Recognizing our Finest: Staff Sgt. Matthew Chase

  • Published
  • By Capt Nick Strocchia
  • 459th ARW Public Affairs Office
JOINT BASE ANDREWS, Md. --  Staff Sgt. Matthew Chase was born in West Palm Beach, FL and moved early on in his childhood to North East Philadelphia where he now resides.

With a military career spanning 13 years, Sergeant Chase initially entered in service with the active duty Army under the Delayed Enlistment Program. After attending Army basic training, Sergeant Chase's first duty station was at Ft. Benning where he provided universal support the numerous training programs hosted on post.

In 1992, Sergeant Chase was reassigned to Korea where he served as the driver for the Republic of Korea Army liaison at camp Red Cloud. While not in uniform, Sergeant Chase was playing Morale, Welfare, and Recreation hockey against the the South Korean national team as a goalie for the theater Army team.

Sergeant Chase returned to Ft. Benning in 1994 where he served as a fire team leader in the 24 Infantry Division and eventually left active duty in 1997.

Sergeant Chase bounced back and forth between the Pennsylvania Army National Guard and Reserves before leaving the Army all together in 1998.

After a six year break in service, Sergeant Chase decided to join the Air Force Reserve and signed up to become a Security Forces troop at Willow Grove, AFB. After three years at Willow Grove, Sergeant Chase's unit came under BRAC at which time he came to the 459th ARW at Andrews, AFB.

Here, Sergeant Chase has had the opportunity to attend a number of training schools. He initially went to Cobat Arms school to become a CATM instructor.

Subsequently there after, he was afforded a unique opportunity to attend an Alchol, Tobacco, Firearms weapons course where he was closely oriented on many of the Soviet weapons currently being utilized by enemy forces in the Middle East.

Recently, Sergeant Chase attended a Remotely Operated Video Enhanced Receiver (ROVER) Joint Service/Joint Nation familiarization course which provided him with a new perspective on in-theater threat detection.

When Sergeant Chase is not in uniform, you can find his office parked 100 stories above the Philadelphia skyline. Sergeant Chase is a structural iron worker in Philadelphia where he recently completed the 15th tallest building in the US and has plans to start work on the 2nd tallest building in the world this spring. When he's not hammering away at buildings, Sergeant Chase is building up his home and busily preparing for his wedding in May.

Sergeant Chase's unrelenting attitude to help others, be the best at his job, and an unshakable military pride has him setting his sights to make Chief Master Sergeant one day where he hopes to make both a positive and significant impact within the Reserves.