglio's early missions included an April 2004 flight to rescue Marines pinned down in battle in Iraq. One of the Marines in the battle was Elk Grove Village resident Lance Cpl. Phillip Frank. Frank was killed in that battle. His parents went on to form the Heart of a Marine Foundation in his memory.
After graduating Prospect High School in 1994, Stramaglio went on to Loyola University in Chicago. She intended to go to medical school but a trip to Italy changed all that.
While in Italy in her senior year of college, Stramaglio toured former concentration camps and met World War II veterans. After meeting with the veterans and seeing the camps Stramaglio called her mother to tell her she would not be a doctor but would join the Air Force as a pilot.
"I wanted to preserve what these men and women fought for," said Stramaglio. Upon hearing the news, Stramaglio's mother, Karen Stramaglio, told the Journal she choked up.
Karen said she raised her daughter to be a volunteer and dragged her along to homeless shelters as a child when she volunteered. She said she supported her daughter's choice whole-heartedly and was very proud of her.
Turning to the skies was not a big surprise to Karen. Gina earned her civilian pilot's license before joining the Air Force.
Since coming back from the Middle East, Stramaglio has been able to visit home more often as she is stationed at Scott Air Force Base in southern Illinois.
Speak Out!
Comments are edited first by Journal staff before running in print and appearing online.