Leaderboard

For all those Pilots out there Air Drop qualified. Here are a few pointers. During the Pilot brief with the Jumpmasters and DZSO make sure you specify the DZ boundaries according to the AF regs, not the other way around. The Army will screw you if they can. Confirm that the DZSO has conducted at least 3 ADZSO operations in the last six months. Meaning that he assisted a senior DZSO with three jumps. If he has not, and has not been a DZSO prior to your jump, ask for a current DZSO. Confirm that all Jumpmasters and static safety's are current. I know we let noncurrent Jumpmasters release Jumpers to become current, however in order for that to happen the noncurrent jump master is watched by the official Jumpmaster for that pass. And most of all, if the DZSO sounds like its his first time on the radio it probably is, which means he has no idea what he is supposed to be saying and not saying, If he sounds like that, I personally would not drop based on the information from the DZSO is unclear. well Thanks to all those pilots that supported me in the past, I'm glad I was able to be there for Jared and return the favor. Take care............"No Drop" :)

Not guilty all counts.

SFGuy's post has been re-approved given Axle's acquital. I PM'd him about why it was temporarily unapproved and he understood. Sorry, but no. While it is OK for individuals to give advice on here; anyone needing true legal representation should contact a lawyer and not depend solely on what is recommended to them on an Internet forum (even this one). If you want to know more about the military legal system, I suggest reading The Military Commander and the Law. It contains everything most military personnel need to know about the UCMJ and military proceedings. Beyond that, you need to talk to a JAG/ADC/etc. Cheers! M2

I've heard the same thing. Safety will not offer privilege buffet style. You need to order it off the secret menu. If they don't offer, you don't need to say anything. They will also say that you don't need cousel, but its your ass, get it if you need it. Which is why I've seen some entertaining ones. Not a full-blown real example, but here is the jist: Standard form 97 header (or whatever fighter dudes call it) info like the day and tail number, and a synopsis something like, "smoke filled the cockpit so we landed." Factual, to the point. Lastly, something I've seen over the last few years is CCs/DOs/Supervisors asking their peeps to make written statements after a situation. Sometimes its a manner to get the facts and fix things (the good boss that has your back) but often that shit is held against peeps (the boss in CYA mode and protecting his career). Watch out! The Herk world is the same WRT personnel training. Pilots and Navs qualified out of the schoolhouse/AC certification and LMs restricted until they complete an actual personnel training folder. However, since we are all airdrop qualified and I think we drop sufficient personnel, by the time a CP is an AC, they have dropped enough to learn the emphasis areas like the JM brief, DZ survey, chute types/restrictions, DZ coord, comms, formation considerations, wind analysis, and in this case off-DZ/AD malfunction protocols. A big point here is that we should also make sure ACs know that they should not be talked into putting their plane/crew into bad situations by people/entities like TACC/AMD/ATOC/APS/ARMY/USER/MX/crew chief/ATC/CP. Out

I don't know, I've done some short notice drops to far flung FOBs because the grunts were running out of food & ammo in a hurry. I don't know how low they actually were on supplies, but if they were depending on my bundles to keep them in the fight, and I called a no-drop and RTB'd, I could imagine a not-unlikely scenario in the current fight where my no-drop led to a loss of life because they ran out of firepower. I just don't think it's too hard to get into a situation like that in the environment the ground forces are operating in right now. All it takes is one guy worrying about being the next Jared and waving off.

What I mean is, if they aren't using their own money to pay the taxes you claim gives them "skin in the game" in the first place, it's meaningless. If I give you a hundred dollars, and the local government collects twenty dollars in taxes, do you really care? No, because you're still up eighty bucks. People who aren't paying into the system, but are collecting from the system, have no incentive to cut the spending. They don't care that politicians are wasting billions of dollars, because it's someone else's money.

What's sad is things like this are going to start affecting people's decision making downrange. All this fiasco is going to do, regardless of the outcome, is make people even more spring loaded to call a "no-drop" whether in training or in the combat zone. Maybe that's OK most of the time, but there will come a time when it could have a negative impact on the mission when it didn't have to come to that. We're in the business of war and people will get hurt, there's no way around that. How far will the risk-averse pendulum swing?

I can confirm: fully acquitted.

FIFY.

The man.

I work about 20-25 miles from Seymour Johnson and during the day you can normally always hear the Strike Eagles up relatively high. Not today, what must have been a pair came over low enough to set off car alarms in the parking lot. If anyone is at SJ, I'd like to register some kind of a complaint if you don't come by again tomorrow... Strikes while I'm at work, and low level Herks from Pope when I'm home. Doesn't get much better!

Red fox: you're getting some solid advice here, like everybody has said fly as often as you can. Study, be prepared for every flight, and ask questions. Your instructor should brief you on what to expect each time before going up and he or she should debrief the lesson and give you feedback on what went well, what you need to work on and what to expect for the next lesson. For the studying portion read the Pilot Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge and the Airplane Flying Handbook both are a bit dry and may help cure insomnia but they are free on the FAA website and cover a good portion of the material on the written. Research part 61 or part 141 that's where the requirements for private pilot are found. Chair fly the maneuvers, pratice the head work it will help. Try to fly out of a quiet field if that is possible, also you don't need to learn in a fancy plane with the latest avionics or gps however do make sure the plane is maintained well, ask to see the aircraft logbooks and if they don't show you find another school. Good luck and make sure ou have fun

To be honest man, getting your PPL is not that difficult. If you want to get it with the min. hours required, then just treat it like a class that you want to do well in. Once you start flying, study the material you need to know for the next flight (and the stuff you screwed up on the last flight) and then go fly when you feel comfortable with the material. I liked flying at least twice a week (I was also working 50 hours a week, working on my masters in an engineering program at night, and working with my guard unit). The benefit to flying frequently is getting comfortable with the cockpit arrangement, checklists, radio calls, etc.. However, do not jump in the plane for a lesson before you are ready just for the sake of frequency. There are plenty of items that you need to divide your attention between when you're in the air and, if you don't familiarize yourself with the flight before flying it, you will struggle to keep up with it, wasting flight time. This will surely frustrate your instructor too.

You don't necessarily need the flight time to get a high AFOQT score. I took ground school my senior year in high school (it was actually a class taught at my high school), and despite no flying time, I scored a 99 on both the pilot and nav portion. But seeing as you are an Aggie,... - I recommend you take ground school twice. - See if Gleim on King has a study workbook that you can color.