Jacob Lucy graduated May 27 from Air Force basic training at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas.
Lucy received three awards at his graduation: Air Force Basic Military Training Honor Graduate Ribbon, Warhawk Award and Marksmanship Ribbon.
The Honor Graduate Ribbon is awarded to basic training graduates who have obtained an honor graduate designation and demonstrate excellence in all areas of academic and military training. Lucy was one of the few to receive the honor.
The Warhawk Award is given to the top PT performer. Lucy was the top performer out of 723 airmen.
The Marksmanship Ribbon is issued to service members who pass a weapons qualification course and achieve an above-average score.
Lucy is at Sheppard AFB in Texas where he is beginning his training in aircraft avionics and environmental control systems. He is expected to be home in December and at that time will be assigned to his first base.
He graduated from Surrey High School in 2010. His family includes his mother and stepfather Roberta and Mitchell Pride, Minot; his father Bob Lucy, Tioga; grandparents, Linda and Tommy Rystedt and Rita Lucy, all of Powers Lake; and stepgrandparents, Sherry and Martin DeForest, Venita, Ore.
Air Force Airman Andrew Mathieson graduated from basic military training at Lackland Air Force Base, San Antonio, Texas.
He is the son of Sheila Mathieson, Minot, and is a 2009 graduate of Minot High School.
Coast Guard Capt. Gregory A. Buxa begins a new assignment this month in Alameda, Calif., as the chief of operational and strategic planning for the Pacific Area Command.
He will be responsible for all Coast Guard involvement in military and environmental exercises along with all international engagement in the Pacific. He is the chairman of the North Pacific Heads of Coast Guard operational planning group.
Previously Buxa was commanding officer and before that executive officer, of Coast Guard Air Station Sacramento in Sacramento, Calif. The change of command was held June 17 at McClellan Field.
Buxa also received two Coast Guard Commendation Medals. One of the medals was for his work while assigned as the acting commanding officer of Coast Guard Air Station Sacramento. The work included overseeing and directing the planning and coordination required to dispatch an HC-130H aircraft crew with medical personnel aboard which performed a night drop of the medical personnel in the midst of rain squalls, shifting winds and low clouds to save the life of a critically injured mariner southwest of Cabo San Lucas, Mexico.
He also directed the launch of a HC-130H Hercules fixed-wing aircraft crew to the scene of a MH-60 crash in the mountains near Salt Lake City, Utah. which provided life-saving treatment of two seriously injured Coast Guard aviators. After the earthquake in Haiti, he coordinated the deployment of two C-130 Hercules fixed-wing aircraft which transported 59,000 pounds of critical response equipment and 240 response personnel to Haiti and evacuated 111 displaced Haitians to areas of refuge.
The medal for his work while serving as executive officer of Coast Guard Air Station Sacramento included his coordination of transporting 37,000 pounds of life-saving cargo and supplies after a massive tsunami hit American Samoa in September 2009, his coordination of extraordinary fixed-wing aircraft logistical support to help combat wildfires that ravaged southern California in 2007, and his coordination and transport of a Sacramento-based Federal Emergency Management Agency team that responded to flooding in North Dakota's Red River valley in March 2009.
Buxa, who was raised in Minot, graduated from Des Lacs-Burlington High School in 1985. He also graduated with honors from the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in 1989 with a bachelor of science degree in electrical engineering and has a master's degree in public administration specializing in organizational leadership from National University. He is married to the former Linda Baacke of Milwaukee, Wis., and they have three children Abigail, 9, Lydia, 7, and Benjamin, 5.