frog

I don't fly in the Air Force, but I use my private certificate to travel often and I have two cents to share with you. If you decide to pursue serious instrument work, choose your instructor wisely. There are fine stick and rudder instructors out there who simply don't understand the IFR system and procedures, any many of them have very little experience in IMC. If they aren't comfortable flying a STAR and approach into a busy GA reliever in benign IMC, keep looking. I suspect UPT is the wrong place to unlearn bad habits. With that said, obviously basic attitude flying is important as well, but that really shouldn't need to be said.

I fly on the civilian side and have worked airspace in the past to include Powder River. There is a huge disconnect in what A3 tells these guys and what your local flers think. From the HQ perspective, there is no impact created by expanding MOAs because VFR pilots can still fly in the MOA and the AF freely uses this fact during the push to expand or create MOAs. Public comments are discounted and then your local squadron is left with the mess. Contrary to base encroachment issues, many of these ranchers have been flying their Cessna180 to check cattle for far longer than the MOA has existed. They aren't going to stop working just because the government ignored their public comments and created new SUA.

The reliance on technology is also a weakness. Some day some dude is going to launch with a compass and a clock to go find a target.

Many of the airfields that the herks use are only secured an hour prior to arrival. Security leaves after departure. There was a herk that broke in northeast Afghanistan once and they wanted to leave the bird on the "ramp" overnight...I had a hell of a time convincing them that the airplane would be in 10000 pieces and gone by morning if they left it without security.

They don't...they did the bare minimum to comply with the law. Keep your head down and don't ask questions.

I just checked the CAA legislation, and this requirement is written clear as day. Our government is out of control.

If you are set on the requirements that you listed, then active duty probably isn't for you. Ask about Guard or Reserve...I don't know much about them. Just a data point: I'm a CE officer. We move every 2-3 years. Deployments have been about 7 months out of every year, but that is improving rapidly with the drawdown. We were told to expect 6 months down range out of every 18-24 months once the drawdown is complete. My advice: worry about being 35 when you are 35. Family is awesome, but don't waste your life just waiting around for it to happen.

No.

Along the same lines, being a good dude doesn't make you incapable of assaulting a woman. I think that is what gets a lot of people in trouble...they just don't realize the evil that lies waiting for a drunk moment in a bad situation. I read the FOIA docs too, and I may not have gotten to a guilty vote, but I would bet money that something happened. I also love that everyone will throw out the accuser's statements, but are perfectly willing to accept the wife's statements without a second thought. She has more to lose than anyone in the case, and has every reason to lie. Not saying that she did, but just my experience from watching previous cases.

Ipad with foreflight is pretty nice. It reduced my chart subscriptions from $1000+/year to $75. The payback period is pretty quick even with the the new ipad. If you are willing to monkey with the software, the other android options might be worth a look. If you want to buy something and go fly a n hour later in IMC, buy an ipad...very few reliability issues as long as you keep it off of the glare shield.

I have no doubt that they have a model crunching numbers on it, but I really think most people who take the bonus are going to stay anyway. Full disclosure, I'm a 32E so I certainly don't have a good perspective on aircrew specific tools, but the CE community has conducted study after study that says bonuses are ineffective. People stay in until their family starts to break, and then they jump. For most people with their head in the right place, it doesn't matter if the bonus is $10K or $100K, you aren't going to leave your 5 year old for seven months for the fifth year in a row. For people who are really focused on earning big money, $25K is chump change...go find a job doing something lucrative, because flying isn't ever going to make you rich.

Come on, the bonus is a perk, not an "incentive", and none of you guys are going to leave over the bonus not being increased. If you really hate your job as much as you guys talk about, then the difference between $25K and $35K should be negligible. If the money is really what you are after, quit being a puss and go get a job where you can be compensated for your performance and make some real money. Everybody talks a big game about leaving, but the reality is half of you are scared to leave because in your heart you know that you are compensated pretty damn well with relatively good stability and benefits to fly some cool jets despite all of the mother blue BS.

This keeps getting better and better! https://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/12/us/politics/hagel-to-open-review-of-sexual-assault-case.html

Tough to say...he was convicted by five of his peers.

AETC will be keeping blues Monday per commanders briefing this morning. I haven't seen an actual policy letter.

Honestly, if you worked with your past leadership regularly, and there is mutual respect between the two of you, just email them directly. Keep it short, very brief explanation, ask for a recommendation, and let them know you can get on their schedule for a follow up phone call if necessary. If the guy knows you, respects you, and wants you to stay in the Air Force, it shouldn't bother them one bit. If they don't want to write you a recommendation, the worst thing they can do is ignore your email. You don't have much to lose. Caveat: I'm a lowly O-3. But I wouldn't hesitate to email my past commanders directly if I really needed their help. What career fields are you hoping for? Knowing the assignments officer at AFPC can really be helpful if that particular career field is undermanned.

I really don't buy the "shoe clerks are out to get us" sentiments related to this promotion board. Somebody came up with some really dumb ideas to implement this board, and it unintentionally hurt the younger flyers in a bad way . Leadership needs to recognize this and give a free pass to flyers without a UIF on the next captain board due to the training pipeline requirements. End of story...really not very complicated. I really don't have a suggestion for the guys that got hosed on this board...that really sucks.

I agree with you that many people don't understand how hard flyers work. However, in a similar way that you educated your physiologist, do you ever ask somebody in support offices about their problems? From a CE perspective, I would LOVE to eliminate training days, staff a night shift, or get all of your work orders done, but I don't have the resources to make that happen. Here is why: - Training Days: The Air Force has elected to implement a dumbass deployment process in which my CE troops will probably never deploy to support the homestation unit that they are assigned to. The homestation wing commander has no buy in on what his combat support capabilities are. Of course, if this gets fixed, it means your homestation base doesn't get maintained when the entire wing deploys. Additionally, more than half of CE taskings are outside the wire...and no, these guys aren't EOD...just your average plumber. What that means is I have to have all of my airmen proficient enough in combat skills to show up at an Army Power Projection Platform and succeed. This requires an entire syllabus of training in order to meet the combat and engineering training tasks...this is before any taskings are issued. So you spend somewhere between a full day per week, or maybe one day every other week to train these guys up, and then you find out they are deploying to the Deid. Fantastic, we just lost thousands of man hours that could have gone to supporting a homestation unit. All because the Air Force can't figure out how to manage deployments. But, I have to train each engineer like he is going to get shot at, or I have failed. - Normal Duty Hours: I simply don't have the manning to implement a night shift. With somewhere between 1/3 and 2/3 of each shop deployed at any given time, I can't effectively cover 24 hours a day with enough trained, experienced guys. So, we run a standby team for airfield and infrastructure emergencies. That is in addition to normal duty hours, so if you worked an emergency on standby all night, you are going to work all day in the shop, too. For this reason, I'm not going to run a guy out at night to fix a leaky faucet or an electrical plug that doesn't work. But, you can be assured that an airfield lighting problem or water main break is going to be worked all night until it is fixed. - Work Orders: The bottom line is, a big facility complex like a base requires that you spend 97% of the forecasted maintenance every year, only deferring 3% per year. The Air Force is funding sub-50% right now. Additionally, the more you defer maintenance, the more money is required the next year. The fact is, Big Blue has rightfully decided to invest in other places, such as very expensive airframes. It's time to pay the price, it's as simple as that. CE is also one of the largest unfenced pots of money around, so it gets taxed at HAF, MAJCOM, and the wing. Much of your squadron O&M money that gets used to buy flatscreens at end of year was pulled from money that was originally budgeted to CE O&M work. This is INCREDIBLY frustrating when the flying squadrons are up your ass about work not getting done. Now, one area that we need to improve is communicating with you guys. If work isn't going to get done, you need to know that and the underlying reason. This business of work orders going into the black hole to never be heard of again needs to stop. I worked directly with three fighter squadrons in my last assignment...great bunch of dudes, most of who treated me very well. However, there were a few that really knew how to burn bridges with a number of organizations on-base. Are there some really terrible support organizations out there? Absolutely. However, at the end of the day, I feel like I've done my job if I put 100% of my resources against the top priorities in the wing, which is a pretty tough thing to figure out.. That may have only covered about 25% of the overall requests, but there isn't anything else that I can do. Sorry, this wasn't supposed to turn into a CE specific post, but that is what I know best. Maybe finance has a similar story, maybe not. I'm going to drop the rant here, because we are getting way off topic from the thread topic of CGOC buffoonery. Have a good one!

The disconnect isn't that large. There are lots of people in the ops and support world that go to work everyday, work hard, put in long hours, don't expect recognition, and then get up and do it again the next day. The problem is that the Air Force doesn't encourage or reward workman-like behavior. We only hear about the "special" people in both worlds. I agree there is a disconnect on what level of support is required, but that is a resource problem that isn't going to go away in the near future, and is only remotely connected to the work ethic of the majority of support folks.

Yeah, a nation can just print more money and take everybody down with inflation instead of a single household failing.

Good info, thanks.

I hate to break up the good time, but I think this is a pipe dream. Sure, it sounds great. But you can't just bring back all of those people who used to work in the squadrons because they no longer exist. As support manning was cut to pay for new weapons systems in the out years, the authorizations were eliminated and people were shown the door. Moving people back to the squadron is going to deplete what is left of comm, MPF, etc. Your shit still isn't going to get done, the backlog will just be in a different place. I'm not sure if the flying squadrons used to have personnel officers sit in the squadron as section commanders since they are relatively small, but large squadrons did. Those fellas got the axe...there is no way to bring them back. The same is true for many other support functions, and it's about to get even worse with the current budget cuts. Bottom line: The Air Force cut manning to buy expensive stuff in the out years. We've been paying the price, and it's about to get much, MUCH worse. Only time will tell if that trade was a smart decision. Either way, the decision was made long ago and now we get to live with it. Full disclosure, I'm a support guy (CE). If you think service is bad now, wait for another year or two. The support capabilities within your wing have already been cut drastically, and what is left is about to be decimated.

At least he landed at the correct airport

It's funny listening to people complain about the red tape of the Air Force and how people are evaluated and then look to the airlines for a better life. Sure, it works out great for some, but I can't imagine subjecting myself to the asinine seniority system that the airlines use. If you get picked up during the upcoming hiring boom, good for you, but you'll also be one of the first to get dropped during the next furlough. Enjoying that left seat? Good, because your airline just merged with somebody else, back to the right seat. Give yourselves some more credit and at least open up your options to flying some charter or starting a business that can use GA for travel. There are a bunch of guys out there that have made it in the airlines and have really enjoyed it, but there are even more who have had their sucked away by the seniority system. And here is the real kicker...it has nothing to do with ability, just poor timing. I think some people really enjoy flying for the airlines, but I don't think it is the great escape that many AF pilots make it out to be.

Really?