Hey all, sorry I didn't post more details before this, they've had me flying my butt off since assignment night. The way it works after after your Nav check is this:
4 Formation flights
2 <Simulated> Air Drop flights
2 <Simulated> Air Refueling flights
1 Co-pilot flight
Then you have assignment night. If you assign to a plane which does air drop, then you have 3 more air drop flights, another co-pilot ride, and an air drop checkride. If you track to a tanker, it's t
The drop list the IP's gave us was a fraud! C-17's to CHS wasn't listed, but they knew that was my first choice, and me and another guy who wanted it got it!!!
Woohoo! Going to Charleston baby!!!
Today was graduation. 54 weeks of fun/pain/work/play ending in getting my wings. It was all worth it, I'd do it again if I had to. The graduation ceremony was this morning at 1000. Class 10-05 was sitting in the back in their service dress, just like we were sitting in the back of class 08-05's graduation a year ago. It's weird thinking about all that's happened and things I've done since then, and knowing those guys are all just getting started with it.
We have our graduation dinner t
So we only get 4 "actual" formation flights, by which I mean only four flights where you work just on formation flying. After that, we do simulated airdrop and air-refueling flights, all of which are done as a formation.
We're also in the process of filling out our drop requests at the moment. Should be interesting to see what happens!
Finally go my Nav check out of the way before the holiday break last week. I did extremely well and am very happy, hopefully that will make up for my dumb mistakes on my Trans check! When we get back from the break, it will be straight into formation and Mission Fam (simulated air-refueling and air-drop flights). Only 4 weeks to Assignment night on Jan 29th!
Yup, first flight I hook, and it's a check ride! I did fine in the air, screwed up some aerobatics, but no big deal. Had some crazy dealings with ATC, but handled them very well and my IP said he was very impressed. The problem came after the flight during the table-top Emergency Procedure. They give you a situation after every flight you do, and you have to talk through how you would get through it. It's the same with check rides. Anyway, if there's a boldface involved, you have to say it
Got my #1 choice... T-1's!
We had two get T-38's, two got UH-1's (they both wanted them... including one of the Top Sticks!), two got T-44's (they put T-38's first but are happy with T-44's), and the rest of us got T-1's (including the other Top Stick).
We start T-1 academicsat 0830 tomorrow... I'll let you know!
Half-way done with UPT!
The more academics I do it seems this is a pretty cool plane! A lot more power than the T-6, we're supposed to pull up to 15 degrees nose-up on take-off, and climb at 220 knots! The T-6 was 10 degrees nose-up and 160 kts to compare.
There's a ton more to learn about this plane than there was with the T-6 though, which I guess is to be expected. There's a crap-load of stuff in the checklists you have to memorize too. The T-6 checklist said "Trim - CHECKED" and you just ran the elevator,
Doh!!!
Had a great flight, only 4 downgrades, and I hook for ground stuff!! I'm a dummy, it was my own stupid fault, but I'm not going into specifics. I just need a swift kick to the jimmy. All my flights have been great up to now, and hopefully that will continue. It just sucks that I get the hook on a check ride! Oh well, guess I have to take my lumps and move on. Ground-88 tomorrow.
The days are still the same. Show at 0530, start briefing between 0600 and 0700, takeoff between
WAHOO!!!
I'm DUN!!! Did my checkride first go this morning. I had some mistakes, like everyone does, but overall did great. They have checkride gouge books here with info on every instructor. It tells you what knowledge questions they like to ask, what kind of stuff they have you do during flight, what emergency procedures they run you through, etc... You just study those and glance through all the stuff you've been studying for the last 5-6 weeks and your good!! They tell you over and over a
Wahoo! I forgot how much I love to fly! Even if it is just a Katana!
Anyway, had a blast, did well, and my IP was suggesting a proficiency advance (get me through the syllabus a lot faster). I guess that in some cases they don't let guys who finish early leave right then, they have to stick around. So, I figure if I have to be here, I might as well get the free flight time! So that's what I said.
For the first ride, the IP does EVERYTHING unless you ask to do some stuff. I asked for
One week until I Nav check. I was flying only once a week for the last few, which sucks because you lose a lot in that week. Checklists don't go as fast, your not as smooth on the landings, etc... but I've flown twice this week so far and will probably fly on Thursday and Friday as well. That's good, because the flying in general goes a lot better, but bad in that it can be draining. Regardless, I'd rather be flying than not. I should two-check on Monday then do the Nav check on Wednesday.
My Formation checkride and last Low-Level were yesterday. My complete dork of a Form partner and I did really well, we both received "excellent's". I had about 5 minutes to prepare for my Low-Level after the checkride, but luckily one of my flightmates was cool enough to do pretty much all my flight planning for me. He was already done with T-6's and knew I'd have min-time between my checkride and LL, so he hooked me up!
The LL was fun and quick, no biggie.
So now I get to sit around un
Sorry about not posting yesterday, I was beat and went to sleep early! The long weekend was nice, slept in a bunch and did some studying. People were allowed to leave the area as long as they were within 3 hours of Pueblo.
Had my second flight yesterday, went great again. The sight picture of where to put the horizon when you're doing steep turns, slow flight, stalls, etc... is very different from the Cessna 172. Those with a PPL already will know what I'm talking about, for those with no fli
Just got back from my cross country. We only get one while we're in T-1's and more than likely it will just be a one-nighter during the week. Some people get to do them over a weekend, by not many. The other student I was with and I went to Omaha then spent the night in Denver. On the way back, we stopped in Rapid City then came home. It was cool getting out of the local area and doing mission planning on the road.
I'm now finished with the first half of the Nav phase of training. I,
To the Maj at the SUP desk today who reads my blog: here's my next entry, thanks for reading!
I've done one of my two low-levels now and have started the last block of formation flying (4 flights) of my training in T-6's. The low-levels are fairly low threat. You only do two of them, the low-level charts are already made up for you, and an Excel sheet calculates all your airspeeds for you. You fly it at a constant 210 knots ground speed, so just adjust your airspeed to maintain your timing
So I'm about 3-quarters of the way through the Nav phase of T-1's now, which, they say, is the "meat and potatoes" of T-1 training. Had my first low-level flight yesterday, it was fun flying 230 kts at 500 feet, but the completely flat terrain of northern Oklahoma and southern Kansas doesn't exactly inspire youtube videos of yanking-and-banking through canyons... not that the T-1 ever would anyway! There's a number of guys in the "senior class" of my flight who are now Nav-check complete, and
So I gave the first formal brief this morning:
Note to self: make SURE your alarm clock will work before having to give the FIRST formal brief
Luckily, my 'wingman' came and knocked on my door before it was too late!!
More academics today. Went through navigation, using the IFG (In Flight Guide), and the procedures around here, etc... They give you a full checklist-sized IFG here, with almost everything you need for any flight planning, already bound with the little plastic rings and in sh
Had three rides in the "Nav" phase of training now. Good times! Pretty much every ride in the Nav block is an Out and Back, so now I've had lunch in Lubbock and Ft. Worth with the T-1. I'm planning on going to Abilene on Tuesday 'cuz I hear there's a fantastic steak place open in the evenings called the Beehive. We'll see!
The flights are usually two hours out then 2 hours back. You fly someplace about 30 min away, do a bunch of approaches, then continue on to your "outbase" another 30-4
My formation flying is getting better, I can hang with lead a bit easier than for the first 2 flights. Our days are shorter now. If we fly first go, then we only have to hang out until second go leaves to go fly, then we can go home. Works out to be about 7 hour days now.
The weekly stan tests are still kicking peoples butts. Luckily I haven't busted one since the first one, but a lot of people have been busting multiples, which means they have to take a retest, then another retest if t
So once you get towards the end of T-6's (at least at Vance), they have you go over and do a T-38 sim. At this point, no one (except for the Navy guys) know what we'll be flying for Phase III, and supposedly this sim has nothing to do with that selection (no one at Vance even sees the results, they just go to Randolph for statistics). Anyway, it was fun. You take off from Randolph AFB in your T-38, and fly an ILS at 250 knots. Then again at 300 knots. Then again at 350 knots. Over and over
No flying again today. They're not sure when the engines will be fixed, seems to be a fuel control problem. So, we're all hanging out until then. We had some random briefs, then were done by 1400. They mentioned something to the effect of possibly extending our time here so we can finish, if and when they get the stuff fixed. It might be a few days, it might be a few weeks, until it's all taken care of.
Oh well! Livin' the dream in the Dirty P!!
Didn't fly on Friday, but I'm on the schedule Tuesday. Studied a bunch during the day, sat in on some briefs and debriefs, watched others pre-flight the aircraft, and helped some people learn their radio calls.
The senior class had their solo party in the afternoon. They basically sat in their flight room drinking beer with their IPs and having funny stories told about them. Some of our class sat in on it (we were all invited, but most were busy, and we couldn't have any of their beer).
Had my dollar ride today... very cool! The plane flies a bit easier than the sim, but not by much. It was also nice to see how they do it "on the flight-line" vs. in the sim (checklists, etc...). We took off, went to a MOA for about 50 minutes, then went to McConnell AFB to do touch-and-goes. It's pretty nice to be up at 15,000 feet doing 300 indicated! Seriously cuts down on the drone time between places. We flew for a total of about 3.5 hours, split between two students, which I guess is
Back to doing CAI's again... (that's "computer aided instruction" for those of you who don't remember my posts from 6 months ago... what, you don't study these things??)
The day after track select (yesterday) we showed up at the T-1 squadron at 0830 and got a couple of briefings from the flight commander and the SQ/CC. We'll still have another "15 day program" and be on formal release at first (12 hour days) but we were told it's much more of a "big boy program", i.e.-not as much IP harassme
