pawnman

The casuals here at Dyess are all in bags. Who issues those flight suits, the unit they're assigned to on casual or their UPT base? Are they going to get a second flight gear issue when they check in at the UPT base?

Wow. You're making friends fast. I hope you're this much fun in your first squadron...the IPs are gonna get a kick out of you.

Your recruiter can tell you, if he's any good. Recruiters are usually good for information like that, but don't rely on your recruiter to get all the work done in time for the board dates (unless you have a really good one). All you can do is get the stuff done as fast as YOU can. Letters of reccomendation, transcripts, scheduling an interview with a senior officer...get on that stuff as soon as you can. Pester your recruiter about AFOQT and flight physical scheduling. Checkout www.airforceots.com, they're full of helpful information specific to applying for OTS.

Plenty of time. You have to start UPT by your 30th birthday. I don't have dates for board meetings, but there will be plenty between now and your drop dead date. You're fine.

I assume you're excused from this CBT if you have actually gone to SERE in Fairchild?

Here's how it breaks down: If you get married prior to the move, you get a dislocation allowance to move from your current (civilian, I imagine) house to your first base. If you're single, you're on your own for the first move. The dislocation allowance is hefty, something like $2000. I believe it varies based on how far you're moving, rank, time in service. As far as BAH...There are two separate rates for each location, one with dependents and one without. The Air Force doesn't care what you do with your money or what kind of living arrangements you make, you'll get paid the same. If you're married, you'll get the "with dependents" rate whether the wife lives with you or not (You will NOT get separation allowance if the separation was your idea and not the military's.). If your dependents are authorized to accompany you on your orders, no separation allowance. If your dependents aren't on your orders (for example, a TDY or deployment), then you get a separation allowance (if it's over 30 days). Clear as mud? As for the actual dollar amount of BAH, you need to look them up for each base. They're constantly changing as the markets change. As an O-1 with dependents in Pensacola, I was entitled to roughly $1100/month. We lived on base, though, so we didn't collect it (until I went to EWO school...I moved the family to Abilene prior to going to Randolph.) Here's the site: https://perdiem.hqda.pentagon.mil/perdiem/ Click on "Basic Allowance for Housing", fill in your info, and it'll tell you how much you'll be getting.

You have to take it, but you only have to pass if you're going F-15E's. I can't recall if failing makes you ineligible to select fighters, or if you have to pass it prior to winging if you select fighters.

The Boyd book is awesome, took me a while to find a copy in a store. I also enjoyed Not a Good Day To Die and I recently finished Blackhawk Down. There's some interesting tales in there, from the ground-pounder's perspective. I just started We Were Soldiers Once...And Young, about the beginnings of Air Cavalry in early Vietnam. It was a pretty good movie, haven't read enough of the book to tell you how it compares. A good fictional one is God's Children, about a platoon of US peacekeepers in a Bosnia-like setting. It had some very interesting conflict between a a 1Lt just months from Captain who tags along just for the ride, and the brand-new, West Point 2Lt who is officially the platoon CO. The major lesson to learn here, don't be a douchebag, swallow your pride, and ask questions of people more experienced than you are. Most of my other reads haven't been related to flying or the military.

Sparky, you're a genius. I just finished EWO school, and staying in that one-room hotel for five months was, well, unpleasant. I remember thinking "Best in AETC? Really?" every time I went to the main office to pay my bill. Just out of curiousity, what kind of return are you getting on this enterprise? Seems like a smart idea for someone with the money to invest up-front.

You can also use Explorer to "View Source", look at the HTML code, and get the answers that way. Doesn't work for every CBT (couldn't tell you if the SERE one is one that works or not). I honestly can't see getting anything helpful out of a CBT. I think we did take one at Fairchild, and it was largely about how to use the survival radios.

Of course, with military folks coming from all over the country, it's possible that there are people from Mississippi volunteering to go...get paid for your vacation, not a bad deal. Working through it sucks, but some folks may be willing to make that trade-off. How much work willl an SIB do if the rest of the base is shut down for Christmas?

It's typical to spend a tour in the cockpit, then a staff/AFLA tour, then back to the cockpit, etc. But, depending on your career goals, you can spend a LOT of time in the cockpit. It may not be YOUR jet (for example, you could go to AETC as an instructor). Taking a flying job (after your first tour) may not be the fastest track to promotion, but if you're more interested in flying than retiring as a full-bird, there are ways to do it.

Wild story. I hope I never have to use the training they gave us at P'Cola, but those instructors were top-notch and definitely taught us well.

On the other hand, what's the normal engagement range for the tank's main gun? If you can get a shot or two off before the enemy tank commander can see you, the cloaking has done its job.

Some of us can. There are those who have trouble reaching the switch by themselves.

Maybe I'm being naive here, but... We're losing allies in Iraq. Turkey is a US ally chomping at the bit to go into Iraq. Why don't we give Turkey a role to play in the coalition? Instead of either telling them to butt out entirely, or resigning ourselves to the idea that Turkey will ride into Iraq without us, why not include them in the work we are doing?

Any word on that winglet plan?

A true American hero.

It seems like the simpler answer would be to change the way fuel is budgeted, so guys aren't dumping all the fuel left at the end of the year "so we don't get shorted next year".

Does this actually DO anything for anyone alive? No. Does it hurt our efforts in Iraq? Yes. Sure, it's nice to recognize history for what it is...but you don't need a congressional resolution on a touchy subject to do that.

Indeed. Technology is great, but at some point, you have to by more than a handful of aircraft to make a difference.

Is that a clip from "Brainiac"? I love that show!

We had our baby the week before I started API at NAS Pensacola (not Whiting, I'm a WSO). We used Tricare Prime, got a private room at the hospital on-base, great care the whole time. It was a LITTLE stressful having the kid and starting training right away, but the wife (bless her heart) took care of the kid 24/7 while I had classes and homework. I would chip in when I got home at the end of the day and on weekends, but she was definitely on point until I finished API and went to the pool to await Primary. I think it worked out nicely for us, because the kiddo was almost two before we made our first move, and she was much more manageable than she was when she was first born.

The big gotcha I remember from the fact test is that if you don't do at least ten reps in ANY exercise, you fail the whole test. Kind of different from the PFT, where maxing one part buys you slack in a different part.

OSI, we've been waiting for