Air traffic control legend participates in ceremony Published Oct. 5, 2011 By Airman 1st Class Jake Eckhardt 375th Air Mobility Wing Public Affairs Scott Air Force Base, Ill. -- Retired Col. Derrel Dempsey pinned on Airman 1st Class Kyle Owens' occupational badge at his upgrade-training completion ceremony at the air-traffic control tower Sept. 27 at Scott Air Force Base. "I feel like I don't deserve it," said Owens. "But, it's a great honor." Owens' wife, Casey, works at the Cambridge House, an assisted living home in O'Fallon, where the retired air traffic controller now lives. "When she asked me to come pin-on Airman Owens, I jumped at the chance," said Derrel Dempsey, a former air-traffic controller. Both Owens and Dempsey were inspired by the same thing. "My dad was an air traffic controller," said Owens, an Operational Support Squadron air traffic controller. "I'm just trying to be like him." Dempsey said, "One thing that really encouraged me to come was the fact that his father is an air traffic controller. So, it runs in the family. That, to me, was pretty neat." Dempsey said he felt a great deal of respect to be a part of the upgrade ceremony. "It's an honor for me. And that's coming from a bona-fide air-traffic controller who spent at least 25 years directly associated with the air-traffic control system." Dempsey has 30 years of Air Force aviation experience as chief of air traffic control, flight inspection pilot, radar approach control and control tower officer and air traffic control staff officer at various assignments around the world. He was the supervisor of the largest military air traffic control organization in the free world. He also pursued wartime aircraft surge launch and recovery procedures doubling the capability to launch and recover fighter forces during wartime and contingencies, initiated a program to develop chemical warfare capabilities for air traffic controllers and developed air traffic control enlisted and officer career development and training programs. During Vietnam, he logged 1,000 combat-coded flying hours in the C-140A Jetstar and eventually earned pilot qualifications in 10 different Air Force aircraft. "I have gotten hit twice by ground fire in the Jetstar," said Dempsey. "I love that airplane. It's a pilots dream." As chief of air traffic control and landing systems at the Air Force Communication Service from 1977 to 1979, he defended Air Force budgets of more than $200 million to modernize tactical and fixed air traffic control and landing systems. In his final assignment as deputy chief of staff for Air Force Communication Command's air traffic services, he deployed more than 642 combat-ready Air Force air traffic controllers to 75 Federal Aviation Administration facilities during the 1981 air traffic controller strike. After he retired from the Air Force in 1984, Mr. Dempsey worked another 10 years as a civilian contractor for the modernization of air traffic control systems. The Colonel Derrel L. Dempsey Officer of the Year Award was once known as the Air Force's Annual Air Traffic Officer of the Year Award, but was changed in his honor.