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JarheadBoom

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Posts posted by JarheadBoom

    What's wrong with the Air Force?

    in General Discussion

    Posted · Edited by JarheadBoom
    format

    3 hours ago, ihtfp06 said:

    How in the holy hell can we have gone from leadership hinting at stop-loss to non-continuing Majors??? Did somebody not get the phucking memo that we are short, and only going to get shorter, on pilots?

    Sir/Ma'am,

    Thank you for your concern.  AFI 13-6969 only directs us to look at x, y, and z when determining continuation.  The AFI doesn't direct us to look at AFSC when determining continuation, therefore we do not.  Given the complex nature of continuation, it would be unrealistic to expect perfection.  May I suggest you refer your concerns about the AFI to it's OPR?  You can find that information on the cover page of AFI 13-6969.

    R/S,

    SrA Shoeclerk McDilligaf

    • Upvote 4

    What should the Air Force be if it is so broken now?

    in General Discussion

    Posted · Edited by JarheadBoom
    format

    Quote

    What should the Air Force be if it is so broken now?

    - It should be a place where, when the 4-star-wearing HMFIC of the entire goddamn Air Force says "We are no longer doing xxxxx, because we no longer have the time/budget/manning to continue doing that", xxxxx fucking STOPS.  Not the current model of *xxxxx stops for some, but continues for others because reasons* bullshit.

    - It should be a place where, when someone with "CC" in his/her job title says "I know CSAF said we don't ____________ anymore, but this SQ/WG/MAJCOM will continue to ____________, because I said so", that person is fucking FIRED.  Immediately.

    - It should be a place where trainees, whether E or O, aren't force-fed the "You MUST aspire to be the CSAF/CMSAF or you're a worthless piece of shit!" mentality.

    - It should be a place where Command E-9s wouldn't dream of saying something as fucking ludicrous as "If you're in this room, and you aren't maneuvering to take my job, you're wrong".

    • Upvote 13

    Foreign Exchange Flying Tours

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    18 hours ago, ihtfp06 said:

    There have also been opportunities to go TDY to train the UAE C-17 pilots in Abu Dhabi and I believe the Kuwaitis as well. This may taper off once they build up their experience.

     

     

    There's at least one, possibly two, USAF pilots working the Kuwait C-17 program right now.

    Commercial Aviation air refueling

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    12 hours ago, Clark Griswold said:

    Question(s), considering a hypothetical 777 Freighter AR Cruiser capable aircraft, if you stopped filling the wings to capacity for fuel, would that impart greater structural stress due to the loss of load spreading?  If so, would that necessitate or incentivize a wing redesign?  Designing a new wing to optimize a Cruiser AR (for operations and structural reasons) would seem to negate or again make the payback time too long to generate interest in developing the capability.   

    I don't know any details of the 777 freighter's fuel system, or any of it's loading "gotchas" WRT wing fuel qty. vs. cargo load/gross weight.  It might require some creative fuel scheduling, and possible software revision to the fuel management computer software.

    I can't see a wing redesign, just to accommodate this niche market, being financially feasible. 

    Commercial Aviation air refueling

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    One other way this might be profitable is with cargo, rather than pax.  If there are enough cargo flights that aren't utilizing their full ACL due to required fuel loads, they could increase their cargo loads to the max ACL/ZFW of the aircraft, potentially get off smaller runways at less than MGTOW (or use more derated takeoffs, and get more hours out of the engines), and still make a profit off the flights due to the increased cargo revenue.

    I have no idea if there are cargo flights could benefit from this to make it profitable; I know there's a fair number of flights that cube out their cabins long before they hit their ACL/ZFW.  I would also imagine the cargo carriers would have a similar potential to pax carriers to incur losses on flights, due to the financial consequences of an AR canx.

    • Upvote 1

    Cell phone service providers?

    in Squadron Bar

    Posted

    Dunno what your background is (fighter/bomber/heavy), but I have had good luck internationally with T-Mobile.  Never had a problem in Western Europe or Asia, and had pretty good coverage in the Middle East.  Verizon absolutely sucked internationally, since their network and most of their phones are CDMA-only - the vast majority of the rest of the world uses GSM, and has no CDMA support.  I dumped V after a year, and went back to T-M.  They offer Wifi calling (at least on the iPhone), which can help in areas where their cell coverage is weak.  They also have a .mil discount, and a pretty good device unlock policy for long-term international use.

    I'm working in the ME as a civilian now; if my employer wasn't supplying a company-paid SIM from a local provider, I'd be fine using my personal T-M service here for phone service.

    Offered as a data point; I'm not a T-Mobile shill, despite how this post ended up sounding.

    Owning as a small business as a Traditional Reservist

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    Two booms in my former AFRC SQ are .civ business owners.  One (still a TR) has a very successful corporate catering business, the other (retired TR) is a majority partner in a sewage sludge remediation business, and is a patent holder for his processes.

    Catering boom has his wife & BIL as business partners; they take care of things while he's flying or TDY.

    Sewage boom did a lot via email and phone legwork for the networking/contracting side of his business; his partner was the hardware guy.

    Both are/were able to do quite a bit of flying/TDY above & beyond the minimum for currency, but only because they worked hard at the beginning to ensure their businesses wouldn't go dead in the water in their temporary absence.

    We also had a pilot who ran a successful medical equipment development and sales business, but he was a minimum participant for several years due to the demands of his business, and eventually elected to retire before his number came up in the deployment lottery.

     

    BL: it can be done, but it takes work up-front to ensure you can take the .mil time off and not have it come crashing down around you.

    Commercial Aviation air refueling

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    22 hours ago, Clark Griswold said:

    But decided a tanker on the bottom pushing fuel up to the receiver was logistically easier and safer, less receiver training requirements and safety was enhanced, put sexual innuendo comment here: __Reverse Cowgirl... with airplanes!__.

    < snip >

     

    Receiver on top AR CGI...

    IN-CONCEPT_1_RecreateProject.jpg

     

    Yep... definitely reverse cowgirl.

    • Upvote 1

    Commercial Aviation air refueling

    in General Discussion

    Posted

    5 hours ago, Kiloalpha said:

    A significant hurdle is the fact that none of the current commercial fleet is equipped for AR. Retrofitting isn't an option that I know of, so they'd need all new designs to hookup and take gas.

    Boeing has UARRSIs flying on military versions of the 737, 747, 757, and 767, so the engineering is done for those airframes.  Retrofitting the hardware is definitely possible... it would just require each airframe being retrofitted to be taken out of service for a while for the install.  I'd have to dig into the FARs to be sure, but I don't believe fuel lines are allowed in passenger cabins of transport-category aircraft, so this might only be possible on non-US registered aircraft.    Having said all that, of the aircraft I listed, only the 737 is still in long-term production.  747, 757, and 767 are all either out of production or close to it, and in their golden years WRT passenger service. 

    I don't believe Airbus has flown a receptacle on any of their commercial airframes, so there's a bunch of engineering, development, and testing money that would need to be spent (and eventually recovered) for that capability.

    Probe and drogue is far too limiting, WRT offload rate and airspeed limitations of the drogue.

    I just can't see this being profitable commercially, at any scale.  As already stated, maybe a niche capability from one of the Asian/Middle Eastern airlines, solely for bragging rights.

    MV-22 Crash

    in Squadron Bar

    Posted

    On ‎12‎/‎18‎/‎2016 at 3:18 AM, Breckey said:

    Clipped the drogue with the prop-rotors while TAARing.

    Holy shit, that's a hell of an overrun.  The probe tip is ~9ft forward of the nose when fully extended, and the proprotors are several feet aft of the nose.

    Regardless, glad all 5 got out safely.

    Days for Volunteering for a 501c3 Charity

    in Air National Guard / Air Force Reserves

    Posted

    The Toys For Tots program is run by the USMC Reserve.  While I was in the other service at Willow Grove, we had USMC Reservists doing ADSW days specifically to work T4T; it was blessed by MARFORRES as an official place of duty for pay purposes.  IIRC, there was always way more ADSW money authorized for T4T than there were Reservists with the availability to use it, at least at Willow Grove.  As part of the AD staff (and later a Reservist with the same unit), every year we were pushed to remind our Reservists that there were paydays available for T4T work.

    Not sure how AFRC/NGB would look at that, much less whether the USMCR would allow USAF Reservists/Guardsmen to work "their" program for paydays.  Even with both AFRC and ANG units at Willow Grove at that time, I don't ever recall seeing any of them working T4T.

    AD to AFRC service obligation

    in Air National Guard / Air Force Reserves

    Posted

    Last FY, AFRC stopped accepting retirement applications from Feb to Nov '16, due to AFRC-wide manning issues.  They didn't tell me I couldn't submit my retirement request when I called them about it last week, so the crisis must be averted. [/sarcasm]

    Not sure if that's a factor in your situation, but it's a data point to keep in mind for those looking to finish their careers in AFRC.

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