 Welcome back to the Cyber Underground. I know you missed me. It's been two weeks. I'm here again. I'm Dave. We call me the professor now. We can't do the cyber guy, but that's okay. This is Cyber Underground. And once again, I work for the University of Hawaii Cappy Aligning Community College. I'm the IT program director out there. And I teach ethical hacking and network security. And I do the show to keep everyone up to date on the tips, tricks, patches, and fixes to keep you safe in the cyber world. I just thought that up. That's pretty handy, right? But today we have a guest that is going to talk about protecting us in the physical space, which is a lot of the cybersecurity protection that we forget on a daily basis. So we're going to talk about physical security today. And one of the neatest pieces of physical security is the United States Air Force, Marine Corps, Navy. All those forces have air support. And today we're going to talk about one of the neatest programs stationed right here in Hawaii, the F-22 Raptor. And with my guest, Danielle Lewis. Hi. Welcome to Cyber Underground. Thank you. All right. Tell us everything top secret. No, okay. So we've got to keep you safe, right? Fine. You run the Raptor program, but first of all, build us up. How did you actually get into this and become the person you are in the program right now and then get shipped off to Hawaii? How'd that happen? Yeah, so this all started 21 years ago. Long time ago. Okay, so you were in fourth grade? Not necessarily. After I graduated high school, I actually joined the Air Force. And it took me to a bunch of different bases. I went to Japan and then Belgium and then California. Good thing you thank you for serving. Yeah, terrific. And then my last duty station was here, so I did 12 years in the military. And I just loved Hawaii so much that I asked to stay and I didn't get to stay. So I ended up leaving the military. And since then I've been a defense contractor. I like that. So we're going to ship you off. No, you're not. I quit. Yeah, so now I just do the same job almost. How'd you get the gig? Just instilling clothes. Was it just out there and you applied? USAjobs.com? No, it wasn't that easy. I had to start from the bottom again. So I had to start fixing computers, fixing motherboards and everything on Pearl Harbor. And then from then I transitioned over to being one of the system administrators for the F-22. And then I had to leave that position for a little bit and I worked for the Navy. And then I got the job back as the lead. So you worked your way up? I did. All the way down from underneath the running cables, fixing mainboards, all the way up to... What's your actual title now? Right now I am the IMS lead, the Hickam IMS lead. What's an IMS? IMS is the maintenance system that's used to document all of the maintenance on the F-22. So originally, back in the day when I first started, all of the maintenance that was documented, in order to go out to the plane, he would take out basically a book that had all of the maintenance tasks that he was supposed to do on the plane. We've since upgraded. What color? The owner's manual? Yeah. Yeah. So we've only got 3500 hours to get a cheesy oil and... Exactly. Exactly. So now we have a laptop that basically connects to the plane and it can give you all of... It can give you the configuration of the plane and everything that needs to be done. It tells the maintainers what they're supposed to do for the plane next. It can also open doors and do whatever needs to be done. And then from that, that's a laptop and then we control the servers and then the entire database. So this also takes information about pilot behavior, right? So you can hear everything the pilot's saying. There's a forward camera, I'm assuming. You can see what the pilot was doing, what the maneuvers were. You can correlate if there is an error, you can see if it was actually pilot error or a system error. Yeah. So while the plane is in the air, everything is being documented and when they land, they do a debrief on the jet. So the maintainers get the status of the jet and the pilots do put their comments in and everything is documented on this IT-driven jet. It's just like a lot of hard work. For a pilot who is a human, you think he just gets in the cockpit, flies the plane, and gets out and goes home. But he documents everything and has to put in his comments after the flight. So how long does that debrief take? Oh, the debrief can be really fast. I mean, depending on how the flight was, the debrief can take 10 to 15 minutes. It's not very fast. I mean, it's not slow at all. So the hard work's being done by you guys? The hard work's being done by the computers. Oh, that's nice. Yeah, so we just have to make sure that the data is always available and that everything is running smoothly with the system. Now I'm hoping that if the computers aren't working right in a plane, the pilot can take over. Yes, absolutely. Good. I was hoping that because I'd hate to be in a plane. Oh, the computer's not working. I have to reboot. While I reboot, I'm falling to the earth. That's not really fun, right? That doesn't happen, right? I think you can actually reboot the jet in the air, too. There's too many movies about that. I guess it's science-tracked. I think they do the same thing on the commercial planes that you fly into. They just reboot the computer while they're in the air. That's a little scary to think about. While I'm back there with my gummy bears and watching the movie, they're rebooting the plane. That's why the movie went away for a couple of minutes. I don't think your movie will go away. Oh, it's just a little scary. But you guys do some incredible work. And the F-22 Raptor program, are those the jets that we see flying out above Honolulu Airport? You do. You'll see them flying almost twice a day. Like a pair of them at a time? Yeah, typically four to six, eight sometimes to go up at a time. That's a sortie. Yeah, that is considered a sortie. So they'll go up and do training missions. We have to speak to people who don't speak aeronautical language. They're in the cheap seats. And it's most people that deal with binary only. So the sortie is kind of a flight operation you do. It's in the air, right? And you come back and you debrief from the sortie. It's also during wartime, right? A sortie is a flight mission. Yeah. Same thing. Great. So you fly five or six sorties a day? No, it really depends. Typically it's two sorties a day. And what is the purpose of that? Just to keep the pilot familiar with the aircraft? Yeah, so the pilot has to have so many hours in the aircraft. And then they have to do their training. So they'll go up in the air and then they'll do the training that they need to do and come back down. A gorgeous view. I've seen them take off at sunset. I know, right? And you must just be spectacular. I'm so jealous. Yeah, and a lot of people don't know Hickam and Pearl also share a lot of the tarmac or the runway with Honolulu International Airport for the long strips of runway, right? So I see them coming out almost as the same. Okay, so the people who aren't from Hawaii have a beach, a lot of golf courses, I golf. And we were down there at Oneham Coral Creek and we just watched all these great, incredible military aircraft go over our head one day. And I'd never seen the B-2 bomber. It flew right overhead. Oh yeah. I'd never seen an F-22 up close. And of course one right after the other flew right overhead. It's an amazing experience and not quiet. You're right. They're a little loud. So the headgear, do you ever go on the tarmac and have to wear the headgear? I do. And I've been working on the program now for over five years and it never gets old twice a day. It's always an exciting job. I could be on the tarmac every time. And you do this five days a week. It's a regular job for you? Or just like rotating shifts, I would imagine? Well, yeah. So there's eight of us that run the IT program. So, I mean, we have shifts from five in the morning until 10 at night. So we just make sure everything is covered. They might start flying at eight in the morning. So we go in early to make sure that everything's taken care of. Can you share the support capacity? I mean, how many of the IT people does it take to manage how many planes? Well, so we actually provide a couple of different aspects of support. So we have the day-to-day support while the planes are here. But recently we just came back from a trip to Vegas and we'll send the administrators. Because wherever they go, we go also. So depending on the mission, we might take a laptop computer or we might actually take the whole server set. With this one, we'll take the whole server set. And we send three administrators. And you have to go to Vegas? Yeah. That's a rough deal. Wow, how do you handle it? It's ridiculous. Yeah. Bear and Guam and just all the really nice places. Actually, Guam is really hot. You know, it is. It's really, it's very humid compared to here, too. I understand it. I remember walking, it's like walking in jacuzzi. Yeah. I thought we were humid, but that's a whole another level. Vietnam hot. But wow, does that change the dynamics of the flight path and the glide path and the takeoff speeds when it gets super hot and super humid for those aircraft? I know some aircraft can't take off in Arizona because their wind configuration doesn't pull enough lift at high temps. Does that ever happen to one of your aircraft or can you share that? I think that's more of a maintainer question for the IT aspect. You never have to cancel flights together with weather conditions? Oh, yeah, sometimes they will. Really? Definitely. Does it have to be severe? I think it, well, it depends on how much maintenance you want to do on the aircraft afterwards, I think, or how critical the mission would be. So it takes a toll. It does. And that costs a lot of money. Yeah. Right? So your budget's got to be fairly high, right? I would imagine a certain amount of hours put in a normal, say, a C-150 Cessna aircraft after 500 hours, you've got to rebuild, right, or 5,000 hours, how many hours it is. And rebuilding the engine can cost a lot of money, but I would imagine an F-22 Raptor, multi-million dollar aircraft, just a little maintenance is like working out a Ferrari, right? So your budget must be huge. So that's how you trim your budget. You only fly under good conditions unless you have to. Well, not necessarily just under good conditions. I mean, they have their, it's a balance. They have to get the pilot hours. They have to get the training. So when you're deployed, it just depends on what the situation is, but they have to meet all of those qualifications. Is there a simulator that simulates just this kind of aircraft that the pilots have to do simulators to, right? Yeah. And we have one on Higgum. Okay. Just one. Well, no, there's multiple simulators in there. There's a facility that they have the simulators in. So I'm not part of the simulator. It's a completely different program. Oh. That's run by a different company. I always had the question, though, if they have a simulator, can that simulator emulate different planes, or do you have to have one per aircraft? No, I think it's per aircraft. Wow. That's a lot of money. Because that's an IT driven party. But it's keeping you safe. It's true. And I hear that the jets going over and I was, I went down to Orlando as part of my tour many years ago when I was in the Marines. And they said every time the jets flew over, that was a sound of freedom. And it just stuck with me. And that's what we like to say also. Yes. The sound of freedom. Yes. In addition to the F-22s, what other aircraft do you have to share the tarmac with or share the hangar space with? You have many different coming and going all the time, right? Well, sometimes we do exercises with a couple of different planes. Like sometimes we have the F-35s come in or F-16s. But that's really just ramp space that's shared. But the F-22 here has their own squadron and they don't have to share hangar space. They have their own squad. You've got your own hangar. That must be a nice program. That's pretty nice. Do you do this like Monday through Friday or is this a seven day a week thing? Well, it's a guard unit. So we're Monday through Friday. But it is a guard unit here in Hawaii. And then when they do their drill weekends, we work their drill weekends with them also. So we do the one week a month with them. So this is a permanent duty station for you. Now you can stay in Hawaii. I plan to stay in Hawaii as long as possible. I mean, it's been 13 years now. You gave up a career in the Air Force at 12 years in. I did. For Hawaii. I'm always curious. How come? Well, I had my daughter. I brought her here when she was about three. And it just seemed like an amazing place to raise kids. And being a part of the community and seeing how she was, I mean, she's basically being raised by other parents too. There's so many people that are involved with her. I couldn't imagine leaving here. What were you from originally? South Carolina. Little town in South Carolina. There are a lot of big towns in South Carolina. I don't think there's that. Well, compared to here, it's nothing like Hawaii. Yeah, we got one big. And it's not even big. It's going to Lulu. It's just packed to the brim with people at it. Is it a big city compared to South Carolina? Absolutely. Is it really? Oh, yes. Okay. Compared to where I grew up. Yes. How many people were you? Well, we had one high school, but it was a high school that was a feeder school. So there was a bunch of schools from around the town that came in, or all around. Yeah. And I mean, we had 2000 people in the high school, but we had a Walmart and we had a little Walmart. Walmart. Yeah, we had a Walmart. That makes you bigger than a little town. Yeah, having a Walmart. Having a Walmart. You know, that's a gathering place. Yeah. We have our Walmart downtown in Honolulu. I'm sure you've been there to our audience out there. Please visit Walmart as soon as you can. Go there at about one or two a.m. And downtown Honolulu, it's the best people watching that you're ever going to experience. It's hilarious. The guy with the flippers and the 2-2 was the best. Which one? Well, there was more. I'm sure there's plenty. Okay. Let's get back to your F-22 before we're going to take a break. Pay a few bills. We have to run some commercials. Maybe I'll be one of them. You'll see them on the screen. And then we'll start talking about some more of the F-22 Raptor Program. Sounds good. Till then, stay safe. Hey, Loja. My name is Andrew Lanning. I'm the host of Security Matters Hawaii, airing every Wednesday here on Think Tech Hawaii, live from the studios. I'll bring you guests. I'll bring you information about the things in security that matter to keeping you safe, your co-workers safe, your family safe, to keep our community safe. We want to teach you about those things in our industry that may be a little outside of your experience. So please join me because Security Matters. Aloha. Hey, Stan the Energyman here on Think Tech Hawaii. And they won't let me do political commentary. So I'm stuck doing energy stuff. But I really like energy stuff. So I'm going to keep on doing it. So join me every Friday on Stan the Energyman at lunchtime, at noon, on my lunch hour. We're going to talk about everything energy, especially if it begins with the word hydrogen. We're going to definitely be talking about it. We'll talk about how we can make Hawaii cleaner, how we can make the world a better place, just basically save the planet. Even Miss America can't even talk about stuff like that anymore. We got it nailed down here. So we'll see you on Friday at noon with Stan the Energyman. Aloha. Welcome back to Cyber Underground. I'm Dave the Professor. I'm here with Danielle Lewis, who manages the F-22 Raptor program. And welcome back. Thanks. And that's a guard unit. Describe the guard for people who don't know what we're talking about. It's not the U.S. Air Force. It's- Well, this- Is the Air National Guard? They work for the Air Force. So they're part of the guard. But- What's the relationship there? I don't even know if I can really understand that relationship as a contractor in this quadrant. But it's different from the Air Force than the aspect of- Normally in the Air Force, in active duty, you transition bases every three or four years. But these guys are typically from Hawaii. They've lived- They're born here. And then they're in the unit for a full 30 years. So they stay in the one unit. So they have transitioned- So the F-22 came here in 2009. So these guys transitioned from the previous aircraft. So this is a fifth generation aircraft. And they transitioned from the fourth generation aircraft. So these guys have- Normally in the Air Force, when you travel around, you might travel around to the same platform at different bases. But these guys get different planes at the same base. And they're basically a family. They have grown up together, starting from when their career started until some of the guys I see now are retiring. And they've been working together for the past 30 years. So it's a really unique situation. When you come in, people are really smart and they really know their jobs. So I come in and have to- as somebody from the mainland and working with them, it's a really interesting dynamic. It's a hard transition from mainland to Hawaii. It's a different transition. Even though it came from small town. When I came over here from LA, a big transition for me. People care more. People are concerned more. They're a lot more polite. They're concerned more about the- Well, everybody's connected here. So if you do one thing to somebody, it's somebody's cousin. And there's this butterfly effect around the whole island. So you always got to be on high alert, right? It's just like a real family. So they grew up together. So do you have to break up fistfights over the Nintendo? No, so there's the military aspect of this also. So there's no fistfights over the Nintendo. They still have their military rank and they still have to- They get to stay in line. Yes. Pretty much. This is a big squadron enlisted. Officers. Total. A lot of numbers. Little numbers. Yeah, so I'm not exactly sure how many people are in this squadron, but it is a decent sized squadron. So we have the F-22 side and then there's logistics, there's supply, and there's also the canker side also. So every bit of it combines. So everybody supports each other. What is the actual mission of your unit? So the mission is, so we're one of the six combat coded missions for the Air Force. So Hawaii has the fifth generation F-22 for that. And then aside from that, they also are part of the Hawaii Alert mission. So these jets, if anything happens, they can be up in the air at a moment's notice. So they can scramble and go check things out when something hits the radar inside of our airspace? Absolutely. Okay, and inside of our international waters? Because both are a little slower. Yes. Yeah, you can send a ship out, but the plane is so much faster, right? So you're in the air in a couple of minutes, and I would expect you guys can get anywhere in the islands in a couple of minutes. Yes, they can get wherever they need to go. They can help me commute every day, because that would be awesome. It's a one-seater. Oh. So, and they didn't make any two-seaters, not even my trainer. I lost more of the weight. I can get in the side. No. You've tried. You've never worked. I would, if all people, I would fit, and I haven't been able to do it. That's a big question I had too. You know, when I was in the military, some of my friends were turned down for pilot training because they were too tall. So is there a maximum height you can be to fit in these planes? I think there is, and I think there's a minimum height also, because I don't meet the minimum height requirement. Well, you can't see with an egg. I don't know. I can't see. There's no booster seat they put in the plane. Maybe I can't reach the pedals. So, yeah, I'm about 5'10". So I was right in the money, but my friend, it was about 6'5". And he said, no, you can't fit in. Something about his knees would hit the dash. I don't know if you, I think that there's pilots taller than you right now. So I don't know. Well, taller than me. Sure. 6'1", 6'2". He's 6'5". Oh, he's 6'5", and couldn't do it. Oh, okay. I could not do it. No, I'm not 6'5". They just did it. I'm not 6'5". There's no way. Next to me, you might look like you're 6'5". Next to you. Yeah, yeah. So let's talk a little bit more about what you do for the program. And go through your daily routine. I mean, what do you have to do when you walk in the door? You have this checklist you got to go down. Everybody does, right? Yes, absolutely. What's your process to get everyone on the move? Make sure everything's going to happen and you can close out the day. Yeah, so I'm one of the first ones in. And I go in at 5 o'clock every morning. Oh, poor thing. I'm not complaining, though. It's fine. There's no traffic. No traffic. There's nobody on the road at that time in the morning. So, I mean, my first objective is just to make sure that all the servers are running. Because if the servers aren't running, then the maintainers won't be able to create a hard drive. But you are an IT person. Lock in the door. Oh, they'll have lights on everything? Yeah, yep. Oh, no, no. Because that's behind a closed door. So I just sit at my desk and try to peeing everything. That's... Okay, cool. Way, way more simple than looking at the lights on the servers. They respond to pings. You should not have told us that. They do. So now we know ICMP is enabled. Okay. So obviously, just hopefully there's no firewall in between you guys. So you get up and you make sure those servers are running because they're the essential services that provide your daily activities. Yeah, absolutely. So what's your next activity? You got to check in with somebody? Yeah. So, well, then it's just to make sure that the maintainers are on task. And then we always have a meeting. Our first meeting starts every day at six o'clock. And it's with all the leadership. And we discuss what's going to happen for the day, what happened the previous day, and if there's any hangups or if there's anything that they need to know from my perspective. Are you in charge of creating that mission for the day? Oh, absolutely not. No. So this other leadership that compiles the information and says, this is what we need to accomplish today? Well, it's actually, it comes from the ops side. So the pilots have their flying schedule set. And then the maintainers need to make sure for the flight schedule. Well, so everything follows the flight schedule pretty much. Pretty much. But there is the communication between the maintainers and the ops squadron. So they need to make sure that the mission can actually be done. You're talking about maintainers that are, they inspect the airframe and they change the tires when they need to. And they change the oil and they check the engine. I mean, there's a different shop for each component of the. I'm picturing the guy with a stick in the oil that needs to check it in. No. It's probably not the way it happened. It's not that way anymore. They do have the hat backwards in the overalls. Yeah. No. I mean, they do have the overalls in. I just want to picture it. I've never seen these guys maintain the aircraft. It's got to be an enormous task. Yeah. Maybe you should come out one day and just check it out. Yeah. I'd love it. I know they won't let us film, but maybe we'll get some audio. Yeah. You probably can't film. I don't. Interview some people. Yeah. It's amazing to think of that this is going on on a daily basis behind the scenes. A lot of people, trust me, a lot of people I know complain like I do that, you know, tax dollars. Because we look at our paycheck and I want to vomit. But they take all that money out. What do they do with it? And this is an amazing thing that gets done with our check. The serving is just a normal MP in the Marines 40 years ago. I realized that, you know, this is what people are investing in. They want us to protect them on a daily basis. But my mission was nothing compared to yours. You're here on the vanguard of the assault in the middle of the Pacific Rim with three of our worst enemies on these waters. Right? So at any time, you're in the air and you've got to support that. Absolutely. So on a daily basis, you have to be ready to go at all times. Now, I would imagine you have to rotate some aircraft off the flight line for bigger repairs. You do. You must keep a good number of them ready to fly fueled and ready to go. Right? And is that what we see going over the airport? Well, day to day. Well, there's a couple that are that stay ready to go with the moment's notice. But day to day, you see the typical training missions. But for all the aircraft that are on the ground, I think they keep as many ready to go as possible at any moment notice. And I would imagine that the guys that fly those planes that have to be immediately ready to go are in the one little room with a coffee maker. Just watching TV or reading magazines ready to jump to their feet and run out to the flight deck. Absolutely. That's how it goes. Yeah, and they stay on shift. Just like in the movies. That's their... They do different shifts. Sometimes they'll go for eight hours or 24 hours. But that is their mission is to be there just in case they need to go at any moment's notice. Okay, I'm feeling better about my tax dollars already because I know people are sailing around in aircraft carriers with the same mission, sitting in a little room waiting for those orders to launch their aircraft off the deck of a carrier. We've got the same thing here. How many other support missions combined with yours when, say, we do one of the big military exercises that come up here? Like, you get the whole, I don't know, six feet, seven feet. What fleet comes out here? I don't even know. Oh, it just depends on what they're doing. I mean, we support... We exercise with RIMPAC when RIMPAC comes out here. And we... They have a... Another mission that the F-22 Squadron does too, and they bring a couple of different airframes out and they'll practice in the air together. So this is communications and logistics thing. And you want to see if your tactical works and your strategies for bigger battles is actually effective. Yes, and make sure that everybody can talk to each other and everything can happen the way that it's supposed to happen. It's impressive. I've seen some, you know, edges of the RIMPAC as they cruise by the islands. You can see an enormous support fleet with an aircraft carrier and flights going around. You think that's a lot of money, a lot of time, a lot of planning, a lot of people, and that's a lot of effort, but it's worth it when you consider the wars we've had to go through that nobody seems to remember anymore. Yeah. The big wars. I mean, that's all, that's not in my memory, right? That's my grandfather and his father, right? And now we have to deal with the wars that just go on forever. Afghanistan, the Iraq, the Syria, it just won't ever end. We can't really pull out either. But then we have to think about on another front, out here in the Pacific, someone could attack at any time. I wish I could ask you questions like who are you most afraid of? Because I would think, in my opinion, China's not going to attack because it got too much invested in the business economy out here. They don't want to blow their investment, right? They have loans with us, they buy our bonds all the time, so it's all about money. I don't think China wants to attack us. Russia, lose cannon. Can't predict. North Korea, maybe they don't think they're big enough yet, but I think the moment that guy snaps his fingers, he's scared of security. You're scaring me a little bit with this dog. That's my job. He's the mitracho. So I'm supposed to do this. I'm supposed to scare people and motivate people, but also tell people that, you know, when it comes to all the cyber security in this world, there's a physical aspect to security. And we're always promoting defense and death. So it's a layer. And I tell my students this all the time, the funny thing, hey, I'm going to put a fence around my house. It'll be chain link because if someone jumps over, I want everyone to know about my fence. And then I want them to all encounter, you know, the Rottweilers I put in the yard and then, you know, the door lock and the alarm and then Granny's got a shotgun upstairs. It's layers of security. You're one more layer that people forget about all the time. And it's funny. And an important part of the economy too. Yeah. And I always say that people become complacent. That's right. And it's a huge part of it and nothing has happened. But we in the Pacific, we do have a threat out there. And in Hawaii, we're the ones, I'm a huge believer that we're the ones can set the precedent for what needs to happen. I agree with you completely. Thank you for being on the show. Our time's up. I told you it went fast. It was a wonderful interview. Thank you so much. Do you want to promote your program for the last 10 seconds of the show? No? I don't know how to promote it. Okay. Thanks for joining us, everybody. I joined us in a couple of weeks for another Cyber Underground. More tips, tricks, and patches and fixes to help you keep you safe in the cyber universe and physical universe as we've seen today. Until then, everybody, stay safe.