What's wrong with the Air Force?

[Guest nsplayr]

Back to the good stuff!

[Springer]

On 9/16/2023 at 10:26 PM, nsplayr said:

Do we sent guys to TPS with an immediate follow on assignment handing out gym towels at the Deid?

Sort of.  After TPS buddy was sent to some safety job.  Fed up, left AD to fly Guard -16's/airline.  Airbus hired him away from airline to be test pilot in Toulouse.

[Biff_T]

15 hours ago, nsplayr said:

Back to the good stuff!

"Buck Nasty, what can I say about that suit that hasn't already been said about Afghanistan."

Classic. Lol

[Lord Ratner]

26 minutes ago, Biff_T said:

"Buck Nasty, what can I say about that suit that hasn't already been said about Afghanistan."

Classic. Lol

"She looks like she wears underwear with dick holes in them" 😂🤣

[FourFans]

21 hours ago, Lord Ratner said:

"She looks like she wears underwear with dick holes in them" 😂🤣

I love how none of them can stay in character after that.  Comedy Gold.

[Khruangbin33]

On 9/16/2023 at 8:26 PM, nsplayr said:

...Do we sent guys to TPS with an immediate follow on assignment handing out gym towels at the Deid?

Not necessarily the Deid, but yes, with rather appalling frequency.  Could not believe the BS tours that were (are still?) being handed to multiple brilliant/fresh graduates in a row.  All were jobs which could have been gapped or given to schlubs like me.  I won't say much more than that.

[MechGov]

https://www.airforcetimes.com/news/your-air-force/2023/09/19/old-is-new-again-as-air-force-special-ops-branch-revamps-training/

Something, something, SOF truths about quality over quantity and mass production of SOF

Some choice excerpts:
"Bauernfeind told Air Force Times that several other types of skills, like airdrops, aerial refueling and low-level flight, could become part of unit training rather than the initial pipeline. He said the standards used to decide whether airmen should move on in training will change accordingly."

"It’s trying to fast-track special operations flight school by sending students straight to AFSOC training units after they earn their wings on the T-6 Texan II. That cuts out the intermediate phase of flying the T-1 Jayhawk, which is heading into retirement after serving as the stepping stone to mobility and special operations aircraft.

That decision can shorten pilot training time by six months, AFSOC spokesperson Lt. Col. Becky Heyse said."



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[HU&W]

3 hours ago, MechGov said:

https://www.airforcetimes.com/news/your-air-force/2023/09/19/old-is-new-again-as-air-force-special-ops-branch-revamps-training/

Something, something, SOF truths about quality over quantity and mass production of SOF

Some choice excerpts:
"Bauernfeind told Air Force Times that several other types of skills, like airdrops, aerial refueling and low-level flight, could become part of unit training rather than the initial pipeline. He said the standards used to decide whether airmen should move on in training will change accordingly."

"It’s trying to fast-track special operations flight school by sending students straight to AFSOC training units after they earn their wings on the T-6 Texan II. That cuts out the intermediate phase of flying the T-1 Jayhawk, which is heading into retirement after serving as the stepping stone to mobility and special operations aircraft.

That decision can shorten pilot training time by six months, AFSOC spokesperson Lt. Col. Becky Heyse said."



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Same article, no paywall - https://news.yahoo.com/old-again-air-force-special-201159107.html

A few more interesting tidbits:

"Going forward, Bauernfeind wants to use the first four years differently.  As he sees it, airmen would spend up to two years in initial qualification training before reaching their special ops squadron. Once there, they’d get up to 18 months of training time to learn more about their mission and the special operations culture before deploying."

"Other tweaks, like dropping a requirement that students learn a particular type of landing that has never been used in combat, are streamlining the C-130 syllabus as well. And adding more simulators and virtual reality software can free up aircraft to fly combat missions instead of being tied up in training at home."

[tac airlifter]

5 hours ago, HU&W said:

Same article, no paywall - https://news.yahoo.com/old-again-air-force-special-201159107.html

A few more interesting tidbits:

"Going forward, Bauernfeind wants to use the first four years differently.  As he sees it, airmen would spend up to two years in initial qualification training before reaching their special ops squadron. Once there, they’d get up to 18 months of training time to learn more about their mission and the special operations culture before deploying."

"Other tweaks, like dropping a requirement that students learn a particular type of landing that has never been used in combat, are streamlining the C-130 syllabus as well. And adding more simulators and virtual reality software can free up aircraft to fly combat missions instead of being tied up in training at home."

Anyone know what he’s referring to here?

[Herkdrvr]

1 hour ago, tac airlifter said:

Anyone know what he’s referring to here?

I think he means elimination of landing A-1.  

[Swizzle]

4 hours ago, tac airlifter said:

Anyone know what he’s referring to here?

 

😜 

[Biff_T]

8 hours ago, Swizzle said:

 

😜

Fishin is the Mission

 

Could you imagine casting a line off those pontoons) You could take that baby deep sea fishing.  Lol

[Pooter]

If there's one thing the Air Force pilot pipeline managers constantly forget and have to re-learn, it's that teaching skills at the lowest possible level in the cheapest airframe always pays dividends. 
 

Passing the buck to b-courses to teach fundamentals that should have been learned in IFS/UPT/IFF is 100% of the time a giant waste of money. The temptation to green up slides over doing the things that actually make sense is going to run our service into the ground.

 

Whenever this comes up I like to tell people some napkin math I did a few years back: I used more JP8 in my first 8 sorties in my MWS than I did in 3 years/1100 hrs in the T-6. 

[Standby]

3 hours ago, Pooter said:

Whenever this comes up I like to tell people some napkin math I did a few years back: I used more JP8 in my first 8 sorties in my MWS than I did in 3 years/1100 hrs in the T-6. 

I know the real answer is more nuanced…but I’ll ask: why even fly the more expensive jet unless it’s needed for combat operations? If it’s more cost effective to train in a fuel efficient and less maintenance intensive jet, why even fly the MWS? Do you think there is any merit in teaching the METL item in the actual aircraft they will execute it with? If yes, where does the crossover in benefit occur? Why not get people with the UPT basic stick and rudder skills to an MWS and plop them in a sim to grow into the mission?

[HeloDude]

Discussion on The Pilot Network on FB about AAMS going away very soon.  Says that when it goes away, the only way you can get your line by line sortie info is through the 1Cs…but their system only goes back 18 months.

[brabus]

@Standby I’m sure it depends on MWS. For fighters you absolutely must fly the actual airplane to get the training, there is no substitute. More sims/less flights for RAP is a viable solution in theory, HOWEVER, sims are MASSIVELY behind for what they’d need to be to actually make that transition in how we do daily training. Maybe we can reassess in 10 years.

[di1630]

[mention=13370]Standby[/mention] I’m sure it depends on MWS. For fighters you absolutely must fly the actual airplane to get the training, there is no substitute. More sims/less flights for RAP is a viable solution in theory, HOWEVER, sims are MASSIVELY behind for what they’d need to be to actually make that transition in how we do daily training. Maybe we can reassess in 10 years.

I don’t think you’ll need to wait that long. I think in 5 years maybe less we’ll do 50% of training (tactical stuff) in sims and 50% part task training in the jet.

They are building JSE at Edwards, Nellis and Alaska and it will improve massively in the short term.

Biggest obstacle is dinosaur leadership that focuses on quantity over of flying vs quality.


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[Standby]

1 hour ago, brabus said:

@Standby I’m sure it depends on MWS. For fighters you absolutely must fly the actual airplane to get the training, there is no substitute. More sims/less flights for RAP is a viable solution in theory, HOWEVER, sims are MASSIVELY behind for what they’d need to be to actually make that transition in how we do daily training. Maybe we can reassess in 10 years.

I was playing devils advocate in my response to Pooter. My real belief is that if you have trained someone in the basics, why not put them in their MWS sooner? You can practice 6K setups in the T-38 all day…but why do that if you could drop someone into their F-XX and actually train?

I get the notion that we shouldn’t be deferring basic training items from UPT to FTU to ops…but there is something to be said for doing the job in the actual airplane you’re going to do it in. Basic stick/rudder airmanship at UPT. Then why not get them to their FTU sooner? I’m classifying basic airmanship as the minimum proficiency level to advance to the next block of learning. For the SOF folks: there is no AMP-3/4, fixed gun engagement, nap-of-the-earth LL in the T-6 or T-1 program…so why extend their time another 3-6 months? I get that any time in the jet is valuable, and it’s cheaper in a trainer…but this is the cost of doing business. 

[Danger41]

I'm a huge fan of the old ACE (Accelerated Copilot Enrichment) concept and really believe we should put some companion trainers at every base to let folks fly and get air sense in a cheaper trainer. If the argument is "more is better" (I disagree with this but I'm in the minority) in terms of flight hours, get some airplanes that you can fly a bunch and get experience on the cheap. @Pooter nailed it with his T-6 example. 

[hindsight2020]

1 hour ago, Standby said:

I was playing devils advocate in my response to Pooter. My real belief is that if you have trained someone in the basics, why not put them in their MWS sooner? You can practice 6K setups in the T-38 all day…but why do that if you could drop someone into their F-XX and actually train?

I get the notion that we shouldn’t be deferring basic training items from UPT to FTU to ops…but there is something to be said for doing the job in the actual airplane you’re going to do it in. Basic stick/rudder airmanship at UPT. Then why not get them to their FTU sooner? I’m classifying basic airmanship as the minimum proficiency level to advance to the next block of learning. For the SOF folks: there is no AMP-3/4, fixed gun engagement, nap-of-the-earth LL in the T-6 or T-1 program…so why extend their time another 3-6 months? I get that any time in the jet is valuable, and it’s cheaper in a trainer…but this is the cost of doing business. 

In my opinion the benefit of white jets is actuarial in nature. 500 hours. First 500 is where the first spike in accident risk of the bathtub (the other one is the experienced/complacency spike, which we also have good historical precedents for, even recently). When you move more of that window to the zone where the preponderance of your iterations will be done in the expensive jets, well by all means fvck around and find out. That's it, no RAND study needed.

 

[Clark Griswold]

1 hour ago, Danger41 said:

I'm a huge fan of the old ACE (Accelerated Copilot Enrichment) concept and really believe we should put some companion trainers at every base to let folks fly and get air sense in a cheaper trainer. If the argument is "more is better" (I disagree with this but I'm in the minority) in terms of flight hours, get some airplanes that you can fly a bunch and get experience on the cheap. @Pooter nailed it with his T-6 example. 

Concur

Left field idea but I thought about this and why not shorter courses and bring the different communities together (pointy nose, heavy, rotary, unmanned, trainer) for professional skills development, networking, rated development… ?

Different programs in relatively simple platforms for courses like upset/spin/acro refresher, STOL/off runway and back country flying, tail dragger, sea plane, etc… flying is most of it and it brings the rated crew dogs together for mil aviation and operational discussions 

Basically PME but way better

[brabus]

4 hours ago, di1630 said:

I don’t think you’ll need to wait that long. I think in 5 years maybe less we’ll do 50% of training (tactical stuff) in sims and 50% part task training in the jet.

They are building JSE at Edwards, Nellis and Alaska and it will improve massively in the short term.

Biggest obstacle is dinosaur leadership that focuses on quantity over of flying vs quality.


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That’s where we should be, but 5 years is way over-optimistic. I’ve been in and around the acquisitions/test world for a long time and I’ve learned one major thing - double or triple the timelines you’re told (and that’s after you account for half the shit you’re promised doesn’t even make it past power point and bar napkins). The sad reality of our procurement process.

Edited September 22, 2023 by brabus

[Lord Ratner]

6 hours ago, Standby said:

I know the real answer is more nuanced…but I’ll ask: why even fly the more expensive jet unless it’s needed for combat operations? If it’s more cost effective to train in a fuel efficient and less maintenance intensive jet, why even fly the MWS? Do you think there is any merit in teaching the METL item in the actual aircraft they will execute it with? If yes, where does the crossover in benefit occur? Why not get people with the UPT basic stick and rudder skills to an MWS and plop them in a sim to grow into the mission?

He answered that question:

9 hours ago, Pooter said:

teaching skills at the lowest possible level in the cheapest airframe

So for the tanker, if we're talking basic stick and rudder and keeping radio calls, trimming, airport operations, airspace navigation, and other fundamentals honed, then the cheaper smaller plane is a better value.

 

You also have to be competent in the specific landing and handling characteristics of the tanker, and in that case the lowest level and cheapest plane is the tanker. Or perhaps you could have a few tanker variants that don't have any of the refueling systems maintained and it's just a pattern monkey. But the premise is sound.

 

And yeah, the simulator is adequate for a huge percentage of this, which is why the airliners do not train in the aircraft (non-revenue), ever. 

 

For fighters you are obviously going to have less capacity to use the simulator, but there's no reason why an F-22 pilot couldn't practice in a much cheaper jet aircraft. Got forbid we actually ran acquisitions in an integrated, forward thinking way, you would buy trainer aircraft that are vastly cheaper yet handle similarly to the MWS's. 

 

The flying I did in the T6 improved my KC135 flying far more than my KC135 flying improved my T6 flying. 

[artvandelay43201]

5 hours ago, HeloDude said:

Discussion on The Pilot Network on FB about AAMS going away very soon.  Says that when it goes away, the only way you can get your line by line sortie info is through the 1Cs…but their system only goes back 18 months.

Can’t emphasize this enough. Just went through an airline interview and was almost screwed by the AAMS system going away. Hope everyone saved their green monster. 

[Danger41]

37 minutes ago, artvandelay43201 said:

Can’t emphasize this enough. Just went through an airline interview and was almost screwed by the AAMS system going away. Hope everyone saved their green monster. 

Really? I've heard from dozens of sources (including the airlines) that they just need the FHR summary.