The US Air Force reported that an F-16C Fighting Falcon crashed during combat training exercises near Caliente, Nevada, on Tuesday evening. The pilot was reported “missing.”
Unfortunately, that often means the pilot was lost with the aircraft.
No names or further status have been released. The Nellis AFB video media release can be seen here.
The US Air Force Academy has purchased new training aircraft to replace those it has leased for more than a decade. USAFA has not purchased a training fleet since the ill-fated T-3A Firefly killed 3 cadets and 3 officers from 1995 to 1997.
The Cirrus T-53A is a single engine propeller driven aircraft and will be used in USAFA’s flight training program. The T-53 acquisition will run $6.1M for the fleet of 25. The local article also notes the aircraft is equipped with a whole-aircraft parachute.
The aircraft will be evaluated by test pilots from Edwards Air Force base before its use as a cadet trainer.
Like the Air Force, the US Navy pays its aviators a monetary bonus to encourage retention (though it doesn’t always work, as the Air Force acceptance rate showed).
This year, due to high retention levels, the Navy altered its bonus plan; as stated now, the only aviators who will get the previous years’ $25K bonus per year are F/A-18 Hornet pilots. All others will get a bonus specific to their airframe: Read more
Lt Ryan McGuire, the pilot training student who lost his leg and won a fight to stay in training, has graduated and received his wings.
By becoming the first amputee to graduate from pilot training, First Lt. Ryan McGuire earned his spot among the elite group…
The new Air force pilot is reportedly headed to Altus AFB, Oklahoma, to learn to fly the C-17 Globemaster III. He has become the first amputee to earn his wings in pilot training.
USAF Lt Ben Garland has reportedly changed his mind and asked for an assignment as a Public Affairs officer rather than pilot training. He will be assigned to the USAFA athletic department rather than his original assignment to pilot training at Laughlin Air Force Base. The decision process has been ongoing for some time.
While its good he made that decision now, as opposed to halfway through Read more
An Air Force article notes that the T-38 Talon, the Air Force’s primary jet trainer, has just passed 50 years of service. To put that in perspective, the Air Force was only 14 years old, the Korean armistice wasn’t even a decade old, and most people probably didn’t know where Vietnam was yet.
The Air Force has indicated it will eventually begin an official search for a replacement trainer.
The T-38 isn’t the oldest aircraft in the inventory. The B-52 is approaching 60 years of service.
The Air Force Times notes that the Air Force approval of vision-correcting laser eye surgery has allowed people who would otherwise have medically unqualified to become pilots.
Early on, the Air Force offered photorefractive keratectomy vision correction to a limited number of aviators. With this procedure, the surgeon uses a laser to remove skin cells from the surface of the eye before correcting the patient’s vision.
Over time, the program was extended to more airmen Read more
Though it has been done under “beta” conditions in the past, the US Air Force is now conducting its first actual training class of UAV pilots who were not previously aviators.
The training is not short. The new Lieutenants have already completed flight screening, must conduct a significant amount of T-6 simulator training, RPA basic training, and then finally to the basic qualfiication course for UAVs. The “pipeline” is programmed as about a year.