Three California Air Guard Planes Return After 2-Week Supply Trip to Latin America
Three California Air National Guard planes carrying 60 troops returned to Los Angeles Saturday after a two-week stay in Panama and visits to nine other Latin American countries to resupply U.S. embassies.
The first of the C-130 cargo planes, which are part of the guard’s 146th Tactical Airlift Wing, touched down at Van Nuys Airport about 3:30 p.m., ending a 10-hour flight from Howard Air Force Base in Panama.
Col. Tandy K. Bozeman, wing vice commander, said “it was a super operation,” which included surprise flights to Jamaica to provide cots for about 4,000 people left homeless by flooding.
The state’s air national guard has been running supply and training missions to Latin America since 1978 without resistance, but this year the operation was unsuccessfully challenged in court by the Americans for Democratic Action and the National Lawyers Guild. Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Warren Deering rejected the protest and set a July 14 hearing for further arguments.
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