Changing/Switching airframes

[Duck]

The functional isn’t releasing anybody to any non-RW platform except for T-6s. Unless you can snag an embassy gig flying C-12s the RW-regional transition is really all you got. 

So this is completely unscientific and based 100% on observation, but out of my MAF to MAF buddies and my MAF to T-6 buddies, the guys with the T-6 tour have been getting picked up at a faster pace than my friends who where only KC/C dudes. I realize FEDEX/UPS is off the table, but if you are just looking at a major, I would take the T-6 if you can’t get anything else.

[norskman]

3 hours ago, Duck said:

So this is completely unscientific and based 100% on observation, but out of my MAF to MAF buddies and my MAF to T-6 buddies, the guys with the T-6 tour have been getting picked up at a faster pace than my friends who where only KC/C dudes. I realize FEDEX/UPS is off the table, but if you are just looking at a major, I would take the T-6 if you can’t get anything else.

Copy and thanks!  That's good gouge. 

[Hawg15]

Does anyone have any SA on the possibility of switching airframes from a fighter to a non-ACC heavy without a medical DQ for ejection seats? Is there any chance, especially with the current climate and mysteries of how AFPC works, it could happen?

[LookieRookie]

18 minutes ago, Hawg15 said:

Does anyone have any SA on the possibility of switching airframes from a fighter to a non-ACC heavy without a medical DQ for ejection seats? Is there any chance, especially with the current climate and mysteries of how AFPC works, it could happen?

Try to join the MAF Assignments and Mentoring page. All the assignment functionals and AMC/A1 are admins.

[matmacwc]

21 minutes ago, Hawg15 said:

Does anyone have any SA on the possibility of switching airframes from a fighter to a non-ACC heavy without a medical DQ for ejection seats? Is there any chance, especially with the current climate and mysteries of how AFPC works, it could happen?

She isn’t worth it.

[Danger41]

You could look at AFSOC AC/MC-130 or HC/EC-130 and stay in ACC if you are just trying to avoid the iron triad.

[di1630]

Does anyone have any SA on the possibility of switching airframes from a fighter to a non-ACC heavy without a medical DQ for ejection seats? Is there any chance, especially with the current climate and mysteries of how AFPC works, it could happen?

Current 11F...good luck. You’ll need to wait til you can go guard/reserve.

There’s gotta be a chick involved to do something like this so you should just volunteer for UPT and have her try to get the same base.

Enjoy Laughlin.


Sent from my iPhone using Baseops Network mobile app

[LonghornAirman]

To the guys in the heavy community,

I just dropped C-17s, but, although I'm super excited for it, always wanted to go AFSOC. How common is it to move from AMC to AFSOC after your first assignment? Can anyone provide any guidance on how to go about this?

[viper154]

2 hours ago, Longhorn said:

To the guys in the heavy community,

I just dropped C-17s, but, although I'm super excited for it, always wanted to go AFSOC. How common is it to move from AMC to AFSOC after your first assignment? Can anyone provide any guidance on how to go about this?

Possible. Sure. First focus should be on becoming the best C-17 pilot/new guy in the squadron you can be. Having a good standing with your squadron cc can go a long ways when assignment time comes around. As always, wants and needs of the air force always come first, and luck and timing is everything. If C-17 manning is good and a AFSOC airframe is hurting for guys when it’s time for your second assignment that’s your best chance.  

Edit to add-I’m at a AFSOC schoolhouse with quite a few prior MWS students from different airframes/backgrounds including AMC. 

Edited July 17, 2019 by viper154

[DirkDiggler]

1 hour ago, Longhorn said:

To the guys in the heavy community,

I just dropped C-17s, but, although I'm super excited for it, always wanted to go AFSOC. How common is it to move from AMC to AFSOC after your first assignment? Can anyone provide any guidance on how to go about this?

In the MC-130 community it's very common to see AMC crossflow guys, previously it was mostly prior slick guys but I personally know 5 prior C-5/17/KC-135 guys that transitioned to MCs or ACs.  CV-22s are going to be a harder sell since the training pipeline is longer and always backed up.  Can't speak to U-28s or C-146s.  I'll echo the previous comment above, be the absolute best C-17 pilot you can be and be honest with your boss about what you want.  The better a pilot/officer you are the easier it will be for your Sq/CC to advocate on your behalf when the time comes.

[Danger41]

In the U-28, the community started with guys from all the various AF airplanes so the community is used to that. Having said that, in the last few years if someone came from a different aircraft, 90% of the time it was a booger flick from a different community and that person was a major drain on their squadron.

Be in the 10% if you do switch, please.

[tac airlifter]

54 minutes ago, Danger41 said:

In the U-28, the community started with guys from all the various AF airplanes so the community is used to that. Having said that, in the last few years if someone came from a different aircraft, 90% of the time it was a booger flick from a different community and that person was a major drain on their squadron.

Be in the 10% if you do switch, please.

That’s a bit harsh, although maybe I’m in the 90% and this is how I find out 😬

[WheelsOff]

Be the best C-17 dude you can, as has been stated. Hopefully you’re at TCM or CHS and can get airdrop qual’d...that would likely make you more marketable to AFSOC depending on what type of airframe you’re trying to get into. I’ve also known a few guys who were picked up for green door, so that’s maybe an option for you down the road as well.

[Danger41]

19 hours ago, tac airlifter said:

That’s a bit harsh, although maybe I’m in the 90% and this is how I find out 😬

Hahaha no. You predate that and fit well within the BAMF group from other jets. 

[the g-man]

Be the best C-17 dude you can, as has been stated. Hopefully you’re at TCM or CHS and can get airdrop qual’d...that would likely make you more marketable to AFSOC depending on what type of airframe you’re trying to get into. I’ve also known a few guys who were picked up for green door, so that’s maybe an option for you down the road as well.

Eh. I’d say CHS or TCM plus AD just makes you more likely to do a prisoner swap or LTS. If you’re a single squadron dude, be good and upgrade quickly and you may be able to get one of the special AFSOC jobs

 

 

But honestly your desires could possibly change in the next 3 years to wanting to stay in AMC or head to AETC.

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[50ScoopsofWhey]

What about going to bombers instead of AFSOC?

[WheelsOff]

9 hours ago, 50ScoopsofWhey said:

What about going to bombers instead of AFSOC?

The B-1 is broke af and that community is trying to figure out what to do with all their new pilots who aren’t flying (friend of mine PCS’d to the schoolhouse a year ago and in that time has flown the jet TWICE). The B-2 is cool but fairly tough to get into unless you know somebody, so I hear. I guess there’s always the Buff?

[jazzdude]

I think a couple years ago they were looking for cross flows from heavies to BUFFs. Thought about it for a few days but decided against it. Why not? Minot...and PRP/nukes.

 

Edit to add: usually there's also a message looking for crossflow to B-2s every year or so

 

[Blue]

3 hours ago, WheelsOff said:

friend of mine PCS’d to the schoolhouse a year ago and in that time has flown the jet TWICE

Damn.  Worse than I thought.

[Ant-man]

Speaking of broken B-1s, last week, the OG at Dyess said it will take anywhere from 3-7 years to recover from all the maintenance issues. He said that the community will have to shrink, and that inevitably some people will finish MQT and be sent elsewhere. There are several pilots in the ops squadron on regression, and a few younger guys have been kicked to the OSS where they go unqualified. 

Wouldn’t it make more sense to send people to other airframes before pushing them through the FTU, only to send them elsewhere? For context, I have not flown a military aircraft since last year, and will not fly the B-1 until next spring at the earliest. 

My understanding is that General Ray wants to keep people in the aircraft that they dropped. I want to be clear that I am not ungrateful, I’m just concerned about the long-term impact on my flying career and don’t know how to bring it up to anyone with decision-making power.

[SurelySerious]

23 minutes ago, Ant-man said:

Speaking of broken B-1s, last week, the OG at Dyess said it will take anywhere from 3-7 years to recover from all the maintenance issues. He said that the community will have to shrink, and that inevitably some people will finish MQT and be sent elsewhere. There are several pilots in the ops squadron on regression, and a few younger guys have been kicked to the OSS where they go unqualified. 

Wouldn’t it make more sense to send people to other airframes before pushing them through the FTU, only to send them elsewhere? For context, I have not flown a military aircraft since last year, and will not fly the B-1 until next spring at the earliest. 

My understanding is that General Ray wants to keep people in the aircraft that they dropped. I want to be clear that I am not ungrateful, I’m just concerned about the long-term impact on my flying career and don’t know how to bring it up to anyone with decision-making power.

First, it’s not that there aren’t any flyable jets, there just aren’t that many. 

 

Second...you have to keep a broad spectrum of ages/experience in the community. If you just kick every new person out until the jets are ready in 4 years for full combat coded squadrons to be full up it would only be new LTs from the FTU (or in your proposal, people also new to the airplane fresh out of FTU), and that doesn’t really work. 

 

Although, let’s be honest, big AF is moving that way with the current definitely-not-retention-crisis anyway. 

[viper154]

1 hour ago, Ant-man said:

Speaking of broken B-1s, last week, the OG at Dyess said it will take anywhere from 3-7 years to recover from all the maintenance issues. He said that the community will have to shrink, and that inevitably some people will finish MQT and be sent elsewhere. There are several pilots in the ops squadron on regression, and a few younger guys have been kicked to the OSS where they go unqualified. 

Wouldn’t it make more sense to send people to other airframes before pushing them through the FTU, only to send them elsewhere? For context, I have not flown a military aircraft since last year, and will not fly the B-1 until next spring at the earliest. 

My understanding is that General Ray wants to keep people in the aircraft that they dropped. I want to be clear that I am not ungrateful, I’m just concerned about the long-term impact on my flying career and don’t know how to bring it up to anyone with decision-making power.

Pretty sure some kid on here (or someone with a story of him/her) failed out of the B-1 FTU for academics and got sent to B-52s. I also remember someone in the FEB board who got booted from B-1 FTU and was being sent to scan IDs at the gate for the next 9.69 years. 

How lucky you feeling? 

Be patient, things might change, you might just have to fly that desk for awhile until things get fixed or you can get a white jet tour. 

[Disco_Nav963]

tl;dr summary, you'll probably get to stay and you'll probably get to fly a more normal amount, and you'll probably look back on it as being worth it

You're young. Have patience. I wasn't at that OG/CC call, but the previous WOM I'd heard was that brand new B-Course grads are *not* being sent off to do other things. The temporary crew force redux is hitting the middle tier of experience (broadly speaking), spread out across year groups. The whole point of drawing down manning is to ensure that those who stay can fly, gain experience, and upgrade on a more normal timeline (and not get bottlenecked as has happened a lot recently) given reduced sortie availability... While those that go elsewhere use their experience to add value elsewhere in the CAF, and learn things that will add value to the B-1 when they return.

The circumstances suck, but the community has weathered worse and bounced back to bigger and better things... e.g. the early 1990s trying to figure out if it still had a mission after the Cold War, and the early 2000s when the fleet and the crew force was permanently reduced by 1/3rd. You can look at this as "I missed the 18 fat years, and arrived just in time for the lean ones," or you can look at it as an opportunity to be on the ground floor of creating something great. I spent 8 years on the Octobomber, arriving a few years after the "Nukes Across America" incident when it was nuclear exercise after nuclear exercise occasionally punctuated by Guam. People that were short term thinkers looked for the first opportunity they could get to punch to something else (ALFA tours, green door assignments, rando non-flying staff gigs, etc.), and missed going to combat. Those of us who stuck around and tried to make our corner of the AF better eventually led the way when we went back to CENTCOM. Likewise, I suspect the B-1's finest hour is still ahead of us.

[Chuck17]

4 hours ago, Disco_Nav963 said:

I suspect the B-1's finest hour is still ahead of us.

Cut up BOne parts roasting on the desert floor at DM as B-21s roar overhead...Thats the future. 

The crews are staying put for the most part because of assignment cycles (systemic reaction is slow), and because the initial AFGSC plan to take care of them was unrealistic - things that take a lot of time/money/approval/basing decisions and/or are competitive. It’ll likely be a mix of most of those options, but no one place will get all the BOne dudes - you’re not all going to school/staff/UPT.

That takes time to settle. And just because your airplane takes a dump doesn’t earn you any extra points in the eyes of big Air Force. 

Luck and timing. Make your choices appropriately and remember rule #1.

Chuck

Edited August 5, 2019 by Chuck17

[Guest PeggyDriver46]

I met a F22 driver that was a patch in 135s and somehow worked a deal.

I was always told once you're heavies you're always heavies. I guess anything is possible.