JET-SET JOB; COMMANDER PROUD TO SERVE.

Byline: Jim Skeen Daily News Staff Writer

Asked how he likes his job, Lt. Col. Robert Catlin pointed toward the office window that overlooks Air Force Plant 42's runways.

He recited a list of aircraft he's seen in just the past week: everything from small Cessnas to F-117 stealth fighters and a B-52 bomber. As he finishes the list, two A-4 jets being modified for the Argentine air force fly by.

``I'm loving this job - this view, seeing all the airfield and variety of aircraft,'' Catlin said. ``It's a smorgasbord of aircraft history.''

Catlin, who assumed command of Plant 42 in January, is the man responsible for making sure the installation continues to produce and flight-test aircraft. Plant 42 hosts programs from three major aerospace contractors - Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and Boeing.

Counting workers at Lockheed Martin's neighboring Plant 10, which shares Plant 42's runways, the facility employs about 9,000 people, making it second only to Edwards Air Force Base as a center of employment in the Antelope Valley.

``My job is to maintain the best aerospace industrial complex in the Air Force,'' Catlin said.

One challenge Catlin faces is to make sure Plant 42 stays an Air Force asset.

Plant 42 is what the Air Force calls a GOCO, or government-owned, contractor-operated installation - bases where the government is the landlord and private companies run the programs.

Other GOCOs have target dates in which the government wants to switch their ownership over to private industry.

``Plant 42 doesn't have a date. That's TBD - to be decided - because it is unique and its assets can't be duplicated,'' Catlin said.

In the past, whenever Plant 42's parent unit, Aeronautical Systems Command, got a new commander, the question was raised whether the installation should be retained.

``Every commander has justified the value. That's my challenge,'' Catlin said.

A key piece of Plant 42's future will be the decision as to where the production line will be located for the Joint Strike Fighter, the largest U.S. defense project for the early 21st century.

The two contractors competing for the JSF, Boeing and Lockheed Martin, are assembling their prototypes in Palmdale.

Lockheed Martin has indicated it wants to produce the fighters in Fort Worth, Texas, where it assembles F-16 fighters. Boeing officials have not indicated where they want to build the aircraft.

Antelope Valley leaders are working to put together incentives to convince whoever wins the JSF contract to come to Palmdale, bringing with them a fighter production run that could last 25 years.

``Joint Strike Fighter - that's going to be key,'' Catlin said.

Catlin, 41, his wife, Cynthia Holliday-Catlin, and their son, Anthony Gabriel Catlin, a kindergartner, came to Plant 42 from Colorado.

Catlin had worked overseeing space-related contracts at Buckley Air National Guard Base in Aurora, Colo.

``The reception we have received as been tremendous,'' Catlin said. ``The community is so supportive.''

Catlin comes from a military family. A great-grandfather fought with the Union Army at Appomattox, an uncle was with the Tuskegee Airmen, and his father was a career Air Force enlisted man, serving stints as a B-36 bomber radio operator and later as an air traffic controller.

``Duty is something that is important. That is something I learned early,'' Catlin said.

Catlin completed Officer's Training School at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas, and received his officer's commission in January 1980. During his Air Force career, Catlin was drawn toward space-related projects.

``I remember on my 13th birthday watching the first walk on the moon. I stayed up all night to see it,'' Catlin said. ``My imagination just took off with that.''

Catlin served as the administrative contracting officer for the Peacekeeper intercontinental missile systems and as warranted contracting officer for the Strategic Defense Initiative Organization - the ``Star Wars'' program.

At his Colorado assignment prior to coming to Plant 42, Catlin oversaw 11 major operations and maintenance contracts for command, control and product processing of Air Force space programs.

``I think I'm the first commander with a space background. I don't know if that was intentional or accidental,'' Catlin said.

The Air Force is moving toward a day when it will be known as the Air and Space Force or the Aerospace Force, he believes.

``Pretty soon you won't be able to tell an aircraft from spacecraft,'' Catlin said.

Catlin said he is excited about working with the city of Palmdale and the aerospace corporations on its annual aerospace worker recognition dinner and the Plant 42 Heritage Airpark, a proposed 26-acre airpark that will run on the south side of the installation. The airpark will showcase the aircraft the installation has produced.

``You don't realize until you see the list of aircraft how significant this place has been to aerospace and to our nation,'' Catlin said.

CAPTION(S):

2 Photos

PHOTO (1--Color) As Plant 42 commander, Lt. Col. Robert Catlin oversees the developing future of flight.

(2) Lt. Col. Robert Catlin stands next to a poster of stages in the history of air travel; from his window he can see the next step.

Jeff Goldwater/Daily News