West takes over 1st SOW

HURLBURT FIELD, Fla. -- Col. Bill West took command of the 1st Special Operations Wing during a change of command ceremony Wednesday. West, a navigator, comes to Hurlburt from his position as commander of the 27th Special Operations Group at Cannon Air Force Base in New Mexico. West succeeds Col. Jim Slife, who has headed the wing for two years. The 1st SOW oversees operations at Hurlburt Field, the most deployed installation in the Air Force. It employs more than 8,700 airmen and almost 2,000 civilians. During Slife’s command, the wing was in a near-constant state of deployment, conducting combat operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, the Philippines, Libya, South America and the Horn of Africa. (Source: Northwest Florida Daily News, 07/03/13) Previous