Clayton Bigsby

For me at an immediate level, absolutely immeasurably yes on the first two. I'm an ATC, federal employee. Being reclassified as a political appointee and having my due process rights waived was not something I was happy about, because I'm not an appointee, and that was just within the last couple weeks. Let's also not forget the two and a half months I went without a paycheck, over the holidays no less, for absolutely nothing. It's not the first shutdown I've been through, it certainly won't be the last (guessing we have one coming in a month or so), but it was the longest and the most obscene. And the anti-labor executive orders...don't think I even need to explain those, how detrimental they'd be. I'm very active in our union, it's the proper avenue for us to improve and address the workplace. I think we have a good mix where it's optional to be in the union in the first place, you only pay dues if you're in, and we can't strike so the legally-mandated communication is different. I could go on if needed but I think I made my point. Also I was very concerned for the future of my profession, our wage, and my leave time...lots of talk of big changes for those in a second term. And our labor contract expires two years into it. For the satisfaction of identity as an American...well, I'd like to be able to travel the world again, and it's somewhat abhorrent that we still can't go to Canada or any of Europe because of the President's erratic-at-best, or even lack of plan for COVID. Our response and stats do all the talking here. You can say what you want on political leanings or leverage, but the fact that we're shut out from our longest-standing, closest allies should alarm you. And sadly I trust the career politician to create a functional, cohesive government/cabinet more than the current clown show that only favors loyalty, like it's the fucking Mob or something.

You think the US made gains with Russia the past 4 years? Donnie did Vlad's bidding on the reg. Agreed on China and Iran, but so much could have been done with both of those, so much more effectively. Dude was all over the place.

ATCer here. I'm a Tower guy, so explaining what Center/Tracon dudes do can be difficult because 1) it wasn't me and 2) the equipment and rules they use are very different (even from each other). As absurd as this guy with the phone seems, keep in context the terrain surrounding the area, and the locations of radar antennae and radio transmitter/receivers - for Centers they're optimized for talking to people in the flight levels above 10k, and around terrain (which there's lots of in that area) you lose line-of-sight and radar contact/comms very quickly below those altitudes. Assuming the aircraft is semi-controllable, which it obviously was, and someone on a multi-crew aircraft is able to maintain communications, passing along a phone number while you can is a prudent move and it wasn't just so the mishap aircraft could cancel IFR on the ground. There's lots of info needed and it's likely that was rapidly going to be the only way to communicate with the Center, who can pass around useful stuff like Lat/Longs and other crucial info for emergency response and not just rely on eyewitnesses calling 911. Also do J-models have integrated Sat Phones, like the C-17's Aero-I? Also where this occurred is just beyond the eastern fringes of the servicing approach, SoCal Tracon (SCT), and at the lower levels of Los Angeles Center (ZLA). SCT in the area is really set up to work the Palm Springs TRSA and to feed/sequence the satellite airports in the area (Bermuda Dunes and Thermal), and there's a basic ATC procedure of not forcing radio frequency changes on emergency aircraft unless better handling will result. Someone in an emergency descent from the low twenties or teens (not sure where MC-130s do their A/R) isn't a whole lot of time to work with beyond an emergency point out as you blow through someone else's airspace. Finally the LiveATC tape was edited so not all the comms are there. Anyway consider the limfacs, don't just look at it as quibbling. Very very happy there was such a happy end result. America!

Rabid Seahawks fan here, super familiar. Totally agree.

No, the best part with him is he doesn't have to play to make the money! If he played, he'd have to compete. If he competed, he'd be exposed as a guy who boarded the injustice train right as his playing ability dramatically dropped off...and everybody forgets that because it got drowned out in the noise of the anthem protest. He has been offered contracts to play, he just doesn't want them - he wants to be appointed the starter right out of the gate. If he really wants to play at all, which I don't think he does.

Not 4 verses worth I don't, lol

Him him.

Fuck there's 4 verses? What the shit?!?

Their fallen member was their PAO. Pretty detailed article there. 🍺

They still do it. I went to Tuscon last year to visit Pima Air, and those quals were going on the whole time I was outside in the museum yard. Very cool, and I live 10 miles north of Chino! So I've seen quite a bit of warbird stuff.

Wonderful response to Kaep seen on Twitter, replying to that brilliant tweet from him - "Relax Colin, Iran ain't signin you either"

All the cock-meat sandwiches you can eat!

I thought I heard they shot/wounded someone on their way out of the jewelry store before they hijacked the UPS truck. Then they shot at the cops once surrounded and bogged down.

When I went thru Basic Loadmaster at Altus, there was a story of a Saudi stud LM who had been failed in Basics (which is entirely academic), was sent home, and was supposedly executed in the airport after de-planing for disgracing the kingdom with his failure. Therefore the ensuing policy was to pass all Saudi studs. Since the story came from one of the retired mil now civilian instructors who had been there a very long time, it was somewhat credible.

So who got to take turns kicking the everliving shit out of the other Saudi studs who stood by filming it?

Got to look at this one a bit at the Chino airshow earlier this year, and it looked great. Great progress from a just year previously, I remembered seeing the freshly-arrived and distinctively Bronco parts piled up at Aero Trader. Now it's flying all over the place.

lol Not for UTAs, my friend...in my experience, orders with travel were only available for Annual Tour, or for any missions that had the funding. But drill weekend? That was on me to get there. I did the non-rev thing as a ground guy. For the most part, it worked. To the OP, what you may run into is needle-dick airline personnel who don't understand what you're doing, and may try to claim that you're using your travel benefits for financial gain. If and when that happens, nuke that shit from orbit, behead the remains. I'm getting all triggered internet tough-guy over this as I ran into that exact situation and I played it soft, thinking I have to get along with my boss/employer and besides the airline making this claim wasn't even my own, it was a partner airline at my airport (on whom I was non-reving for UTA, their flights served my destination direct while mine required 1-2 connections). But the takeaway was that I wished later on that I had been much firmer and put the two station managers in touch with USERRA as mentioned above, as well as with their leadership further up the chain, airlines have extensive participation in the reserve components and some education being dropped from the executive/flying side of things would have made life much easier for me and for any other guardsmen/reservists who happened to work there later on. Meanwhile one of my jackass coworkers was non-reving up to Alaska to do commercial fishing. Okay...

Apparently there was a lot more AF-oriented scenes that were cut to prioritize the comic story. Hopefully the blu-ray release has more content. But it's Disney, who knows, they'll probably make you wait after it's been in the vault for 20 years to get that.

It's back up here.

First Command still exists, I bank with them and they extended us two full paychecks during the gov shutdown, when USAA comparatively did not for my coworkers. Yeah, we got savings, but I was still working every day and having some funds available and not just raiding the emergency fund was nice (especially when the emergency is fucking ridiculous in the first place). We insure with USAA, one place where they really shone with us was moving HHGs from Hawaii, nobody else would. I've also heard they're good for financing overseas direct vehicle purchases, most banks are leery of extending funds for a vehicle whose VIN doesn't exist yet at the time of purchase. But yeah, I definitely agree, USAA has gone way way downhill. They were next to useless for our VA home buying experience - they call you 'pre-qualified' and won't run any actual numbers until after you've made an offer and have it accepted, leaving the potential to lose earnest money if there are any snags. Navy Fed was way better!

The 0.32 BAC is a rumored number floating around (I also read 0.34). Again, rumors of termination, resignation, and suspension (which in reality would be administrative leave). I believe the incident occurred last thursday, right? I heard about it friday...and immediate administrative action is certainly unlikely over a 3-day weekend (which most admin stretches into a 4-day'er). But I'm guessing we'll see it on all the national news media very soon.

We'll see if it's an actual termination. Seems very very fast for that. A resignation, maybe...and that's been rumored. Lots of rumor out there and little factual info.

Wasn't the rescue coordination center at Tyndall? If so, I assume that capability has been transferred elsewhere?

Understood, but the E-3 is kinda key to everything we do. The other bases are way more limited in terms of fleet dispersal - what, 3 at Kadena, 3 at Elmo? Less? One at Boeing Field? Whatever's TDY to Nellis or overseas? Tornado hits Dyess, there's still Ellsworth plus whatever's at Eglin, Edwards, Nellis, and deployed. A little more redundancy. Then there's also the other bombers that can pick up the slack if need be. Other than grabbing the NATO AWACS, I'm not sure what else you could do in the case of the E-3 fleet. Yes, natural disasters can take out any base, it's just in the post-BRAC era it's surprising how much less redundancy there is in certain places. Whiteman, Offut and Tinker all come to mind. Unrelated - would building HASes like at USAFE fighter bases be more storm-proof-ish? And oh, God, the tornados can have Altus! haha

Air Force Magazine (AFA one) article I read this morning said 'over a dozen F-22s' left behind, some 'damaged beyond repair'. Damn.