Leaderboard

If it is anything like Huggy's numerous previous "retirements", I'm sure he'll be back on active duty sometime soon.

What were we talking about again?

365's aren't part of the force management initiative. 365's are the lead force management initiative. https://www.youtube.com/embed/wMEq1mGpP5A?autoplay=1

I'm beginning to sense a one sided opinion.

I get it, in fact that is perfect setup for most of the military... It's effective and efficient. However aviation has changed, dramatically, over the past few decades. When we "gen" back up and lose a few airmen and planes in the process, we are no longer talking $100,000 and 5 months training; it is beyond exponentially higher than it was. Nor are we talking the same percentage, we lose one p51 and pilot that is nothing compared to losing one f22 and pilot... Not that I'm belittling the value of a life, I certainly am not, but the effect on our militaries ability to wage war is dramatically decreased with respect to the loss of the latter. They are truly irreplaceable. If we were really serious about reducing mishaps, pilot training would be completely different. From UPT, to initial, to continuation, we would have triple the number of sims, they would all be connected, scenarios would be random, difficult, challenging, you would fly it until you could recognize and react flawlessly. You would train, continually. Exercises would be tough, failures would be common. Flying hours would be abundant. We keep saying that we can never eliminate the human element, but we really haven't scratched the surface with respect to training aviators as best we can. What if we lost a missile crew, missile, and war head 5-6 times of year, do you think we would nonchalantly sit back and say, "that's the cost of having missiles." I will just never understand why losses are so acceptable in aviation... I'll go out on a limb and say, with a few exceptions (fatigue, depression, altered mental state, impromptu air show, etc...), anytime we use a human factor code or label it "pilot error" we are masking the problem and therefore the solution. It is so much easier and cheaper to blame an individual rather than fix the system that produced him.

Well I was running to it then I saw this girl and... But back to China... With their acquisition of IL-78 Midas tankers, a budding airlift capacity with the new Y-20 Strat Airlifter and then this possible new helicopter they will have more of what they need to move quickly and sustain forces... China likes to teach her neighbors a lesson from time to time (Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai publicly said the war was intended “to teach India a lesson"). Starting to seem someone is going to get a lesson in a few years. China’s Military Gets Expeditionary

Haha I've gotta write this one down ...

Could this be why Huggy finally retired...? Plan to “optionally man” the U-2 EDIT: fix link

Trolling.

That's part of the great conflict of interest within the Air Force...we don't fly enough at home, we don't recognize, reward or value excellence in flying, we handicap ourselves with too many rules and regulations in the name of safety, we downplay the aviator and make sure the finance guy feels special and the whole base shows up for the fun run/suicide awareness/don't rape people day, and worst of all we force out our best/brightest along with all their valuable experience while the turds float to the top to lead us further down the drain.

I know the perfect replacement! Gen James Mattis, USMC (Ret)

Premise 3 is false, We know the problems: read just about any thread in these here forums to find them, categorizing into human factors code is as useless as categorizing your dogs shit color when he drops a turd on the carpet... It's a secondary/tertiary effect that makes for pretty charts but does nothing to address what the problem is or how to solve it. You want to fix aviation, at least military aviation, you make it your only priority and make sure, absolutely, nothing else matters. We'll stop crashing airplanes when get back into the business of flying them.

It's interesting that every single person I've talked from the O-7 level all the way down to the uninitiated have the exact same reaction as you. Which really does bring into question what this board was looking for. To answer your question, it's about a million dollars to send us through TPS, not including everything it took to get us to that point, as well as the follow on quals or requals we end up with.

A Baptist Preacher was seated next to a retired WWII Fighter Pilot on a flight to Texas. After takeoff, the retired fighter pilot asked for a whiskey and soda, which was brought and placed before him. The flight attendant then asked the preacher if he would like a drionk. Appalled, the preacher replied, "I'd rather be tied up and taken advantage of by a woman of ill-repute, than let liquor touch my lips!" The fighter pilot then immediately handed his drink back to the flight attendant and said, "Me too, I didn't know we had a damn choice!"

Might want to stand by there Heathcliff. "I remember a time" we were headed into LPLA (that still Lajes?) at night when the approach control radios failed and we were on heading to a big dark patch on the radar.........anyway the whole night had been sporting SO to get a jump on depAture in two dayz I stomped upstairs to Navy Wx shop and ordered weather.."any wx of note between here and the East Coast? says I....."Nope" says he......."thank's bye" "thanks see ya" and off we go to billeting and the next day off to KGB central (George the Crook's) for hours of merriment with the crew chiefs. Next day badly hungover..back up to Wx shop....Navy guy (who I could of sworn I saw at the Crook's..it wasn't that big a plaCE") drops the wx in front of me including a satellite photo of a full blown hurricane blocking our route home. Well what can you say? Anyway, got a nice boot in the ass going back so that was good. .....................................................we promptly named it "Hurricane Numbnuts".........

If you're concerned about your QOL, you should be concerned about the health of your MAJCOM (in this case AFSOC) staff. Screwups and work undone at the higher headquarters level have a way of making life suck at the unit level. It can suck enough that seeking promotion becomes a non-issue.