HILL AIR FORCE BASE — Despite a 30-day extension to the Department of Defense’s “stop movement order,” officials with Hill Air Force Base’s 388th Fighter Wing say they expect airmen deployed in the Middle East to begin coming home soon.

Earlier this week, Secretary of Defense Mark Esper stretched the order through June 30, a move intended to further prevent the spread of COVID-19.

In late Mach, the DOD announced a 30-day stop movement order for department personnel, uniformed and civilian. Adding to previously implemented DOD travel restrictions, the order stopped most military exercises, deployments, redeployments and other military activities that required travel of any kind. According to the DOD, approximately 90,000 service members slated to deploy over the next two months would be impacted by the restrictions.

“The department acknowledges that this order will have great impact on our service members and their families who are looking to proceed with their lives,” the DOD said in a statement released earlier this week. “(But) the rapidly changing environment has created significant risks to service members.”

But the DOD is now allowing waivers for the resumption of travel for several groups of department personnel that were previously suspended, including deployments.

Col. Steven Behmer, commander of the 388th FW, said the order will be reevaluated every 15 days, but it appears deployed members of the wing will receive one of the waivers.

“I think we’ll start to see some of our folks starting to come home in the month of May,” Behmer said.

Hill’s 34th Fighter Squadron is currently deployed to the Air Force Central Command region, which covers the area from the Horn of Africa through the Persian Gulf region, into Central Asia. The group’s travel itinerary had been temporarily suspended after the first stop movement order was issued. Behmer said future deployments among members of the wing will also probably be solidified soon as well.

“As far as our deployments go, (airmen) coming home and … leaving, those are moving again,” Behmer said. “We will continue to monitor those dates and as they become releasable, we’ll put them out.”

Current Air Force policy prohibits releasing information about exact deployment locations and time tables, but 388th Chief Master Sgt. Dan Taylor said the wing will alert family of those deployed as soon as specific dates become available.

“I know people are trying to make plans as far as family members coming home,” he said.