mb1685

I'd assume your recruiter means that in 2 days they're going to start setting up a MEPS appointment to have you swear in. The first time you swear in, it's just to DEP (Delayed Entry Program). You're not obligated to much other than meeting with your recruiter and other selects about once a month for DEP calls and getting the ball rolling on things like your flight physical and paperwork. You can still turn down the selection at any time. This would technically be a DEP Discharge, which is mentioned somewhere in AFRSI 36-2001 if you want to dig through the regs. I don't think that requires any sort of waiver to reapply, but you will have to disclose the fact that you applied and turned down a position. It's probably anyone's guess as to whether a particular selection board will find that significantly objectionable or not, but it's probably going to be neutral at best. Once everything is squared away and you're about to actually report to OTS, you'll go back to MEPS a few days before and swear in again. This time you're swearing in to EAD (Extended Active Duty). From this point on, you're officially "in" the military and it's a more involved process to have you released. The ability to do this might change depending on particular circumstances at the time, but short of a major war and/or critical manning issues, you generally have the option to DOR (Drop On Request) while at OTS and get discharged from the military. If you do this, you'll get a DD214 since you were on active duty and it will indicate that it was an entry-level uncharacterized discharge. Because of this, you'd need a waiver to rejoin the military in any capacity (have a look for "RE code" sections of governing documents). Not impossible but not a guarantee either. Short answer: you definitely don't have to decide within 2 days.

Since you’ve invested so much in your hours and ratings, I 100% would recommend not accepting the CSO slot. I’m sure it’s a great career in many ways but you’d be throwing away so much money and opportunity compared to someone with little or no flight time. I can’t speak to the odds of getting picked up for AD OTS again after turning down a position, but it doesn’t hurt to try. And as most people here would recommend, pursue Guard and Reserve units. You’d be able to continue your civilian flying career in parallel, and I’m pretty sure 99% of their selection boards are not going to bat an eye at someone in your shoes having turned down an AD CSO slot.

Probably a dumb question, but we won't need to resubmit applications to Fresno if we don't have any updates, correct? Or will this essentially be a "new" board?

I love how seeing these old posts is like coming across a perfectly preserved time capsule. Seeing discussions about Fall Out Boy, The All-American Rejects, and Hawthorne Heights is an instant trip down memory lane. I've been listening to a lot of Mark Lettieri lately -- killer rock/blues/jazz guitarist based in Fort Worth. Might not be your cup of tea if you're not a guitar nerd but I'm always blown away by his playing and songwriting, plus the tight rhythm section. The song "Seuss Pants" from his newest album is a bit of an adventure.

Yikes! Not good news for an older dude such as myself who was starting to get some interview traction before this charlie foxtrot. Wonder if they'd consider bumping up the UPT age limit even more once things eventually return to any semblance of normalcy. I imagine the backlog from this is going to add a massive amount of time to the pipeline. 😱

I've heard the same. I think AFPC HQ is at Randolph, so that would make sense. I took the test at San Antonio MEPS and I think it only took about 3-4 days to get my scores.

USAF: "Alright, we need pilots. Older dudes, you've got some time. New UPT age limit now in effect." COVID-19: "Not so fast..."

103rd Airlift Wing invites are rolling out.

Anyone planning on attending the 104FS meet and greet in May? Just booked my airfare, would be great to meet up with some folks throughout the rest of that weekend.

Yeah, I’ve always wondered exactly what’s proper to put in that spot on form AF24. I’ve noticed that the 121FS attaches an AF24 in their UPT board info packet with a few sections prefilled and 11F is in that spot. I’d assumed that’s because that’s what the squadron’s vacancy being filled is, but it does seem kinda weird putting that as a UPT board applicant.

I’m just another wannabe but I’d say your stats and background are outstanding. Pretty much the only mediocre thing would be your non-aviation AFOQT scores, but I’d think your Pilot/Nav, PCSM, and flight time outweigh that. I guess you could retake the AFOQT if you feel confident you won’t do any worse. Retaking the TBAS could maybe help a little too — my AFOQT Pilot is a 92 too but my PCSM 201+ hour projected column is a 97, so that seems like evidence that there’s a little room for improvement in your TBAS performance. In the grand scheme of things I’d say that’s trivial, but then again this is an extremely competitive endeavor so it might be worth doing. You have tons of time with the new age limit. I don’t think there’s any one single thing you could do at this point to significantly improve your chances other than casting a wider net (even just opening up to F-15 units, since it sounds like you’re set on fighters) and staying persistent. As long as you’re not a douche and you keep taking feedback and advice to heart, I’d say it’s only a matter of time.

I just went back and checked my email invite from 2018 and there were about 40 email addresses on it. Not sure how many they typically invite for formal interviews.

Very interesting to see their age cutoff being age 33 at the time of board even though the (updated) regulation applies to starting UPT by age 33. Wonder if that’s a misprint or if they’re just more willing than most fighter units to submit age waiver requests?

Just got an email notification — issue appears to be resolved.

E-mail notifications for thread subscriptions no longer appear to be coming through. Doesn't appear to be related to spam folder settings (no BaseOps/FlyingSquadron emails showing up there in my Gmail). In case it helps, the last notification I received on my subscribed thread was on December 4th and there were new posts starting on December 6th which didn't seem to generate e-mail notifications. Issue replicated by @M2 in this thread.

Now that’s some speedy service! Thank you!

Random question: anyone else who was subscribed to this thread no longer getting emails? It’s worked for me for months but doesn’t seem to be emailing me anymore. They’re not going to my spam folder either.

That’s pretty cool. I used to work for Redbird at their FBO and they were doing the RedHawk conversions at the field (KHYI).

I’m 99% sure rated boards are only for those who are already winged and qual’d AF pilots. I’ve met some unsponsored candidates while rushing squadrons for their UPT boards.

They used to do them for prior service (up to age 29 for Pilot and up to 31 for NFO), but the new program authorization does away with waivers in favor of making the limit 32 across the board (for both designators).

Siamese Dream 🤘 I’m not sure if things are different now that the UPT age limit was increased to 33, but based on what I’ve read, it seems like those in charge of Active Duty accessions were completely unwilling to do age waivers regardless of circumstance (the AD officer rated cross-training board seemed to be a different story). Hopefully someone with first hand knowledge will chime in. Is there any reason you wouldn’t consider Guard/Reserve? I’d heard of guys getting age waivers from heavy units at age 35 when the age limit was still 30, so it’s probably not unthinkable that they might stretch even further now. That way you’ll be able to search specifically for C-5 units. You’d probably be a really competitive candidate with your prior AF experience.

I can’t really think of a reason you’d need it for the TBAS. I guess for the multi-tasking portion, but if you took the time to write down the items you have to (short-term) memorize, that would probably get you so behind that you’d bomb it anyway. You can’t tend to the other simultaneous tasks if you’re tied up writing things down (and subsequently looking at the things you wrote down).

Yep, got a call from the 175FS a few hours ago.

The good news is that the Air Force recently increased the UPT age limit to 33. Search around these forums a bit and you'll find some threads about it and a copy of the document. Right now that comes from just a memo from HQ USAF/A1P (the AFI hasn't been updated yet), but based on everything I've read, it seems like it applies to all types of accessions (AD, Guard, Reserve; and both civilian and military applicants). Since the ROTC rule to commission by 29 is probably just a buffer to ensure candidates can make it to UPT within a year after commissioning (to account for IFT, SERE, waiting to class up, etc.), I'd expect that cutoff to increase too.

You might get a discounted hourly rate if you manage to get a job at a flight school/FBO.