Enlisted Drone Pilots

[Azimuth]

The USAF is the only branch without warrants. So is it the USAF has it right and the other three branches are out to lunch, or is it the other way around?

The USAF got rid of theirs due to the creation of E-8/E-9 grades and quit appointing WO's in 1959. I'd say a sound decision made in the 1959 USAF isn't a sound one in the 2016 USAF.

The USAF doesn't want to create them again because of money. It's easier to task SNCO's with stuff well above their pay grade, then pay them more money to do the same job.

 

 

[Stitch]

21 hours ago, guineapigfury said:

Sensor manning is nearly as bad as pilot manning; we'd be cannibalizing the right seat to fill the left.  If any SOs want to make the jump, it will be only for the purpose of picking up the skill and departing for greener pastures.  So now we're taking cats on a 6 year enlistment and sending them through the FTU twice, all to get 30ish months of pilot time out of them with an expected reenlistment rate in the single digits.  That sounds just stupid enough for Big Blue to select it as the way forward.

Oh it'll be less than that, remember that those same guys/gals will get tasked with bay orderly in the dorm (as applicable), building clean up, base details, TCN escort duty overseas, PME, non-vol for honor guard and tagged for numerous bullshit details like parking cars at the base airshow and other stuff that has nothing to do with flying.  Meanwhile, their flying skills erode and they have to re-qual when they get back in the box (STS) taking up even more limited flying time I'm sure... And yes, I know young LTs in any flying squadron have similar but very different different but challenges.  I just wanted to point out that it won't even be 30 month at best. 

[guineapigfury]

Im looking at a 6 year enlistment split up as 5 months FTU /1 month of MQT / 2.5 years of ops / 5 months FTU / 1 month of MQT / 2.5 years of ops.  I left out leave, ALS and such.

[Azimuth]

2 hours ago, guineapigfury said:

Im looking at a 6 year enlistment split up as 5 months FTU /1 month of MQT / 2.5 years of ops / 5 months FTU / 1 month of MQT / 2.5 years of ops.  I left out leave, ALS and such.

That's no different than current Enlisted Aircrew.

Edited March 23, 2016 by Azimuth

[guineapigfury]

I communicated that poorly.  I was trying to get across that by upgrading a SO to an enlisted pilot, we'd have to put them through Holloman and MQT twice, burning half a manyear that could be more efficiently spent flying the line.  I also left out FTAC, Aircrew Fundamentals, and URT from that timeline, which is an additional several months in total.  So a 6 year SO/Pilot enlistment gets us something like 3.5-4 years of useful flying at the price of sending someone through the FTU twice.  There also an FNG for twice as long since the crew positions are so different.  Also, we now have to train replacement SOs more frequently.  I think thats a bad deal for the Air Force.

[Lawman]

This would be where arguing to institute a warrant officer program would make sense then. Get the extra pay and graduate some E's to a role that doesn't require the 4 year degree to fill the seat, but without all the bullshit broadening and box checking required to be a successful regular commissioned officer when you're trying to promote against peers outside that small community. It would only work though if the head office protected the field to be and do what they are supposed to be/do. Not F it up with this everybody is a leader so now we can use warrants outside the role of technical/tactical expert.

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I know you're enamored with the idea of re-instituting the warrant officer corps in the Air Force--a whole different rank structure that hasn't existed in the Air Force for decades--but it's not clear how doing so would really help. 

If E's without college degrees can be made RPA pilots, then it would be much smarter to (1) design an enlisted career path that would reasonably ensure E's entering RPA pilot training would successfully complete the program, and (2) incentivize E's--monetarily and otherwise--to want to be RPA pilots . . . and perhaps more importantly, remain on AD as RPA pilots. Keeping them as E's would help protect the field from getting screwed up by the "everybody is a leader so now we can use warrants outside the role of technical/tactical expert" problem Army warrants are currently experiencing.  As noted before though, I personally find it tough to envision an Air Force enlisted track that would set E's (with no prior college experience necessary) up for success in RPA pilot training (which would have to include weapons employment, except for Global Hawk drivers). Furthermore, you'd have to throw some pretty huge bonuses their way, or get awfully creative with non-financial incentives, to get them to remain on AD. 

I really don't see how the Warrant Officer idea is the panacea you make it out to be. 

TT

Well it's the rub and I'll agree the Army is F'ing up a good thing with warrants same as they F'd up a good thing when we got rid of specialist ranks.

The idea of warrants is the same as the idea of non command/limited duty officers like you find in the research engineering corps. It's the only way to get pay with enough incentive to the tasks required which is the big problem a lot of you keep coming back too while at the same time not creating a person who needs all those boxes and career progression requirements checked to stay competitive after 2-4 years. The problem with enlisted/senior enlisted ranks or regular commission officer ranks is their field of promotion isn't specific to their job and there are so many that the guy that stays and specialized and didn't broaden (the original idea behind a warrant) isn't competitive to when promotions come around that guy non selects and now his job field suffers while the total number of say E6 to E7 looks fine and A1 stand around scratching their heads wondering why they can't make and keep enough enlisted UAS guys.

The Army is F'ing it up because we are expanding warrant roles in this "everybody is a leader" model where we want Warrants to be 2/3 pay captains in all but name. Either the corps will die and we will all just wake up one day as Cpts and 1Lts or they will figure out this was as bad an idea as making every hard working but non leadership oriented specialist into an NCO.. General Lundy is one of the few flag officers (aviation branch chef) that sees this as a mistake but that's a fight between flag officers to have.

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[Clark Griswold]

Good article on the subject and author is an EP at Cannon.  If they don't want WO then his idea of a pipeline of enlisted SO to RLO pilot could be a viable COA, I particularly liked the idea of delegation to Wg/CC the selection of OTS selects  

https://warontherocks.com/2015/10/stripes-to-stars-enlisted-airmen-deserve-to-become-officers-before-they-become-pilots/

 

Edited March 26, 2016 by Clark Griswold
minor fix, addition

[deaddebate]

[TnkrToad]

On March 26, 2016 at 2:38 PM, Clark Griswold said:

Good article on the subject and author is an EP at Cannon.  If they don't want WO then his idea of a pipeline of enlisted SO to RLO pilot could be a viable COA, I particularly liked the idea of delegation to Wg/CC the selection of OTS selects  

https://warontherocks.com/2015/10/stripes-to-stars-enlisted-airmen-deserve-to-become-officers-before-they-become-pilots/

 

       While I agree it sounds like a good idea, again there are statutory limits of how many officers the AF can have as a proportion of the overall force. Adding substantial numbers of 18Xers--at least as I understand it, I'm no personnelist--necessarily requires cutting officer numbers in other AFSCs. I'm not sure AF leaders are terribly excited about cutting officer slots in other communities to pay the RPA bill, given how the CSAF has said every AFSC is undermanned. I'm not sure what community/communities would be ripe for officer reductions, although someone on this forum suggested there are too many Space officers. 

TT

[SurelySerious]

We have an excess of GOs.

[Clark Griswold]

       While I agree it sounds like a good idea, again there are statutory limits of how many officers the AF can have as a proportion of the overall force. Adding substantial numbers of 18Xers--at least as I understand it, I'm no personnelist--necessarily requires cutting officer numbers in other AFSCs. I'm not sure AF leaders are terribly excited about cutting officer slots in other communities to pay the RPA bill, given how the CSAF has said every AFSC is undermanned. I'm not sure what community/communities would be ripe for officer reductions, although someone on this forum suggested there are too many Space officers. 

TT

Might be a case for reducing the PED tail, we provide the RPA and the data, the customer does his own PED work to save manpower there to pay for more manpower in ops.

Not familiar with Space so I can't speak to whether or not they have too many O's but if every Wing had to loose 1 or 2 O billets to pay for growth in the RPA enterprise that's probably feasible, assuming conversion to GS or E for said billet, or just eliminating the function altogether.  Shifting an equal number of E billets elsewhere in the AF to grow the SO cadre along with this hypothetical 240 RPA Pilots (120 Wings having to give up 2 O and 2 E billet to pay the RPA manning monster)

Break Break:  Question for RPA guys, if 240 crews (Pilot/SO) were added to the mix with the 60 supported CAPs, would 4 extra crews per CAP significantly improve QOL?  Or is that a drop in the ocean? 

You could also start to cut long term orders for Guard / Reserve RPA wings, right at 1095 for end strength reporting considerations if the Total Force would be looking at statutory limits on numbers and composition.  3 years would get takers, that's 15% to the goal of 7305 and a lot of dudes would interrupt other gigs to get that.

On the subject of reducing RPA manning, proposal to make an RPA cockpit single-seat:

https://breakingdefense.com/2015/10/how-to-cut-predator-reaper-uav-crew-in-half-lt-gen-otto/

5 hours ago, SurelySerious said:

We have an excess of GOs.

Word.

Few years old but relevant as ever:

https://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/world-report/2013/07/24/the-pentagon-has-too-many-troops

[guineapigfury]

Cutting the SOs won't help pilot manning.  Having one guy fly the jet and operate the sensor and laser works in fighters because that guy has fighter pilot talent and more importantly fighter pilot motivation.  Based on my four years in MQ-9s, my blunt assessment is that we lack the talent to pull this off.  With the pitiful amount of training RPA crews get it's borderline miraculous some of these guys can stay in their airspace.  Your average 18Xer shows up to his operational unit with something approximating the number of hours the rest of us got in phase 2 of upt.  Dudes were getting 10 hours of training in MQT and then were on their own.  Was anyone here ready to lead a combat mission where they employed and guided in munitions danger close with mountainous terrain the day after finishing T-6s or Tweets?  That's what this plan is.  Also, you don't get a cockpit to look out of for SA, your radio sucks, there's civilians everywhere, and you're doing NBO.

[guineapigfury]

240 pilots and SOs apiece would certainly help alot, but thats damn near half of Hollomans output for this year.  Guard and Reserve guys are already on long term orders and we're still shorthanded.  I see lots of contractor gigs available for the foreseeable future.  What terrifies me is that we'll see a modest manning improvement in 2017, think everything is returning to glidepath and increase CAPs to 70 just before the 18Xer exodus commences in the fall of 2018.

[Clark Griswold]

8 hours ago, guineapigfury said:

Cutting the SOs won't help pilot manning.  Having one guy fly the jet and operate the sensor and laser works in fighters because that guy has fighter pilot talent and more importantly fighter pilot motivation.  Based on my four years in MQ-9s, my blunt assessment is that we lack the talent to pull this off.  With the pitiful amount of training RPA crews get it's borderline miraculous some of these guys can stay in their airspace.  Your average 18Xer shows up to his operational unit with something approximating the number of hours the rest of us got in phase 2 of upt.  Dudes were getting 10 hours of training in MQT and then were on their own.  Was anyone here ready to lead a combat mission where they employed and guided in munitions danger close with mountainous terrain the day after finishing T-6s or Tweets?  That's what this plan is.  Also, you don't get a cockpit to look out of for SA, your radio sucks, there's civilians everywhere, and you're doing NBO.

Ditto, on it not really helping the RPA manning situation and I just don't see it working very well, just my opinion but for these missions a multi-crew aircraft works best.  Can't speak to the talent level as I have never been in a MQ-9 squadron but that is UFB on the level of training 18X'ers,  you said dudes were getting 10 hours in MQT then on their own, has that improved?

8 hours ago, guineapigfury said:

240 pilots and SOs apiece would certainly help alot, but thats damn near half of Hollomans output for this year.  Guard and Reserve guys are already on long term orders and we're still shorthanded.  I see lots of contractor gigs available for the foreseeable future.  What terrifies me is that we'll see a modest manning improvement in 2017, think everything is returning to glidepath and increase CAPs to 70 just before the 18Xer exodus commences in the fall of 2018.

Yikes, 70 CAPs coinciding with the first group's ADSC expiring?  Fire meet gasoline...

[SurelySerious]

Cutting the SOs won't help pilot manning.  Having one guy fly the jet and operate the sensor and laser works in fighters because that guy has fighter pilot talent and more importantly fighter pilot motivation.  Based on my four years in MQ-9s, my blunt assessment is that we lack the talent to pull this off.  With the pitiful amount of training RPA crews get it's borderline miraculous some of these guys can stay in their airspace.  Your average 18Xer shows up to his operational unit with something approximating the number of hours the rest of us got in phase 2 of upt.  Dudes were getting 10 hours of training in MQT and then were on their own.  Was anyone here ready to lead a combat mission where they employed and guided in munitions danger close with mountainous terrain the day after finishing T-6s or Tweets?  That's what this plan is.  Also, you don't get a cockpit to look out of for SA, your radio sucks, there's civilians everywhere, and you're doing NBO.

Ditto, on it not really helping the RPA manning situation and I just don't see it working very well, just my opinion but for these missions a multi-crew aircraft works best.  Can't speak to the talent level as I have never been in a MQ-9 squadron but that is UFB on the level of training 18X'ers,  you said dudes were getting 10 hours in MQT then on their own, has that improved?

240 pilots and SOs apiece would certainly help alot, but thats damn near half of Hollomans output for this year.  Guard and Reserve guys are already on long term orders and we're still shorthanded.  I see lots of contractor gigs available for the foreseeable future.  What terrifies me is that we'll see a modest manning improvement in 2017, think everything is returning to glidepath and increase CAPs to 70 just before the 18Xer exodus commences in the fall of 2018.

Yikes, 70 CAPs coinciding with the first group's ADSC expiring?  Fire meet gasoline...

No, that's the MQT syllabus for you. Because of the manning problems and lack of training capacity, training is cut short at every corner. Undergraduate, FTU, MQT, and CT. Some of the guys that get to the squadron have the smarts, just no experience with aviation so they take time to develop.

You know the theory that some people might develop into good pilots if they had 60 weeks of UPT instead of 53, but we only have training resources for 53 weeks so tough luck? It's like that, but with 20 weeks of training and we're graduating you anyway so good luck CAF.

[Clark Griswold]

7 hours ago, SurelySerious said:

No, that's the MQT syllabus for you. Because of the manning problems and lack of training capacity, training is cut short at every corner. Undergraduate, FTU, MQT, and CT. Some of the guys that get to the squadron have the smarts, just no experience with aviation so they take time to develop.

You know the theory that some people might develop into good pilots if they had 60 weeks of UPT instead of 53, but we only have training resources for 53 weeks so tough luck? It's like that, but with 20 weeks of training and we're graduating you anyway so good luck CAF.

Copy - Is there a significant (5% or more) attrition rate from URT and/or the FTU?  I heard there were some problems with dudes straight from UPT to the Reaper but is the same problem occurring with URT?    My question is based on informal discussions with other IPs and this was about 7 years ago so a helluva lot has changed but just wondering.

[viper154]

The UPT directs are now getting the last 3 weeks of the 18x course at Randloph so we get some time in their RPA "SIM"s. I'm from one of the first classes that started getting RPAs from UPT again, and my number got called. You can see the difference between the UPT direct guys and the 18x guys. As said above, a lot of the 18x guys are good dudes but they lack a lot of the airmanship built from being in the air, flying form, working with ATC , having multiple radios, IFEs etc. Getting 40 hours at doss and 40 hours in bamboo bomber t-6 sim (most the buttons and switches are just pictures under plexi glass) Isn't the best to build flying skills. From what the 18x guys said most the sims were instrument sims, and for those of you who don't know the MQ-1 and 9 have absolutely 0 traditional instruments. The first UPT directs are just graduating the FTU, but myself and all my peers going Reapers have had few or no issues. 

Edited. I failed English. 

Edited April 3, 2016 by viper154

[Clark Griswold]

22 hours ago, viper154 said:

The UPT directs are now getting the last 3 weeks of the 18x course at Randloph so we get some time in their RPA "SIM"s. I'm from one of the first classes that started getting RPAs from UPT again, and my number got called. You can see the difference between the UPT direct guys and the 18x guys. As said above, a lot of the 18x guys are good dudes but they lack a lot of the airmanship built from being in the air, flying form, working with ATC , having multiple radios, IFEs etc. Getting 40 hours at doss and 40 hours in bamboo bomber t-6 sim (most the buttons and switches are just pictures under plexi glass) Isn't the best to build flying skills. From what the 18x guys said most the sims were instrument sims, and for those of you who don't know the MQ-1 and 9 have absolutely 0 traditional instruments. The first UPT directs are just graduating the FTU, but myself and all my peers going Reapers have had few or no issues. 

Edited. I failed English. 

Gotcha - that sucks they (18Xs) aren't getting more training, I was wondering if the AF was phoning it in with that new AFSC and it looks like my hunch was true, no great sage here but I doubted they would take it seriously.  

Not sure how much ass pain it would be but establishing a permanent, semi-permanent or recurring TFR for an out of the way base to have a practical phase for URT but it would be worthwhile.  From my days in the GH, local training out of Beale was short & relatively simple, but the actual act of doing all the things you need to be able to do as a mission commander, plan-brief-ground ops-flight to an area-rtb-debrief crew-instructor led debrief, was invaluable.  

Actually controlling the aircraft, dealing with dynamic conditions, herding the cats to get the flight done, handling problems and the experience of actually doing what you will be doing when others will depend on you to do it right is worthwhile, giving the RPA community a base, ideally with some manned traffic in the vicinity to work with or around, terrain to account for, local procedures to comply, multiple ATC agencies and all the x factors of real training would be worth it.

Edited April 4, 2016 by Clark Griswold
minor fix

[FlyinGrunt]

Sounds like Cannon to me . . . as we speak.

[Clark Griswold]

1 hour ago, FlyinGrunt said:

Sounds like Cannon to me . . . as we speak.

Little too fast on the send for my own good.  Didn't realize Cannon was the FTU for the 1/9, that was where I was thinking of. 

[FlyinGrunt]

No, I should have been more specific.  It's not -the- FTU, but the 551st SOS is -an- FTU for the -9.  We're done with the -1; don't know if Holloman is as well.  What can I say, I try not to absorb any more drone knowledge than I have to . . . I'm worried that it's contagious.  (I keed, I keed . . . well, mostly.)

What I was really getting at is that as much as we bitch about it, the nature of student controllers and students in a number of wildly different MDSs (and some that probably should still be students in the others - we've got 6 or 7, depending on how you count!), combined with being in BFE, is probably exactly the kind of environment you described, Clark.  

[Clark Griswold]

6 hours ago, FlyinGrunt said:

No, I should have been more specific.  It's not -the- FTU, but the 551st SOS is -an- FTU for the -9.  We're done with the -1; don't know if Holloman is as well.  What can I say, I try not to absorb any more drone knowledge than I have to . . . I'm worried that it's contagious.  (I keed, I keed . . . well, mostly.)

What I was really getting at is that as much as we bitch about it, the nature of student controllers and students in a number of wildly different MDSs (and some that probably should still be students in the others - we've got 6 or 7, depending on how you count!), combined with being in BFE, is probably exactly the kind of environment you described, Clark.  

If they got more training that sounds like an ideal environment to learn the ropes, if it was Gen Clark Griswold calling the shots, they would get at least 100 hours in light GA planes with an emphasis in cross country for airmanship and a solid 6+ months of FTU-MQT.  My RPA is experience is from the Global Chicken so different animal and type of ISR mission but I went there with about 5 years flying experience, the training program was good, could have been better but was adequate to make this driver of the family truckster safe to operate the GH and eventually something slightly better than mediocre, slightly...

If the AF really takes this seriously and it obviously is a significant part of the future AF, give the 18Xer's more time in the air before planting their a$$ in the shelter.  Use the 11's that go to RPA as IPs, 18Xs gets more airtime 11Xs gets to fly, win win.  Thinking something like an SR20 for economy and a bit of range. 

[Guardian]

I say bring back warrants if it allows us to get rid of a lot of senior MSGTs and CMSgts. Generally deemed to be next to worthless. For every chief worth their salt I have met 20 that didn't deserve to even test for senior. And they think they are DVs. Self inflated egos for sure. Since when has a chief been more important than a squadron commander? Sorry. Pretty anti E8/9 if you couldn't tell.


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