Hodor

Are they really doing a long T-6 program straight to F-16s? The Navy was planning on doing that to shorten their Goshawk requirements when I was going through Whiting. Its the whole reason their T-6 has a HUD and MFCDs. Any Navy peeps wanna chime in if that's actually working?

Coming from a crew aircraft, having another brain and set of eyeballs in there is pretty clutch. With CRM all things are possible.

Wasnt there a program in the 70s or 80s that had the 747 basically being a cruise missile dump truck? With a good launch system I wonder how many missiles a 747-8 can carry? Probably between a ton and shitload. Edit: Cant say the word Duck

Yeah, just skip 3rd and take this to the eventual conclusion if they aren't going to be serious about keeping PR relevant or having the missile field mission be owned in house. The Whiskey is great and all but at some point flying a traditional helicopter into war turns into charging tanks with cavalry. I love CSAR, but the USAF showed how much it mattered when they canned CSAR-X and chose the W.

She had wings?

Looks like someones dumping the byproduct of midwest getting screwed on NM, which is totally what that state would be into...

So... to "save" 50 slots a year for guys who want fixed wing they are going to spend millions of dollars to stand up a totally new training program, find a contractor (Probably DOSS), and pump an extra 15-20 new LTs a year into the pipeline. Okay sure, why not? There are some ways they can salvage this to make good Helo pilots. If this was out in the South West or Rockies, the High/Hot exposure could make up for it, but getting real IFR time would be rough. You could put it at Kirtland to save the cost of moving guys across the country, and ABQ isn't terrible. Beats Enid for sure, and opens up some nice IP slots for the like 6-9 USAF dudes running this thing. Forget the fact that you're closing the 23d down and finding somewhere to put 20 or some odd guys that probably chose to go there for good reasons like 60 guys that are smoked from Ops, Huey peeps that need a couple years to thaw out. The type rating is kinda nice. It would have been cool to get a Bell 212 rating out of Rucker for all the TH-1 hours. Downsides I can think of include shutting down Rucker for the reason above plus it's already there, churning out pilots at an awesome rate and is a great program. The first time guys get a 100% blue experience will be at the 512th, which already has trouble producing a qualified student that the line units can use. So that'll increase that strain, maybe it'll be better with new helos. Choosing a Huey as the other type rating is sort of short sighted, since it's set up to be replaced as this comes online. I can't really formulate an objective reason but I feel like this is just going to turn into a year at Doss for the studs going through this. Having said all that I'd totally apply to instruct if it's in a cool place and doesnt pay poorly. This is gunna be in Pecos, TX though, run by out of touch contractors doing exactly what Uncle Sugar tells them to do, nothing more.

Choo Choo

Daytime Rage time.

The CSAR/Helo numbers look good now, but there are a huge number of guys getting out now at the end of their ADSCs or 100% set on doing it. Many are leaving to do jobs totally not flying related. A few are using the Rotary to Airline route, but they're older dudes that had 20 years in already. I can't begin to imagine what will happen when the contractors totally take over SUPT-H. Without having USAF dudes there to balance out the old contractors its gunna get weird. UPT by just sim instructors. Upping the flow of new dudes is going to do F all. We can't even train the Co-pilots we get now. Moody is a great case study. Brand new Lts are getting 45-60 hrs a year, getting passed around to guard units for any experience they can scrape up, or deploying with other RQS's. Have you ever seen a bitter Lt? Its like the Ghost of Christmas Future. The iron to fly them isnt there. More importantly the SMAs aren't there. Their retention is a whole other topic.

May as well make sure your SMAs fly with the butterfy grip and get ready to break that can up into neat 100 rd links. I always wanted to fly with one of the old Mossbergs we had in the armory but I never got to qual with em.

I did a week long planning cell and Im also ready to not work with the army again

Do it. There are gunna be hard days where you're doing BS, but then you're flying in formation at 50' on starry night in the NTTR or hacking the mission down range.

Our functional confirmed last quarter that going there as IP was still a thing for USAF bros, not that any from our community would be going. As a former Whiting SNA/Stud most the USAF dudes seemed to enjoy it a ton. As student I regret nothing about going there, despite the lengthened timeline.

2 on not bringing it to Japan. Cars are dirt cheap on Okinawa and the salt spray will start to devour it unless you wash it a ton and have a garage. I live on base and when I wake up and walk to my car after a windy night it's covered in salt crust. Used car dealers will sell you a decent car for 3k with a 2 year bumper to bumper warranty. I got both ours in the lemon lot, but it's hit or miss. Tons of selection in PCS season, but it dries up off season.