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People also need to remember that the regionals are not mainline. Yeah, it's all the same FAA rules and all the same Captain's authority, in theory, but these guys are all in the rat race to get to mainline, and nobody wants to do anything that might remotely affect their chances. Being the guy who won't take a night circling approach at DCA when everybody in the regionals has been doing it for years is not the type of attention I would imagine many of them want to draw to themselves. Personally I see 0% of the blame going to the regional crew. It's just not rational to think that Tower at one of the most controlled air spaces in America would let a helicopter get that fucking close. I certainly am never clearing for helicopters directly below me on short short final, and I fly a ton of visual approaches. The helicopter crew definitely fucked up, but the real blame here goes once again to one of our "institutions" that hasn't been holding up its end of the bargain for a long time. Even if we fix the FAA tomorrow, we're going to see the unfortunate results of a couple decades of laziness and complacency keep popping up.

Visual search from the RJ approaching 300’/1nm from touchdown is a red herring. PCF: helo altitude control/vis lookout RC: asinine procedures IVO DCA IF: Change the procedures/amount of traffic using DCA/immediate surrounding airspace. This is an easy fix that should have, and could have, been done years ago Everything else is just noise in the big picture.

It's funny how the Left frames the productive class—the ones funding everything—as the bad guys for not “sharing enough.” Never mind they’re already paying most of the taxes. Meanwhile, those who receive far more than they contribute in benefits are cast as victims. It’s a neat trick: blame the people keeping the lights on while ignoring the real problem—spending. But hey, why fix the system when you can just keep milking it? Mainstream politicians across the ideological spectrum are insulated from the negative consequences of their decisions. The rich stay rich, the poor are lavished with benefits with no incentive to achieve anything, and the middle class has to pull themselves up by their bootstraps.

No one should be interested in the things I'm not interested in anymore.

Perhaps we’re talking past each other. I’m for cutting waste, cutting overall spending, and cutting taxes. I’m probably one of the few on here who is for cutting welfare and the defense budget. As for social security and Medicare, that Ponzi scheme was never going to work and was doomed to failed, just like any other Ponzi scheme.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DFyffoFycnT/?igsh=YzlndWNrNHE2Mmw2 well played internet

DOGE is going to force this guy to retire, and we'll finally be free of his tyranny!

New Shots Of Ukrainian F-16s Shine Light On Combat Missions Ukrainian Air Force F-16AM Fighting Falcon returning from a combat air patrol, having expended one of its AIM-120C-series AMRAAM missiles. Appears to be the first confirmation that Ukrainian Falcons are sporting the more advanced and longer-ranged C-series AMRAAMS. A Ukrainian F-16 pilot wearing JHMCS. Plus a video of a Ukrainian F-16 sporting a full loadout of US-supplied GBU-39 SDB glide bombs...

I spent almost a decade in San Diego and it’s pretty common. Developers froth at the mouth at the idea of getting that land. It’ll never happen. Same as people bitch about San Diego airport and how it should move to Miramar and be a joint airfield with the Marines. The department of the Navy is well entrenched in San Diego and I think it’ll be a cold day in hell when they move out and let the city take over.

Guess they wouldn’t know it’s a dicky until they check your socks.

Isn't it hilarious that the same senior leaders that will complain about how our generation doesn't want to stay in and only thinks about the airlines, somehow completely misses the fact that when they were company grade officers they were basically living a frat boy's wet dream, with no real deployments, mission, or sacrifice? I had one Colonel tell a story about drunkenly arriving his car into a light pole at the OClub, only to have SF drive him home and pick him up in the morning to retrieve his vehicle. That same colonel then defended the 0-0-1-3 policy and giving article 15s to officers who were drunk in public. He had nothing to say when I asked if he had a bottle of scotch in his desk as a wing Commander. These guys are nothing but cowardly hypocrites. They enjoyed a system that was so awesome and carefree that it gave them the camaraderie and memories to stick around when the job inevitably gets lamer and lamer as you gain more and more responsibilities. But they can't see that without that first decade of awesome memories, there's no nostalgia to keep you tied to the organization. It is bordering on criminally stupid that the leadership of an organization desperate to retain talent can't see that allowing colored t-shirts and large mustaches is a no-brainer.

I'm sure the nuance of this will be lost on your one each lib, but Tricare is part of the total benefits package my employer - the US government - offered me in exchange for my labor. In no way, shape, or form is it "socialized."

next you're gonna say he's not a real christian or whatever he claims!

Can’t wait for all of the VA disability scammers with “tinnitus” (congrats, you’re just forty), “sleep apnea” (really? Cash for life for snoring?) and “back pain” (again, just forty) get raked over the coals and spend ten years paying that shit back for lying to a flight doc on exit then heading to the gym and getting your FAA physical done. Always hated that.

Caveat up front: there are good/bad/disciplined/undisciplined pilots in every community and this is not geared toward any individual. But I'm gonna be the asshole here. In my experience, the army rotary wing community ranges anywhere from lackadaisical to outright dangerous WRT instrument procedures, airspace and traffic awareness, and flight discipline. I've witnessed a 5-ship Army Apache mission brief take place in the lobby of the San Angelo FBO that was basically: "Alright dudes, we're gonna take off, head east, 200A, everybody fall in. Questions?" "Sick. Step complete." I've been in control of a T-6 pattern full of solo students and had to send them all breakpoint straight through (half of them didn't even know what to do) because we had a 4 ship of army black hawks blast perpendicular through our pattern while talking to precisely no one on the radio. The second I saw the news out of DCA my first reaction was "goddammit some army rw clowns got everyone killed." Then I felt bad for jumping to conclusions and not waiting for the report. But after a few weeks, each new piece of data points right back to them and I'm back to being pissed. Why were they off altitude? Why are they dicking around at night in the approach corridor of a major airport? Why are they not on VHF? Why was this even an approved routing for them in the first place? Why were 28 different agencies permitted to fly helos in close proximity to DCA? These were not one-off, swiss-cheese-holes-aligning, mistakes. This was business as usual, proven by the fact there had been multiple near misses at DCA in the recent past including a helo-caused airliner go-around the day before. Obviously an airspace/procedure re-design is warranted, but I think we need to take a look at community-wide culture that was comfortable operating like this in the first place. @busdriver said it best that these procedures are "no-step stupid." The problem with that is if you've been raised in a community of hot dogging and "we'll do it live" you're probably not equipped to make a good risk assessment.

Way back in the day when I went through my first “no morale” iteration we decided to do scarves. The regs didn’t specify how you had to wear it (other than generally around neck and tucked into flightsuit) or what color/designs it had. So welcome to chief aneurisms when you have a bright red scarf worn like an ascot on any day of the week as you walk into finance. It was 10,000 times “worse” (from the chief perspective) than shirts. It was the ultimate “you play fuck on me, I play fuck on you!” The ability to give a massive middle finger to the d bags and let them know you have bested them on a daily basis was 100% worth wearing a scarf. The entire wing did it for about a year until morale shirts were back. Do it boys, you won’t regret it. Only disclaimer is I have no idea what current reg says about scarf design/wear, so QC that before full commit.

fuck fauci that little RAT....RFK jr is coming for you

They are min force for my last hurrah; only way to go out is with a bang. I imagine it’ll be like a movie where I’m walking away from absolute carnage in the background, laughing all the way back to DAL.

I can’t recall, I lost mine on a fishing trip to the Gulf of Buccees.

Glad they got out, that thing came down fast.

This isn't the first time they've tried to take Friday shirts away. The last two times I remember them trying that, we just kept wearing them. It drove the Chiefs (outside of ops) nuts. Eventually the winds shifted and Friday shirts came back. If you're off station, instead of wearing your ACC/AMC patch, wear the ANG patch...people generally leave you alone. You just have to get your own, off-base establishment. Our state doesn't allow alcohol on base, so we found a building just off base, rented it and turned it into a bar. Way, it is easier to have shenanigans off base anyway.

You know, all this fuckery is getting insufferable. However, I can't imagine having to deal with this crap and be a liberal in the military. Between uniform inspections and Trump's EOs it must feel like the apocalypse cometh.

3 letters in DEI...👀

Elon and Trump have to find that $4T in tax cuts that are set to expire this year for their billionaire friends. Here’s the House’s proposed budget with…a $3.3T increase! https://docs.house.gov/meetings/BU/BU00/20250213/117894/BILLS-119NAih.pdf

Cool. It'll make all those Agent Orange, Gulf War Syndrome complaints invalid too. https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/02/implementing-the-presidents-department-of-government-efficiency-workforce-optimization-initiative/ Looks like the RIF for gov't is now coming. With "individuals identified as non-essential during appropriations lapses" as first targets. Ah, loved having to go from a 24/7 positions with appropriate manning of AD and civ's, to pulling constant 12s because the civ's were "non-essential." I'm sure the F22 capes and test program out at the base(s) near me will be 100% protected. Oh wait, nope a chunk of them got "non-essential during appropriations lapses." Guess those F22 capes can wait. Also, making DOGE Team Lead sound an awful lot like Commissars; The Emperor protects.

What does CSO training look like these days? I went through in 14-15 when we were jack of many masters of none. I've read about the divesture of the T-1 from flying training. Does the amount of sorties in the T-6 increase? I always felt we got shorted with sorties compared to our pilot brethren. Sims don't build airmanship. This was always a big complaint from FTU's.

I just wanted to say this to be first, but I think we just started watching a 4 year long season of South Park.

Thems the rules. Prove the lying part, or is it just being forty rucking sack, 20 years on a flight line, etc.?

Yea I did. But I’m glad the “total victory over Russia” seems to be off the table now.

The irony here is amazing

When you’re at 300’ on an approach, your visual scan is the runway in front of you. There was not a breakdown in visual scan for the RJ.

I had a pilot call in “Im showing no indication.” Tower asked them to fly by and was furious when they realized it. Several ass chewings later, it was still funny. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

So nsplayer’s political moratorium ended with the Biden administration? Guess I can’t blame the guy. I think we’re all trying to pretend it was just a bad dream.

Performance issues? It's not uncommon. 1 in 5 I'm told.

Nothing, it’s just the leadership of the AF thinks they can min run this enterprise and get away with it We can not have the AF we say want with the resources Congress allocates, missions we are legally required to OT&E for with the way we operate now Something has to give or more money and the freedom to execute that money in the best way possible for the needs of the AF vs the needs of X defense prime or Congressmen or pilot hating shoe clerk Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The problem right now (and the one AETC 5/8 is trying to work around) is that the T-6 portion of UPT is fucked/is the bottleneck right now. The T-6 fleet is in bad shape, it's getting worse, and there's no easy or expeditious way to fix it. The T-38 is well past any reasonable service life, and the T-7 is obviously delayed. This IPT concept is the latest attempt to get to the 1500 pilots/year production goal that the AF can never achieve. Believe it or not but the money issue for IPT was actually one of the smaller issues getting the program started.

Asked and answered brah. The T-50 was the "T-16" COA. It's circa an 80% replica. Boeing cheated (again); we all lost. It's over. But hey, do not despair, piston CFIs are going to save military aviation... if they're not too distracted updating their regional ehrirlineapppps on their phone. And if people think I'm being hyperbolic with the latter, then that tells me they don't have a fvcking clue what the operating and quality control realities of part 61 (even some 141) are. I cut my teeth in that morass before I touched a single .mil airplane; I know the rot in that pay to play, blind leading the blind environment. FAFO doesn't even begin to encapsulate the hubris of senior AF management in proferring this IPT imprudence with a straight face. What's insane is that the USAF/USN doesn't even recognize Army wings as real. But regional aspiring thumb-suckers is A-OK for .mil flying fundamentals, straight into a gazillion/multimillion dollar PL1/PL3 asset? And I'm the imprudent one here? Orwellian, this whole clusterfvck of dereliction.

Ok, cool. So like Hertz rent-a-T6.

It is a miracle this hasn’t happened yet. We are all in on the hope/luck-based gameplan.

I would do it. Or I would do something like it. In fact, I am currently looking for a "retirement" gig that will let me keep doing military aviation in a part time capacity. I'm figuring out how to min run the airlines, and am winding up with a lot of free time on my hands. May as well do what I like, get paid retirement, get paid min guarantee, and then make extra money chasing clouds. That said, I'm aware of things like Drachen, etc. I also don't want to fly perma red air. For some reason I'd rather do something IFF-like or straight UPT. Maybe I'm crazy. Not gonna be able to do the part time (non-retired) gig after I'm retirement eligible - I just can't make working for free make financial sense.

Let’s say funding and airspace access was a non-issue, so we start moving T-6s to airline bases. Some guys will jump on it, and most will stop doing it relatively quickly once they’re reminded why they left the AF for the airlines in the first place (summed up as “all the bullshit.”) The bullshit is un-killable.

Indeed. It doesn't even have an internal ladder. And isn't stressed to be able to hang a ladder on the side, a la T-38. Nice job, Boeing. The T-50 was the obvious choice. But no... couldn't award another contract to Lockheed.

Five feet? I think it’s a safe bet most of you have never been in a KC-135 cockpit.

You don't say.. Here I was thinking you just like to crack open a thesaurus when you started typing a post.

*yawn* more sophistry. I'm already on record, I only timestamp these rants on the interboobs so the forensics can go back in 10 years and go "yep, we knew". We've been through this all the way back to 2018 fam; it is a dilution of quality, definitionally. Tell your bosses to put down the hopium pipe and grow a back bone, and tell their SES overlords at the Puzzle palace to tell SecAf no buck no buck rogers. Kids need new MILITARY trainers and hours with their brain behind their ass at .7M+ and no automation, herbie drivers too. I was a CFII before I touched a single military airplane, let alone instructed in one; I can speak 61/141/135/121/one-WGAF. I was also in academia before the military; I know ballwash pseudointellectual fodder for paper degree issuance when I read it. Hell, I used to teach it! 😄 To the degree which civ-only folks don't understand the historical rigor behind undegraduate USN/USAF military aviator accessions and initial traning, it is also true that many mil-only folks really don't understand the quality control morass that is 141 (forget 61). I won't rehash the dissertation on here, the BLUF is that abrogating our military pilot accessions to 141 is to admit defeat. Considering the US record as a combat operational loss leader for the past 50 years, I guess losing at pilot training is par for the course too. Empire in decay, happens to the best of 'em I guess. Honestly, I'd be more on board if they just cut the shit and 1) admitted they can't effectively lobby Congress for more cowbell for the UPT enterprise, and 2) admitted they have to send it to the civilian prop schools just to pad the logbook with negative transfer hours of little import. Heck, by that cockeyed COA's order of merit alone, again just cut the shit and go full up MPL (Euro standard, sim only) for your copilots (3/4 of pilot accessions for the USAF) and put their money where their mouth is. Padding the 141 with excess federal pork is the only thing this will accomplish anyways. Excess crew deaths down the line in grey jet initial/continuation training are on them though, not on us dinosaurs "getting in the way".