I met someone on the net and during a conversation about his eyesight problems, he told me this:

My vision prior to a Bachelor of Engineering - 20/20. My vision after was 20/70. At the time, (1996 he says) the USAF required 20/20 uncorrected for guys walking in off the street (me), but allowed a cycloplegic retinoscopy of up to -0.75 diopters with no more than 0.25 D astigmatism correction about the baseline RE.

This is supposedly back in 1996.

Any truth to this?

jiberish...Post it in the Aviation medicine forum.

Maybe they can help.

BENDY

I say too much BS. Overposting information to cover up a BS story.

HD

I have heard from current AF pilots and officers that the vision requirements used to be a lot tougher than the lenient 20/70 now so maybe there is some truth to it.

Seriously, ask a FD.

They know the dates and requirements.

It's not my bag.

BENDY

I apologize for posting this over here. I thought about the Aviation medicine forum but was hesitant that this might be off topic for them.

Anyway, this guy claims " I'm currently a JSUPT T-1A Instructor Pilot at Vance AFB, Oklahoma."

The reason he is being scrutinized is that he has a website selling some natural vision improvement method similar to See Clearly Method. I wanted to know how legit is that business. On the other hand, since I am in the Army, I don't think our FDs would know the AF requirements back in 1996. Since we have many AF guys here, I thought some would shine some light into the situation. I don't understand why stricter requirements for those who comes from civilian?

Anyway, let me also post it in the Aviation medicine...

Thanks for the responses

Bush, that's the best bet, many of them are familiar with the '96 requrements.

Those that aren't would look them up for you, it increases their knowledge too.

That is where you will get an answer, not here.

Good Luck.

BENDY

Right on bro. I am going there...

The AF pilot vision requirements in 1996 were the same as today. 20/70 correctable to 20/20.

AFI 48-123 really hasn't changed since then as far as vision requirements, although the numbers they'll waive for astigmatism are a little higher.

Thanks, that was what I thought, I got the suspicion when he said AF was looking for uncorrected 20/20 for civilians coming in off the street. Why would they apply a different standard to those and some other standard to AD, ROTC, or AFA? He is full of it...

In his defense, he may have been fed that BS by a recruiter....they do that.

FWIW, I went back and looked at the web page that I created in 1998 discussing the process for applying to UPT. This is what I wrote pertaining to vision requirements -- copied directly from the AFI (at the time):

- Normal color vision for both pilots and navigators

- Distant vision - pilots uncorrected to 20/50 and navigators 20/200 but corrected to 20/20

- Near vision - pilots uncorrected to 20/20; navigators 20/40 but corrected to 20/20

- Refraction, accommodation and astigmatism requirements have had no corrective eye surgery (i.e. RK surgery)

[ 23. September 2005, 06:01: Message edited by: Hacker ]

Originally posted by Jordan:

The AF pilot vision requirements in 1996 were the same as today. 20/70 correctable to 20/20.

AFI 48-123 really hasn't changed since then as far as vision requirements, although the numbers they'll waive for astigmatism are a little higher.

WRONG, it was 20/20 until May of '1997 when it was changed to 20/70 correctable to 20/20.

It wasn't 20/20 in 1991, when I went to UPT with 20/35 vision (correctable to 20/20).

This has turned into such a pointless discussion. There's nothing funny to read, and it really doesn't matter when the vision limits changed...