Seriously

A great story of insulation instead of isolation.

These next 2-4 weeks will be interesting to watch (I hope I'm not saying that again next month). Some projections have the US topping out somewhere towards the end of April, but that assumes full social distancing. I'm obviously an old man now because I want to kick all of the spring breakers in the ass who are ignoring the social distancing requirements.

If you'd like a more in-depth explanation of what Jon's referencing, you can read about it here and here.

The company doesn't save money through retirements. They save money by reducing flying operations. Those 70 pilots' seats will be filled by someone else who has already been with the company for more than 12 years.

Everyone is going to give you their story and the stories of guys they knew, but those stories may or may not have anything to do with what you experience. Even within MDS's there are drastically different experiences all depending on luck and timing. I know guys who deployed every 1-2 years in the Viper and others who never deployed (Many went to Korea; some didn't.). Ops tempos change. Bases change. Leadership changes. It's a real crap shoot. My personal observations: Heavy guys are gone more than fighters. Deployments for the F-16 are decreasing with the increased F-35 deployments. Strike Eagles seem to be gone all the time. F-15Cs and F-22s probably have the best ops tempo right now. Bombers are still doing 6 month rotations to Guam and occasionally going to Diego Garcia. It's only for a few years anyways. If you get burned out on your first tour, you can always put in for a white jet assignment (recommend IFF before UPT). Later on in your career, you'll start going to school or a staff tour. While you and your wife are still childless, I would go overseas and enjoy traveling.

Regardless... the interview isn't a formality, and guys making the leap are best not to carry the attitude of thinking they have it in the bag. There is still a lot of competition for those seats.

I flew with the Bats at a couple exercises during that time. Nothing in that article was particularly surprising. The sad thing is that the USAF isn't far behind. I experienced the same shift-swap shenanigans at PACAF (mostly Korea-centric) exercises. One led to the scariest landing I've done (at 5 am/night/IMC/trail ILS) and the other we called KIO at step. I have yet to receive any backlash for KIOing a sortie on the ground, but I know way too many young guys that don't think they have the right to call it. For any of the younger guys listening, you can call KIO. I've done it 3-4 times in my career and have only received "thank-you," "good call," or a non-chalant "ok, cool."

Keep applying for UPT. Period. It sounds like you still have a lot of time. You have until 30 without waivers, but many older guys have gone with age waivers. It's rare, but I did see majors going through UPT every now and then when I was a FAIP. Late-rate guys bring valuable experience to the 11X career field. For what it's worth, my UPT class had 5 late-rate guys and they all brought a level of maturity that the rest of us dumb 2Lts desperately needed and the instructions were definitely grateful to have them. We all have our unique paths to where we eventually want to go, but if you give up, you will never achieve your dream. The door has NOT closed!

Ah, yeah. Neal trap. Thanks

Is this the same thing the 561st does? Are they moving up to Hill?

Nickel on the grass He was a fantastic contributor to this board.

For some missions the fidelity of the sim *is* actually better than what you can get LARPing in the airplane.

All to recover insured jewelry from a slow-moving, GPS-tracked bread van.

Change may be slow, but at least change is happening. Since I joined: Master's degrees are masked, we stopped picking school selects at the O-4 board (everyone competes yearly now), you can decline school without prejudice (can turn down school after receiving orders without having to separate), 365s are on the decline (still more work to be done here), helmet art is back, sleeves can be rolled up, lots of civilian contractors have been brought (back) into the squadrons, etc. Can more be done? An unequivocal yes... there are so many other things that still need fixing, but things are changing.

Saudi Arabia is a country that exists to serve itself and it's rulers above all others in the world. It has been one of our biggest failings as a nation to continue to prop up their government. Their money and ideology are the source of the majority of the problems in the Middle East.

This will the be the next big problem to fix in the CAF...

F-16 final base is determined during the B-course. Sometime just after the halfway point, the assignments drop to your class then the students divy up the assignments however they please.

If anyone hasn't seen it, there is a reserves vacancy database accessible through the AFPC Secure Applications website on the portal. It's not perfect, but a good starting point. You can search by location, AFSC, etc.

You went IDE in-res and still didn't get promoted?

Not all deployments are created equal. Depending on your platform and whatever the current fight is, you may be deploying to a 1-star resort base or to a middle of no-where FOB. You may be employing daily or just burning holes in the sky waiting for something to happen. For your purposes, mission is far more important than time away from home.

You know the left says the same crap about the right? It's the echo-chamber effect. How would you "not accept the results?" That's about as likely as those bunch of idiots getting into Groom Lake.

You can... you just get reimbursed up to the rate for on base lodging.

Yes. Back in the 70s they were doing it. It died sometime in the 80s when AFE decided that all helmets should look identical with no tape covering. That made it easier for them to find cracks in the shell.

The O-6 formerly in charge of the solving the crisis at the Pentagon is quoted as saying, "it's a production problem, not a retention problem." This was about a year ago..

You should see the JTAC PT test.... that thing is brutal.