Page 30 - DFCS NEWS MAGAZINE 2018-2
P. 30

2018 Tailhook Convention
Lt. Cmdr. Mike Tremel Awarded DFC
By Chuck Sweeney
DFC Recipient Lt. Cmdr. Mike “MOB” Tremel.
A very historic and unusual event took place on Saturday, September 15, 2018 at Tailhook 2018 in the Nugget Hotel in Sparks, Nevada. It had been fairly well known that a Distinguished Flying Cross was going to be awarded sometime during the awards luncheon by the “Air Boss”, Vice Adm. DeWolfe “Bullet” Miller III.
I was at the luncheon and when I had talked with Admiral Miller previously, he wanted me to have the recipient join the DFC Society. He then suggested that he bring me over to meet the recipient, Lt. Cmdr. Mike Tremel, and his wife Amie before the ceremony, so that I would have some time with them to discuss the Society.
It was an easy sell as Mike immediately said he would join, and Amie took the DFCS application form and said she would make sure he completed it. I then thanked them both and gave Mike a DFCS Challenge Coin. The Air Boss had left and then returned with his wife Ellen. He wanted her to meet this new American Hero.
What did Mike Tremel do to be awarded a DFC with all this fanfare? Rather than my trying to capture the event, I’ll just copy the story sent out by MOAA that does a great job.
Editor's Note: This article by Gina Harkins first appeared on Military.com.
A Navy pilot who took out a Syrian attack jet that was dropping bombs on friendly forces last year - the service's first air-to-air kill since the end of the Cold War - was recognized for his heroism this weekend. Lt. Cmdr. Mike
"MOB" Tremel, an F/A-18E Super Hornet pilot with the Strike Fighter Squadron 87, was awarded the Distinguished Flying
Cross on Saturday during the Tailhook Association's annual conference. The medal is awarded for heroism or extraordinary achievement during aerial flight.
Tremel is credited with shooting down a Syrian Su-22 Fitter attack jet over Raqqa on June 18, 2017. He and his wingman, Lt. Cmdr. Jeff “Jo Jo” Krueger, initially set out from the aircraft carrier George H.W. Bush with two other pilots on what they thought was a close-air-support mission. But the airspace was crowded, and when Tremel split off from the rest to track a Russian aircraft in the area, he spotted a Syrian jet. “Our whole mission out there was to defeat \[the Islamic State group\], annihilate ISIS,” he said at last year's Tailhook symposium. “... At any point in time, if this had de- escalated, that would have been great. We would have gotten mission success and \[gone\] back to continue to drop bombs on ISIS.”
Instead, the Syrian air force attack jet ignored repeated warnings from the Navy pilots about getting too close to friendly forces on the ground. When the Fitter took a dive and began dropping ordnance, Tremel fired off an AIM-9X
Sidewinder missile. When the missile didn't make contact, he let another fly. The second round, a radar-guided AIM- 120 Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missile, or AMRAAM, hit its target. “The aircraft will pitch right and down and pilot will jump out and left in his ejection seat,” Tremel said.
Careful to avoid falling debris, Tremel watched the pilot pass in his ejection seat. The whole thing was over in about eight minutes, according to a Navy news release.
Tremel and Krueger flew back to the carrier as the other pilots continued on with the original close-air support
mission. It had marked the Navy's first air-to-air kill since the fall of the Soviet Union. “I couldn't have done it without the guy sitting next to me, 'Jo Jo,' and the other guys that were airborne,” Tremel said. “It was an absolute team effort, to include all the coordination that went on with the Air Force.”
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