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Concur, we have an awesome CSAF undermined by piss poor followership at the levels between him and the squadrons. Guidance needs to take the form of AFI changes at this point, since "conspicuous compliance" seems to be all those people understand.

I hear they're looking at adding an FE station to the Hornet.

Fucking stop it. This guy can't win. For years dudes have bitched about all of the little paper cut stuff in the AF...including this sign, t-shirts, patches, masters, PME. Well guess what? We have a CSAF who is actually fixing a lot of those irritants. And every time he fixes one, someone like you bitches "well, he shoulda done X, Y, or Z instead." Do you think he cancelled an afternoon of meetings about force shaping to hammer in the sign himself? Or do you think he may simply have mentioned it to someone and it got fixed? Everything isn't an either-or! For fucks sake. The man is trying. Some things are easy fixes. Some are complicated beyond measure. If you can't get behind him, sts, who will you follow?

Yep. Way more. He could have delayed and said "Eject, Eject, Eject" allowing the plane to continue rolling out of control. This delay would have put them nose down, inverted, below 1000' when they exited the jet, or he could pull the handles at less than 90 degrees bank as soon as he realized the jet was out of control. They would be morts if he delayed any longer. The WSO is extremely happy he was ejected from the jet when he was. It is easy to second guess a newspaper article. The story is way better first hand.

In a risk averse world, use safety as a weapon...might work.

I think we need to start an AF-wide petition to get Five Guys and Rubios in our BXs. You want airmen to spend less time at lunch? Give them the options they want on base.

That was a tough read. They got REALLY lucky. Young bucks and future studs, take this story as a lesson. Know your GK. Understand your systems, especially what happens to them when something happens that's not routine. Understand how your airplane interacts with the world around it, according to the laws of physics and aerodynamics, in normal and abnormal configurations. Work with your crew. Mostly, never let someone outside your jet fly it for you. Of course, these guys didn't do any of that and they still made it back. Edited to add: My comments are based on the article as written and my own experience. That said, I highly doubt the accuracy of the media's portrayal of this incident. I'm mostly just glad that two fellow aviators made it out OK when things went horribly wrong.

Our EFB password at my last base (AMC) was a simple four digit one. If being required to do more then you should push it up as a safety of flight issue. You don't have the time to enter some BS password when the sh!t is hitting the fan. Posted from the NEW Baseops.net App!

Bingo. He says things like "stop doing stupid stuff because it's written down". Well, sir, with all due respect, who signs the regulations where these stupid things are written down? You want us to stop worrying about AADs until the Col boards...who has it in their power to take that particular piece of information away from the promotion boards? You want every officer to go to SOS in residence, with correspondence being reserved only for folks who have such punishing ops tempos that they can't get there from here...who has the power to restrict SOS to residence only?

Every time I even hear HPO mentioned, it makes me want to go to the airlines. HPOs are not the guys you need to entice to stay in. People who actually want to become GOs are generally going to stay in because that is who they are. The people you need to convince are all the guys who want to top out at O-5, maybe O-6 if the job was right, but see the lifestyle of their commanders and DOs and don't think it sounds like something they want to be a part of. Going to wing stand up to explain to the wing commander as to why a four ship landed 20 minutes late? Getting an angry phone call from the OG because Lt X didn't properly fill out an eSSS before sending an unnecessary memo to the group? Having to tell your squadron that they are going to miss Christmas and be "deployed" for six months to a base in Korea where a third of them have already spent 12+ months because some four star wants another squadron in his command? No thanks. Fix this type of BS and the AF won't need a pilot bonus; they'll have to kick guys out because too many want to stay in. Last years change was a significant step in the right direction, but I think 2003 year group retention (or lack thereof) is going to force them to up the ante. Problem is, that would require explaining to Congress why guys who spent years getting to their dream job won't take a quarter of a million dollars to stay in that job.

I was willing to be cool with the little stuff at first, but yeah, there are so many big ticket items he could fix with policy immediately, yet he doesn't. I'll take the little stuff, but overall he's dropping the ball when he leaves those big ticket items untouched. There's a difference between him saying, "we need to do things smarter in regards to AADs", and actually changing the regs/policy, and not allowing wg/cc, etc to make the policy more restrictive. Sorry, random Sunday morning ramble. Pick any other number of examples... Posted from the NEW Baseops.net App!

Actually, the shittiest people I've encountered that occupied the commander's office have all been promoted. Every single one.

PT test scores (as long as you pass) and OPRs don't seem to matter for 365 or other deployment opportunities either. Weird.

Not a derail. You specifically called out this guy's SA for flying an airplane. I want to know what you fly to make such a statement. I'm sure I'm not the only one since you dodge the question constantly. Please, share with the class your credentials on the matter.

If you have the lifelong dream of flying AF jets, apply for every opportunity out there. Especially AD. You have to realize that while there are certainly never a shortage of things to bitch about on AD, the majority of dudes on here making the most noise don't know any different - most have no experience outside of AD. Most of them don't realize that at least part of their problems reside within themselves, and that they will eventually be just as dissatisfied as a civilian. I've been enlisted, a min wage civilian, a traditional college student, a civilian professional (Engineer), and AD AF for the last 10 years. Trust me, the AF isn't as broken as most around here think it is. Yes, there are issues, but that's life. All the things you mentioned are real benefits of this job that are hard to find elsewhere, and they make the BS worthwhile, at least manageable for 10 years. While I'm not looking to stay beyond my 20, I have no regrets about leaving a good paying, stable civilian job for AD. Good luck.