AEDC Spotlight: Eddie Mickle plays integral role in strategic scheduling for facility outages and maintenance

ARNOLD AIR FORCE BASE, TENN. -- Eddie Mickle, AEDC work planner at Arnold Air Force Base, proactively fills a critical need for the Aeropropulsion Combined Test Force by supporting the scheduling for outages and maintenance.
For example, Mickle created a detailed, integrated schedule encompassing every project being worked during the 2017 summer outage.


“Eddie [Mickle] continuously works with project managers to status, revise and deconflict the schedule,” said Maj. Eric Trad, Test Division Operational Officer. “His integrated schedule serves as a valuable tool to assess progress and issues as well as brief Air Force Branch and Division senior leadership. This effort is in addition to his full-time duties as a mechanical work planner for Aeropropulsion.”
Trad stated that Mickle has a strong work ethic and is dedicated to his team.

“Mickle is consistently looking for opportunities to add value to the mission,” he said. “He is eager to help his peers with his knowledge of Microsoft Project as well as the AEDC Enterprise systems. He is a pleasure to know. His magnetic personality leaves most people wishing they had met him sooner in life.”

Whether at his job or outside of the base, Mickle is also known as someone who is always willing to help people.

“In his personal time, Eddie is a Sunday school teacher at Kings Cross where he devotes time enriching lives of local teenagers,” Trad said. “He goes well beyond the confines of church in this role. Eddie supports these teens by attending their extracurricular activities, such as football, basketball, baseball games, and showing them he's genuinely interested in their success.”

Mickle accepted the position of work coordinator last year after serving as a planner for Aeropropulsion CTF for several years.

“As a planner, my role was to assess the ongoing and future maintenance requirements within ETF Plant and produce executable plans and schedules based on system engineering and operations requirements,” Mickle said. “Now as a work coordinator, my role is to maintain an ongoing strategy for integrating maintenance, operations and project requirements across all Aeropropulsion facilities based on the priorities established by NAS (Test Operations and Sustainment contractor) management and our Air Force customer.”

Mickle mentioned that he has had a “rewarding and educational” career with AEDC thus far.

“Starting at Arnold in early 2005, I worked closely with System Engineers and the Air Force to convert and develop the System Safety Hazard Analysis for better communication and accountability of system operational and maintenance risks across the Propulsion Wind Tunnel Facility, von Karman Facility, and Engine Test Facility,” he said. “I enjoyed learning a great deal about numerous systems across AEDC. From there it was a very natural progression for me to move into the work control process and use the system knowledge I had gained in a meaningful way to improve both the health of our facilities and the safety of the skilled personnel working to maintain and improve them.

“My favorite part of my work is the opportunity to interact with possibly the best collection of extremely skilled and intelligent professionals you could find in the world, and know that our efforts indirectly help bring warfighters home to their families.”