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Same as it was at Beale... easy setup that was a decent selling point to attract volunteers, no accidents, incidents or violations to my knowledge for the Global Hawk Companion Training Aircraft Program to my knowledge during its run. From my perspective, about 5 minutes after I graduated SUPT. Second order effect of the on again off again credentials arms race that has only gotten worse with the advent of online master's degrees and the growth of the Professional Military Educational Complex. Data block on your surf showing likely worthless Advanced Academic Degree? Yup Data block on your surf (if aircrew) showing Advanced Primary Operational Skills (Instructor/Evaluator/FCF cert/etc.)? Nope Think about that, Academic credentials (masters and/or pme) matter more in the great scheme of things than actual Operational credentials and hence experience/ability. What's wrong with the Air Force? Many things but trying to reduce it further down to root problems... model career progression/paths envisioned decades ago and the credentials/education considered necessary for said old models and not really updated for today's reality, would be my choice for today.

This was UPT in 1986, and those numbers are skewed since some of the graduates were wash-backs from other classes.

As I've frequently posted, this is the annual total UPT attrition per FY (from the AF's circa 2001 study of effectiveness of UPT student selection methods). There are plenty of individual class at individual base snapshots that show extremely high attrition, but given these overall numbers there were obviously classes with substantially higher graduation percentages that offset the high numbers.

There's a quote that goes something like "A life without risk is no life at all." How many Air Force programs and policies that are aimed at reducing risk are making us miserable?

Pontius Pilatus depicted below:

Imagine for a moment if you will...USAF pilots on staff around the world that would jump at the opportunity to fly anything. COCOMs/TSOCs solve their little intra-theater airlift problem and pilots still get to fly. Think of the possibilities... Even more frustrating is having that capability (plus airdrop) and seeing it pissed away for one reason or another. Cooter

@PilotPitts Shhhhhhhhh!!!!! 😏

Figured I'd post my timeline for the Civilian to AFRC studs: AFOQT/TBAS: July/Aug. 2018 Sponsored: Sept. 2018 MEPS: Jan. 2019 MFS/FC1: April 2019 AFRC Sponsored Board (submitted): May 2019 AFRC Board Results (hired/acquired): June 2019 OTS: Jan. 2020 **Could've been Oct. 2019, but pushed I it out. UPT: TBA Understand my timeline is kind of unique, I had a recruiter (squared away professional) who help me from out of state, so I could've been done A LOT sooner.

@Burger I've got a phone number from a reliable source. Never called, but maybe it's a start. Check your inbox.

Shack.

Dude, your going to be fine. I was born in colombia. Moved to the states when I was 10 yrs old. Got my citizenship when I was 18 while at basic. It was pretty simple process for bros joining the military. Specially on the enlisted side. There was a dude that spoke no English at all from Africa. Left basic fluent lol a solid E-6 last time I ran into him. Good luck. Cheers Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

When did the Air Force decide it hates airplanes?

The global hawks here at my overseas base are parked next to the base aero club hangar...

The yearly flying hour budget for G-Hawk guys to fly the Aero Club Cessnas for the 12th RS was about $90k for the entire squadron for the entire FY. It was so little money ACC didn’t even know about it until they began the process of creating the 18XX AFSC and started to audit the existing RPA squadrons. We argued like hell for it but no soup for us or anyone else flying a robot. ACC said it would be too much trouble at OCONUS locations because GA type aircraft are almost exclusive to CONUS US airspace... #totalbullshit Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Semantics. It's a function of whether they want to allocate the $$ or not. But the money is there. For a number of years, the AF paid for the RQ-4 pilots (which included some Nav/CSO's) to fly the Aero Club Cessna 172s. Great deal for them... dirt cheap for the AF... benefits were readily quantifiable. But it was cut. I remember one of the many attacks on the Beale T-38's. Around 2005 time frame at Nellis, and F-22 crew chief allowed a gear pin to get sucked into the engine. The resulting damage to that F-22 engine was more than it cost to fund 3800+ flying hours in the Beale T-38A companion trainer. Yes... 3800+ hours in the T-38 were cheaper than the F-22 FOD'd motor.

As to a T-6, no doubt there would be cost savings in commonality but the DART would be cheaper to buy and fly, maintain as a fleet of ACE aircraft, not sure about that... Agreed, this has negative 6.9% chance of happening but it never hurts to argue for it over BO No argument also as to how screwed up things have gotten thanks to the Higher, Farther, Faster crowd that Boyd fought at the Puzzle Palace. Also, I see no end to it with current crop of leaders at the controls now or in the future, no one is going out on a limb to say not every plane has to be the absolute best in category or it's shit, the party line is continuing. In other threads I've argued for less costly, less sophisticated platforms to be an appropriate part of the overall AF fleet and will continue to do so along with others, only a total idiot or a corrupt narcissist would continue this delusion that we need overkill for 80% of the time we deliver airpower. Don't mind getting teased/chided for my incessant, cultish advocacy for platforms like the Scorpion or YA-7F, these are platforms we need, can afford and quite frankly, would be the easy A the AF needs to get it's mojo back with Congress and Media. Every time we dream up some science project that blows up in our faces and we have to go back to Dad for more money is that much more political and real capital we don't have in the future for the other things we will need to just keep the lights on, but hey that's the next guy's problem... Rant complete.

L O L. You sound like a 13 year old, not a 31 year old.

How does this forum keep falling for this same troll? JC! It's the same dude trolling you all with a new account each week.

Lockheed. Differential pay while on mil leave up to the USERRA 5 year limit. Can’t beat it. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

What’s old is new again. ELPs are back in the syllabus. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Wait til people find out they let guys straight out of UPT instruct in T-38s. Minds will be blown. 🤯

Not really a 'WTF,' but funnier than shit!

How about if we change our paradigm, and dual qualify the pilots at whatever base they are located at to fly them? I know it's crazy, but somehow I was able to fly both the U-2 AND the T-38 within a 6 hour period, and managed to do it relatively safely. And I'm sure there are pilots getting 50-75 sorties a year that might like some additional flying. We are the United States AIR Force. It should not be that hard to... you know... fly more. Especially during a pilot shortage.