BFM this

Slightly off topic, but with just enough venn overlap: I’ve lost count the number of times a CA I’m flying with (.civ guys) says “I think they should just build new A-10s.” As long as we have another hour in cruise, I’ll paint the picture of 50 years of technology advances being the toys in the Eyes Wide Shut party between DoD program requirements and industry, and how that would create an incestuous love baby that will only get ripped apart across as many congressional districts as possible to create some too-big-to-fail abomination that would resemble the original A-10 about as closely as an ice cream truck. And I somehow feel re-victimized every time.

Ok, maybe my reading comprehension is falling short, but all I’m seeing is “loss of trust and confidence” boilerplate. Quick talk on?

Usually around o6, always seemed like the callsign starts getting downplayed, spoken less and less in public settings. Don't think I’ve seen anything about this CJCS since he was first mentioned that didn’t state his callsign at least once in every instance. I like it 🤘

Basic training rules. It's what a typical DACT ladder is based off of, among myriad other joint TTPs. ...at least from the AF perspective.

I-L-L!

Wait for the investigation to work itself out. Even money says they were just taxiing.

Trump talks to Putin must mean that Trump is Putin's puppet. Ya not buying that. Despite the noise in the first Trump term, something struck a nerve, at least for me. Some background: I cut my teeth in the military with my first assignment in Okinawa--the Korean Theatre of Operations. Obviously as an E3 my worldview was as tight a soda straw as it gets. But there I was going through exercises, training plans, sorties, upgrades, trips, and doing research projects on forward operating locations both in Taiwan and up on the peninsula. 1995, so KIS had just kicked the bucket leaving KJI in charge, but not before he'd started lobbing ballistic missiles across the Sea of Japan. Fast forward a decade, and I'm back in the KTO, this time as a member of the LPA. More bluster, more ballistic missile launches, KJU taken over after his dad. At this point, patterns start to emerge, at least in my mind. After the NoDAKs had lost their benefactor, the USSR, they devolved into a pattern of famine, saber rattling, receiving aid from the west, less noise until the aid starts to run out, then lather rinse repeat. All while, for the most part, diplomacy is cold and almost non-existent from the west. Then one day, seemingly out of nowhere, POTUS is standing on the other side of the line in Panmunjom, shooting the shit with KJU. What in the actual fuck? But for a minute at least, the NoDAKs appear to have blinked, taken a moment to consider some economic incentives, trade even. ========== Ok, lots of words, but how does this tie into the Ukraine situation? 1: Remember when Obama got caught on hot mic with Putin whispering all of the sweet nothings he could do in his second term? -->Clean pass. DJT keeps a line open to Putin-->obviously a puppet. Bullshit; don't piss down my back and tell me it's raining. 2: DJT, as I illustrated above, clearly breaks with established geopolitical dogma. And I honestly cannot say that I see the downside, although I will not suggest there won't be a downside ever. Likewise with UKR: he's changing course, and I for one do not see a desirable outcome in the course followed over the last 5 years, so by all means pick another point on the compass and press. Folks (not the least of which Zelenskyy) want to see Putin/Russia defeated/punished/humiliated. And they are willing to spend as much of our treasure and the UKR military aged population to reach their utopian vision. Here's the bottom line, as I see it: Putin/Russia are not going to be defeated/punished/humiliated without a real cost that we will not want to pay, and I just cannot fathom how everyone is ignoring that elephant in the room.

https://www.morningstar.com/funds/2-etfs-that-track-congressional-stock-trades

The ORM worksheet requires Tier 2 approval. ETIC 72h

Meh he seems to have a good perspective on when to take some time off.

Given my limited experience with the VA, 50% of the VA workforce could be Thanos-snapped off the books and I would imagine the impact to care or services would not be measurably different.

"I work in a SCIF so how could I possibly answer this email" is passive-aggressive BS. Anyone working in a SCIF in uniform still has to generate annual performance review fodder. This is an insignificant fraction of that wordsmithing goat-rope, yet knickers are getting twisted. Spare me.

Sure. Maybe. If you want to run a thin bench all year then carry the summer with PM, who am I to argue?

Scheduled indoc starts through the end of March. We’re fat right now. But our aircraft deliveries are finally starting to pick up again (aside from parked 321s getting new interiors approved). Our manning has already shown signs of stress during relatively minor weather events this winter. The Company got very lucky last year with only two landfall hurricanes and almost no plains storm events. If they bank on continued lackluster demand going into this summer, I’d offer that would be a risky play.

Confirmed: not true.

If I'm reading his bio right, he's ANG. Would that make a first as CJCS?

At what point would the army decide to sequester all of their data under privilege? Could they, given a civil aircraft was involved?

In principle, I don't disagree with you. However, At what point on a visual approach are you not responsible for see and avoid? I don't like it, especially in light of this outcome, but we were all taught that fundamental rule on day one of instrument flying. And I highly doubt the final report gets published without mention of it.

Agreed with all points except this one. If the helo crew had been spot on their altitude, that would have not been anything close to comfortable separation. Would their altitude error have garnered more than a downgrade on a checkride? Unfortunate that these deaths are what it took to highlight that unsafe margin. …but I guess that’s the nature of unsafe margins; it’s all well and good until it isn’t.

Waiting for the final report to come out, but it appears that the CRJ crew had one, possibly two nuggets of radio SA that they didn't cue in on. While PAT was on another freq, the controller was simulcasting, so the RJ crew at least had one side of the conversation. Ideally, their ears should have perked up at the controller granting visual separation to PAT, then the controller confirming visual/pass behind deconfliction. Again, ideally, those two nuggets should have at least cued their eyeballs down to the ND to get a rough BRA on the traffic, then outside for vis pickup. But what I'm gathering from the NTSB briefings thus far (as well as the final outcome), is that they didn't initiate a scan in the direction of PAT until the TCAS "TRAFFIC TRAFFIC" alert, by which time the die was cast. Their eyeballs were focused (appropriately) on R33 for the visual curve approach. DISCLAIMER: this is 100% armchair QB, 20/20 hindsight, from the comfort of my keyboard. I will admit that I would have to be on my very best game, in that moment, to be able to pick up and cue off of the SA nuggets described. There but for the grace of God go I...

Depending on the carrier/culture, p121 ops range from heavily discouraged to outright phobic responses to an actual visual approach. Dogleg vector to an instrument based final is the norm. I would argue that we aren’t really flying a visual, just accepting a handoff of visual responsibility from RAPCON. At my previous carrier, the suggestion of a visual was a good way to get everyone’s blood pressure to spike: the monkeys and the banana response. Better luck at my current outfit (legacy) typically, but still some that couldn’t fathom actual unaided VFR flying. I’m a weird cat that still gets a satisfying dopamine hit from clicking off the FD and rolling out on a stable final just like Earnie Gann intended. But it begins with reading the room.

This is going to be emotional. For context, the last mass-casualty event for a US p121 carrier was Colgan 2008. 8B pax since then. We are simply ruthless about running down the causes and prevention in this business. It’s a good thing. But it hurts when the swiss cheese lines up.

Video seemed pretty clear. “Open the door, HAL!” “I’m sorry, David, but I can’t do that.”

Credit where credit is due: At least 4 didn't save an overshoot with a lag roll on network TV. I mean, that's something, right?

They lost me at magazine-less.