Hacker

Part and parcel with one of the cancers that has been growing in AF leadership over the last 10-15 years: nobody wants to make a decision, lest their superior disagree with that decision and it reflect poorly on them. So, we have raised an entire generation of "leaders" (really "managers") who have to "run it up the chain" for absolutely every decision. And this attitude is reflected, now, by the superiors themselves, who expect this kind of "mother, may I" out of their subordinates. The grand result is that nobody is really empowered to make any decision, and few commanders have the balls to just make a decision <gasp> and risk their bosses not liking it.

There are other folks who currently fly for them, ahem, and haven't heard such a rumor.

What's the source of this rumor?

FWIW, according to the AF Historian, in a 100% unclassified source, there were. Thanks to the anonymous tipper who pointed the way to that.

Hoping someone knows some history of the USAF PJ community and might be able to help shed some light. I met someone at a party who says he was an officer PJ, essentially, back in the late 80s and early 90s. The time/location/atmosphere of the discussion didn't really allow me to pin down much in the way of specifics; he said he had been a USAF doc attached to JSOC at Ft Bragg, and had done the same training that the PJs did in terms of Airborne school and some Navy diving school, but he was quite clear in saying, "I wasn't actually a PJ, though." He described being part of a couple of SOF-type adventures abroad, pretty entertaining but seemingly humble storyteller. He sure seemed to speak the language of actual former USAF and didn't peg my poser-meter when we started riffing on Big-Blue specific stuff. Afterward, though, I just wondered how someone could go from standard 1-each military doctor to being the equivalent of a modern-day CRO. I don't know anything about how JSOC and USAF Rescue work, I'm just curious if anyone knows about USAF officers, doctors, being attached to JSOC and doing PJ-type stuff back in the day.

Mission employment, and the relative difficulty of it, is the answer you are looking for.

They really are this stupid.

I think you're seriously underestimating the magnitude of the staffing crisis at the regionals. "Plenty" is not an accurate term. I know of a guy who went to jail for manslaughter....drove his 2-seater Porsche with two women crowded in the passenger seat while drunk, and the drive ended in a fiery crash that killed one of them...and who was hired at the regionals (by more than one airline, actually). So...I am certain our disgraced IP he could find a regional that would hire him with a little looking.

I'm sure there are a ton of regional airlines that'd hire him.

I was actually over on the east side of the course at Pylon 2, so I didn't see it (fortunately? unfortunately?). I heard the mayday on the race control freq, and watched the second jet do a battle damage check with the pace plane through my camera. The best part was talking to Marilyn Dash, who was doing the commentating on the NBC Sports and internet live feed, after the incident. She is known to be quite "colorful" with her language, and she told me, "I've never come so close to yelling 'OH SHIT!!' to an audience of untold thousands as when I saw that midair." I think that would have been epic, personally...but probably not good for the commentating career. Looked like you were having fun with the Patriots, tho. And, yes, of course I will hoist a brew with you at ICAS -- wouldn't miss it!

The aircraft doing the passing has to keep the aircraft in front of him in sight, and pass to the outside and no lower than the lead airplane's altitude.

I did, but it was probably overkill -- based on the questions they asked, they didn't look beyond the summary page of my printed-out digital log.

Outside professional flying just requires chief pilot permission at my airline -- and numerous guys have that permission. Most that I know of do airshow flying or instructing.

Punctuation Nazi sez: inappropriate apostrophe use, remain in AETC one more tour.

Attached below. Hacker's Blank Logbook(1).xls