HeloDude

As with Hueypilot, I'm also doing the CAFTT experience--just on the rotorwing side of things. If you're a fixed-wing guy, I'd say volunteer to fly the King Air's. They look like pretty sweet birds and when I was down at Sather talking to a fellow advisor he said that they're brand new aircraft and he logs a sh!t ton of hours--and whenever you fly with an Iraqi, it's always IP time. Kind of cool for us flying rotorwing with the Iraqis--often I log IP time, combat time, and NVG time all from the same flight. The reason I say go for King Air's vs the 172's is that you'll have a lot more fun time training and flying with the old heads/Iraqi pilots than the brand new ones who already speak good English getting trained on the 172's (that's too easy lol). Plus, you'll fly a better aircraft, log more time, and get to see more of the country. I've been doing the CAFTT thing for almost 10 months (just found out I'm extending for an extra month) so I have a pretty decent handle on how things work, the headaches involved, what it's like to train and work with/advise the Iraqis, etc. I have a good friend doing the advising gig in Afghanistan and from what I hear, they're way behind when compared to the Iraqis (that's completely unofficial)--so you'll be doing more 'advanced' training/advising here in Iraq vs in Afghanistan. Also, I'm sure the living conditions, etc are much better (and safer) in Iraq. PM me if you want more details.

For better or for worse, here's how it is (from what I have seen as well as how older 53 guys have explained it to me): Since we don't deploy our Hueys, that by itself can be a career killer. If you never deploy, you'll have little operational experience besides flying around a missle base, doing an IP tour, and then flying around the flag pole again in DC. As far as the Huey Sq's go--most of the missle bases are filled with first assignment guys with only a few older guys filling posistions as CC, DO, ADO, OGV, etc. Getting higher up posistions on the staff, etc are more difficult for straight huey guys because you don't have the operational experience to add to those posistions. Also, the majority of Huey commands are filled by 53/60 guys because as it was explained to me "Why put a straight Huey guy in a command position when he won't go any farther in his career, when you can put a 53/60 guy who needs command experience, and will then go on to work at the joint staff level, etc" A lot of Huey guys are cool with just being a 20 year Major and never deploying. What bothers me the most are the Huey guys who bitch about not getting to do anything different or advance in their careers outside the Huey realm when a lot of these same guys are the ones dodging 365's to fly and train the Iraqis and Afghanis. You don't build much on you past flying experience if all you do is fly around missle bases after missle bases.

The currency in Qatar is the Qatari Rial...the Dinar is used in Iraq. Also, 1 million dinar is only a few bucks lol...it's not that bad, but it is a pretty high exchange rate. I've carried bags and bags of the stuff from Baghdad to our base. The Iraqis still get paid with cash.

Dude, a 365 to Qatar = cake. Try doing a real one in Iraq, or better yet, Afghanistan...I'm sure the guys there are having it the toughest. I just find it interesting that guys talk about deployments to Qatar as if they're hard or something. All I know is that the next time I see a deployment to Asalaya come down, that will be the one I choose!

When I talked to the helo coasties over a year when I was TDY about guys transfering to the CG, they told me that it is designed for guys with prior helo time and experience. Them training you how to fly an advanced helicopter, at night using NVG's, over water, would be the same as retraining me to fly a fighter (I can't wait for the replies on this one)...it could happen, but why take a fighter guy when they can take a bunch of prior Army dudes who have tons of helo time? Not to say it couldn't happen, afterall, MD saw the light and got accepted to transfer to helos in the ANG. I think your best bet would be to try and fly CG Herks.

Like everyone else posting their after thoughts since Beam's reply, I'll add mine. I'll echo that it was good on you Beam to face your critics on our own turf. But here are a couple of more points I'd like you to further address: -If the Air Force cancels ACP for 1-3 years just to 'study' the affects of what it will do to pilot retention....do you have any true operational experience to fully understand what that will do to flying squadrons all around the Air Force if you're wrong (and I personally believe you will be). You can't just say 'oops, I guess that didn't work, we made a mistake...we'll reinstate the bonus'--dude, those guys getting out at their 10 year point are your experienced IP's, ADO's, Evaluators, etc! If the Air Force looses a lot more than expected, you just can't 'get those guys back' or just say 'we'll just train more new pilots the next couple of years to make up for the mistake'. Losing more of your experienced squadron IP's means that your younger pilots, without that extra mentoring, will not develop to be as good of pilots. What will this equate to: Less professional flying force and more importantly...an increase in mishaps (unfortunately we've already seen this occurring). -Something else that's been bugging me...you mention that since the airlines were the biggest factor in beginning ACP and thus should also be the biggest reason in discontinuing the program--did you look at helicopter pilots in the Air Force?? I know that we only comprise less than 10% of Air Force pilots, but, we still get the bonus, and (unless someone can correct me) I don't think the airlines over the last 15 years have been hiring Air Force helicopter pilots by the droves. So then how can you explain the fact that HH-60 CSAR pilots have a huge retention rate problem? Is it perhaps because they have something close to a 4 on 4 off deployment rate?? -Did you look at any of the other services' pilot bonus programs? The Marine Corps offers their largest bonuses for UH-1 pilots, again, I doubt the airlines ever are or ever were trying to hire Marine Huey pilots in droves. In closing, I'll also add that I think the bonus should be increased, not decreased, or even worse, done away with all together. Overall, among the officer corps, we have the highest deployment rates, most expensive initial and upgrade training courses, and the most dangerous jobs in the Air Force. With all due respect Beam, I doubt many other officer AFSCs in the Air Force wear body armor with loaded weapons when doing their jobs overseas (few exceptions being CRO's, Combat Controllers, etc).--I do respect you Beam for your deployment to Aghanistan in helping produce better Afghan officers, but that is by no means anything close to an operational deployment (I can provide further detail on why I made that statement if necessary). If you want the Air Force to get rid of our bonuses, then I suggest doing what the civilian government does for their employees who fly--put them on an entirely different and upgraded pay scale like they do for border patrol pilots.

Biggest understatement of the last 69 years. The Air Force flat out sucks at the assignment process. They offer you phone numbers to your functional....who never answers the phone. They offer you his email address...but he'll rarely email you back. The only way you can usually talk to your functional is through your CC (I know that's the way the AF wants it)...and even then, you rarely find out about those special hidden good deals. All I can say, is that the Air Force, especially among the flying community, is a good ol' boys club (boys meaning guys and girls). If you've got an 'in' with certain people, you get the hook up. If your commander likes you/wants to help you and he's got an 'in', you get a hook up. That's about how it works. The ADP in my opinion is fairly useless.

One of the factors I'm surprised hasn't been brought up yet is the psychological factor of cutting someone's pay... Let me back up one...and I'll add that for sake of the argument let's all assume that every pilot believes in Service before Self and that we can all agree in that there is nothing wrong for wanting to get out at any time when a commitment is up. Even though ACP is considered a 'Bonus' in the sense that you are not necessarily entitled to it, take it away, and pilots will believe that their pay is being cut. Look at it this way...if we were told that from this day forward, no matter what rank you are or will achieve in your career, your pay will never change. That's means that I, would never be able to increase my base pay above O-3 with 6 years regardless of how long I stay in or when I pin on Major, etc--if this were the case, I'm willing to bet that the Air Force would see a large amount of people leave since they are not going to earn what they had originally once planned. This goes along with the ACP Bonus. It's been around for almost 20 years and thus all pilots have come to expect it to be waiting for them when their commitment is up and have thus factored that in to their legitimate future earnings in the Air Force. If you take it away, many pilots (if not most) will take it as a pay cut in their future earnings and thus will be more likely to look elsewhere for other employment whether it's flying commercially or some other civilian job. Couple this with the increased ops tempo, BS with reflective belts and such, blues on Mondays, more additional duties, etc and you're going to see a lot of your more experienced pilots punching. On another note...where is the argument for cancelling the bonus pay for doctors, nurses, etc? I'd like to see the same study (either for or against) for other bonuses.

Hmmm, I have to admit, I haven't heard that one yet...and you could say I know the 36th pretty damn well. I've been deployed for over 6 months now, but I'll write my guys at the unit and ask them if they've heard of anything. You've got to love rumors. On a much more kick ass note...good on ya MD for becoming one of the red headed step children of the Air Force! I should try and find that picture of that dragonfly (or whatever insect) that's hovering while mating...basically combining the two greatest things ever--hovering and sex.

Yes, you need to be (or have been) a qualified IP in one airframe or another. The 172's and 208's are at Kirkuk, not Taji. Here we have the Hueys and Mi-17's. These 365's count as a remote tour (kind of). You get short tour credit but you don't PCS, which means you still get your BAH since you are technically 'TDY'. You make a a lot more $$$ on 365's than you do on remote tours to Korea (or so I've been told).

I guess you've never flown a helicopter

This would work...if the pilot understood you more than half the time. Some (not many) of the Iraqi pilots speak pretty decent English...and some, well, they only understand the very basics, ie turn left to heading 270 (and even that can be tough sometimes with the horrible comm system we have in the Mi-17). Flying and instructing here has definitely proven to be a quite a challenge. It's not like teaching studs back home.

Not too clear on where you're going with this... Are you implying something about the Afghani pilots are the Coalition FE? Just curious, that's all.

My roommate was a maintenance officer/advisor with the 172's and now with the Mi-17's. He's rotating out soon but if you PM your email address and questions, I can have him contact you.

Oh man. The stories I could tell about this issue. I'm doing the exact same mission except with CAFTT in Iraq and my good buddy is doing the CAPTF mission in Afghanistan. It's pretty challenging to say the least. I'll go into more details if anyone has any further questions. All I can say is YJCMTSU.

Hey bud...my advice is just to stick it out a while longer without saying anything to anybody. I'm assuming you're a copilot, and if so, things get better when you upgrade to AC and IP. Upgrading also opens more doors for you to your next assignment. The Air Force overall right now isn't doing that well. They're failing inspections left and right, we seem (haven't seen the statistics) to be crashing more aircraft lately, and we're firing our top Air Force leaders. Add that with the fact that assignments are now 4 years long, pilots are being forced out of the cockpit to fill UAV's (which is a critical mission), and people are deploying considerably more now than ever before...and what you get is a lot of us in the Air Force that aren't as happy as we could be...but hey, there's a war going on so we have to sacrifice our personal desires at times for the greater good. My guess is the only way they'd let you stop flying would be in the way of an FEB or MEB. You can always say that you're 'scared of flying' all of the sudden or severely depressed and that will get you out of the cockpit, however, I'm quite certain that isn't a way to get where you think you want to go right now (finance, etc). Let me give you some insight to how the assignments/manning issue works: I volunteered for a 365 to help train Iraqi pilots and I recently found out that though I'm supposed to get 'preference' on my assignment on my return, most of what they offered me were things that I could have gotten without deploying. I was hoping to go to a C-12/Defense Air Attache' assignment out of here, but with current helo manning, they told me they can't release anyone right now. It's frustrating, but just the way it is right now. So relaying this back to your situation, I don't see anyway of them letting you out of the cockpit early unless VSP comes around again. So all I can say is just keep plugging away man and things should get better. Try to be the expert with some part of your job...learn your niche. If you guys you PFPS, practice and learn as much as you can so that you become the expert...so that even when the DO or CC have questions about Falcon View, they know to go to you because you're the expert. Also, try and find a hobby outside of work. Work always seemed to be better if there was something else outside of work that I was into...for me, road biking. This flying job, as good as it is (dude we get paid pretty well to fly!)...can be very tiring and frustrating at times...you need to find a way to relieve the stress and have some enjoyment outside of work. I hope some of this helps. Good luck.

Huggy, Good on you for trying to spread the word on the U-2 as it seems a lot pilots (including myself) are somewhat ignorant about the community and mission. I know I'm going to get burned for this as a helo guy, but something about the U-2 always interested me...mainly the history of the aircraft and mission. I've heard you've had a helo guy there in the past, but from what I gather from the min requirements on the AFPC page, pretty much the only way I could apply is to go to a white jet after this deployment (also on a 365) and then apply 3-4 years after building up fixed wing hours. Something I've thought about, but unless I can score a T-34/6 to the Pensacola/Whiting area, not sure I want to go to one of the UPT bases as soon to be 30 year old who's single. Any thoughts or advice on this matter? I still have no idea what my follow-on assignment will be when I leave here and right now I have a lot of crazy ideas floating in my head.

Sorry bud, I have to raise the BS flag here just slightly. You say you would want an A-10 (if you had gone the 38 route) and that now your top two picks out of T-1's are a U-28 and an NSA. Well, from the majority of the drops I've read on here, your best chance for getting a U-28/NSA is out of 38's, not to mentio that A-10's obviously come out of 38's....but yet you say you made 38's your 3rd choice. Either your BS'ing yourself and everyone else reading this thread or you are completely oblivious to how the assignment process generally works out of UPT. Having said all that, good luck with getting the SOF aiframes...continue working hard and I'm sure something good will come your way.

Hacker, you're making it sound like this guy pulled a fast one on somebody and should have never went to the U-2. With the way AFPC is currently running business, you almost have to go out and find your own assignment and pull drug deals. If you're fortunate enough to have a good commander (becoming a little more rare these days) maybe he can fight for you to get the assignment you want, but even then, it appears it's becoming much more of a 'who you know' game with AFPC. Don't get me wrong, it has always somewhat been that way and I'm sure it will be partly that way until we're all chilling out with grey beards, but when a person busts their ass for 3-4 years and then are lumped together in the same boat with people who are coasting by, that's just wrong. Don't even get me started on how they're hosing dudes volunteering for 365's and are supposed to get 'preference'. I digress slightly, back to the original point. I applaud this dude for going out and getting a U-2 if that's what he really wanted. Most commanders would have probably just said 'well, I'll look into for you, but it's probably not going to happen blah blah blah'. He took it upon himself, did the leg work, maybe got some people to make some drug deals, and got his U-2. Besides, if the U-2 guys didn't want him, they could have always turned down his application.

I'd be surprised if this one does change. SOCOM never changed the rule on the 53 or on their MH-47's, etc. From what I understand, these units don't work for the Air Force per se, they work for SOCOM.

Hey guys. I know there have been posts made on different thread topics concerning the CV-22, so I figured we can start a new thread for new questions and information. Here are some questions I have if anybody has any info: When are they going to officially stand up an operational squadron at Cannon? I have been told by some 53 bubbas that the dates have been pushed back due to slow CV-22 production, etc. When the squadron at Hurlburt begins to be full up operational, what will their deployments be like? Will they similar to that of the 53 or maybe more to that of the the Talon types (for all I know these could be the same)? Not that it matters, but has AFSOC or SOCOM released any details cocerning females flying CV-22's? I know they were never allowed to fly 53's, but they have females on AC/MC-130's. Goes back to the question...is the CV-22 more of a helo or more of a fixed wing?

Reference Nole's post...

Overall I think those are great points. However, I think the original discussion was about getting an 'actual' fighter our of a T-38 drop. Now out of a T-38 drop, there might be one or two fighters, but there will probably also be bomber, a FAIP with no gurantee to a follow-on fighter, a U-28/NSA, and soon to be UAV's. So a person currently has a better chance of not getting a fighter directly out of 38's than getting one. As for the helo route, first off, currently you have a 99.69% chance of flying a helo/tilt rotor after graduating from Rucker. For the discussion about UAV's getting dropped to Rucker studs...I'd be suprised to see more than 1 or 2 a year if that. Helo manning, mainly amongst the 60 world is pretty bad, probably one of the worst manned in the entire Air Force. Until that manning improves, I doubt you'll see more than a couple UAV's going to the helo world. The reason a lot of 38 guys are getting anything but a fighter because there's a drawdown in the number of fighters available and an increase in UAV, etc. As much as people (including myself) hate to say it...AFPC has a reason why she does things. The reason is just seems pretty stupid and 69% of the time.

I feel it's necessary to add an additional, slightly different perspective on this post for all the newer guys on here. If your ultimate dream is to fly a fighter and everything else comes second to that, and after all the research of what they do (tons of time briefing and debriefing from what my buds tell me) and how the community is (a lot of eating their young, again, from what I hear from buds), then you should definitely try and go 38's. Just know that right now it seems as if only the top couple guys in each 38 track is getting a fighter right out of UPT and the UAV's are on their way. Most guys in phase II tend to change their minds at least once of what track they want to pursue...and I'll say that's a good thing. Guys just need to know that there's a lot more out there than getting a 'chance' to fly a fighter...heavies, 130's, helos...they all have their pros and cons, just like the fighters. One of my good buddies from Tweets once said (doubt he coined the phrase) "There is no such thing as bad tracks, just bad drops". Every track adds its own flavor and it's wise to learn as much as you can prior about what assignments can be dropped out of each track and what those assignments are really like. As for just going 38's to say if nothing else that you've flown a single seat supersonic 'trainer'...I think that's pretty . Pick the track that makes the most sense to you. You can lay everything you have on the line for a chance to fly a fighter, but the reality is that unless you're in the top few (if that), that's all you're going to get to say..."I got to fly a 38 for 6 months". Now, I'll caveat this by saying that there's nothing at all wrong with getting bombers or the PC-12's...but it's not that fighter you so desperately desired above everything else.

I'd say that over the past few years especially, helos and 130's have always been pretty popular. This whole UAV scare is just the icing on the cake for guys who want to fly low.