Forum: General

Newbie Joined: May 06, 2008 Posts: 4 Status: Offline

This is a great forum with a lot of good discussion. I am hoping that some of you might be able to add insight into some questions of mine. I am applying to the USAF as a pilot. Here is a brief background of where I stand:

-Scored mid 90's on AFOQT
-Had a 3.5 GPA in Aero Eng
-Finished private pilot 5 months ago, TT 56 hrs
-4 years post graduation (2004)
-Flight Simulation (helos) / structural engineer
-27 y.o. (I am just young enough to apply)

I think I have a fighting chance at getting a pilot slot, but am not certain of my flying abilities. Are all fighter pilots extremely confident or do they have a realistic appreciation of their abilities? The last thing I want is to washout of UPT for not being up to snuff. I am a safe pilot, but not infallible. A few times I became a bit flustered early in my training, especially in more complicated airspace while with an instructor. While I learned from mistakes, I don't know if having any mistakes constitutes red flags.

I realize this will be the greatest challenge I have faced, and no one knows how they will react under real pressure, but are there indications early in training that tell whether a pilot is "fighter pilot material?" Thanks for your feedback, and I apologize for the lack of brevity.

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USAF_App-

Thanks for opening up a huge can of worms Wink

. To be honest you cannot be any USAF pilot without being confident AND knowing your limitations. We ALL make mistakes as pilots and any pilot (fighter or otherwise) who tells you different has crossed the line from confidence to arrogance. In my experience arrogance doesn't fit very well in fighter squadrons... the culture is kind of self correcting in that respect and if someone has the sort of unmitigated confidence you reference, other pilots will maneuver (sts) to bring that guy back to earth.

My initial impression of your qualifications is that you are an excellent candidate. Remember, however, that the Air Force values the whole person concept and while you may have good scores your extra curricular activities and personality factor in.

There are, in fact, indications in early training that indicate what your success will be later on. Everyone experiences a little trouble early on and you find that with increased experience you are able to handle higher levels of difficulty. Pilots who make mistakes and dwell on them tend to have problems. Compartmentalization is a very important skill for all pilots.

If you want to be a pilot in the USAF then you need to have confidence in your abilities and go for it. You don't want to go through life thinking "What if".

Just my 2 cents

Active member Joined: Apr 22, 2004 Posts: 116

Go for it. The key is to be you and not what you think a fighter pilot should be, too many of those guys out there. They get brought back to earth quick enough. During pilot training you have to want it the most and do what it takes to get it. Doesn't mean cheat,... it means you study the hardest, you help your classmates out the most, you ask your instructors questions after you have looked up the answers and they still don't make sense.
Remember pilot training is for people who want to learn to become USAF pilots and follow the USAF procedures and style of flying. Guys who think they don't make mistakes or know it all...don't and get weeded out.
Sounds like you'd be a great candidate. Just remember its up to you. Also consider how you'll do if you don't get a fighter. Would you be alright flying something else? Is the Military right for you? Good to always have plans b and c.

Quote:

-Flight Simulation (helos)

Relevancy?

Good luck and best wishes though, everyone makes mistakes, you fly more, you become more confident... In my branch, selection process is harder than the training itself, they make sure once you get to the seat you are capable of making it through the flight school, don't know a single one washed out due to repeated procedural mistakes. You already have confidence as I can see from your list of credentials you dropped among combat vets around here. You are admired.

Newbie Joined: May 06, 2008 Posts: 4 Status: Offline

Thanks for the feedback guys. I appreciate your input because I don't know any fighter pilots and I like hearing your perspective.

I will be going to take my physical Monday. My vision is borderline (20/40), but that should be within limits (20/70). I don't require glasses on either my pilot or driving licenses. After the physical I will take the BAT test in a few weeks. Do you all know much about that test?

I included the bit about helicopter simulators as a background of what I have been doing the past 4 years since graduation. I know its relevance to F-16's is not huge, but I have the skills to fly a helicopter. I have about 200+ (unofficial) hours in huey, cobra, and V22 trainers.

On another note, I have a few questions about life as a fighter pilot, especially being married:

How dangerous is it really? I have been reading about a lot of crashes in the "mishap news" section. I don't know how to ask this tactfully, but what are the chances of getting killed over a 10-20 year career, 1 in 10, 1 in 20? Most of the crashes are foreign jets. Is this a result of poorer maintenance and training?

How much time do you spend away from home? I have heard that you can expect to be gone 3 out of 15 months, does that sound right?

What kind of hours do you work?

Do you know what the break down is of available fighter slots for every UPT graduating class? I would prefer F-16 and it would be great to fly an F-22, but I am not holding my breath. I don't know when training will begin for F-35. I was told that your path to fighter/bomber UPT is based on your performance at OTS, but do the Academy guys get first dibs?

Thanks for reading, I appreciate your feedback. Again, sorry for the length.

Newbie Joined: May 06, 2008 Posts: 4 Status: Offline

viper1234 wrote:

USAF_App-

You don't want to go through life thinking "What if".

You really hit the nail on the head. I had put off my dreams of flying when I got married, but my wife and I knew it was always in the back of my mind. A few months ago, I found out that I was still young enough to apply. The chance at having my office be the cockpit of an airplane is just too much to resist, not that it will be hard to give up my cubicle. Rolling Eyes

Active member Joined: Apr 22, 2004 Posts: 116

Hmmm. Dangerous? You've got more of a chance dying driving to and from work.
But it is dangerous. Don't have exact stats, but the Air Force loses close to 6-9 fighters a year average (class A's). Probably 50% of those result in death or injury. I've been to too many funerals already (one is too many really). But if you look at my High School graduation class, (none of them pilots), quite a few of them have passed on from numerous things accidents, cancer, etc.

Hard to nail down a number for your chances of making it to twenty,I'd say they are close to 99% not 10% or 5% as you have put it. Most of the guys do get out before 20 years though because of the demanding life style and better paying options out there.

I worked for a long time in safety but I won't say that foreign jets crash more than ours because of maint or training.

Your path to a training base begins probably in OTS, not fighter or bomber track. Rank High and you might get to select ENJJPT at Sheppard AFB. Otherwise try to rank high so you get to pick one of the other base's of your choosing and not the Air Force's. (They all are good and have there good and bad points).

Your path to a fighter/bomber track is doing very well in the 1st 5 months of pilot training. Rank high academically and in piloting to ensure you have your choice. 70 percent check ride scores, 15 percent daily ride scores and 15 percent academics IIRC. Sometimes the #1 guy might choose a heavy,(not sure why) but one reason might be they know they want to get out after a couple of years to get to the air lines, or they want the globe trotting life style the heavy lifters/ refuelers have.

You spend a lot of time away from home if your in the military period.
Once in a squadron expect to fly 2-3 times a week. 5 times a week during exercises. Typical day is 12-14 hours (12 hours if your flying the next day, 14 if your catching up on the paperwork you missed while flying).
If flying you spend 6-9 hours planning and debriefing flight, 1 hour on either side of the flight to step to the jet, walk around, start it, after landing park it, walk around, debrief maint (fill out paperwork) and take off the gear, then add on the actual flight which in fighters is typically 1.0-2.0 depending on the type of aircraft. 1.4 in a standard F-16 squadron.

Deployments, Training and TDY's are a constant of Military life, just like moving every 3 to 4 years. AEF's will take you away for 4 months every 15 months, but there are enough special taskers coming down you may be gone for 6 months and more frequently, again depending on your expertise.

Hope this helps

USAF_Applicant wrote:

How dangerous is it really? I have been reading about a lot of crashes in the "mishap news" section. I don't know how to ask this tactfully, but what are the chances of getting killed over a 10-20 year career, 1 in 10, 1 in 20? Most of the crashes are foreign jets. Is this a result of poorer maintenance and training?

And those are only viper mishaps? Recently we lost T-38 crews, those guys were in UPT. Get that thought out of your head, man, seriously, you can't think about this if you want to fly "anything" in the military, you could die tomorrow falling off a sidewalk. Soldiers always ask me, "errm.. what are the chances we go to Iraq?" I tell them, "then don't freaking join, because you are deploying." These guys over here are really nice, if you were over at baseops.net they would have fried your @$$ for a question like that... Wink

Quote:

I know its relevance to F-16's is not huge, but I have the skills to fly a helicopter. I have about 200+ (unofficial) hours in huey, cobra, and V22 trainers.

No, no this is good stuff, I thought you were talking about home computer sims... Razz

Hope to see ya @ Sheppard AFB, TX for UPT!!! I crew T-6A's as my civilian job, hope to see ya!

F16guy wrote:

You spend a lot of time away from home if your in the military period.
Once in a squadron expect to fly 2-3 times a week. 5 times a week during exercises. Typical day is 12-14 hours (12 hours if your flying the next day, 14 if your catching up on the paperwork you missed while flying).

Hopefully I'm not "stealing" USAF_Applicant 's thread but are those working days really that long? It feels quite incredible because as far as I know normal office worker works about 8 hours per day. Do you really mean that almost every normal working day in Air Force lasts about around the clock? I'd suppose that not every air force flies 2-3 times a week.

Veteran Joined: Jul 01, 2007 Posts: 325

From the time you get into the Air Force till the day you either retire or go Guard you can expect to work 12-18 hours in a given day and be expected to join in on the Sunday work competitions. During training, when you aren't flying you need to be studying. Once you get to your first operational assignment and finish MQT is where the non-flying jobs begin. Most of our time is spent in the office performing our non-flying duties. Our bosses expect us to be able to fly, it is our queep job and our officership that we get graded on.

__Viper__ we are paid on salary so they are under no obligation to give us overtime. As such, they give us the work that "needs" to be done and we do it until it is finished. There is a ton of stuff that "needs" to be done so get up for it.

As far as ENJJPT goes, be careful what you wish for. You'll get T-6s and progress to -38s but at the assignment drop you are going to see U-28s and BUFFs rather than nicer non-fighters if you didn't do so well during training.

The marriage thing is a delicate one. Hopefully you have an independant wife like I do. Out of the three years we've been married, I've been home for a little over one year of it. The rest of the time has been TDYs and now Korea. When I was home it was all about training. So total time spent with my family has amounted to well less than a year out of the three.

There are quite a few life changing decisions that need to be made before you sign on the dotted line. The Air Force takes "service before self" very seriously and you need to get that right in your mind (and your wife's) before you join.

Active member Joined: Apr 22, 2004 Posts: 116

Several exchange pilots I know have said we work too hard. A friend from Denmark said he could do everything we do and still be home after eight hours, including the flying. A asked him if he had people to do his paper work for him and he had to admit that he did. Another friend of mine was on exchange to Belgium and along with other folks, he had mission planners. Their job was to plan the mission, load it into the Data cartridge and complete the line up cards/ mission materials. That would be nice....
Oh and we also like to spend a lot of time in the debrief so that hopefully we won't make the same mistakes twice. Some exchange bro's have said we debrief too long. I usually disagree with that, as long as the debrief is done properly.

Yep the day's are long, I went in at 0600 this morning and had to leave at 1759 to night so that I can fly tomorrow. I'm not looking forward to next week when I have to catch up on the qweep paperwork that I did not do this week. But that is okay...I'm flying tomorrow.

Oh and for maintenance...those guys are working twelves until the exercise is over. So maintenance has to work 24 hours to keep us flying 8 hours a day. Those guys need a pay increase!

This ain't no normal office job!!!!!

Veteran Joined: Jul 01, 2007 Posts: 325

True dat!

F16guy wrote:

Several exchange pilots I know have said we work too hard. A friend from Denmark said he could do everything we do and still be home after eight hours, including the flying. A asked him if he had people to do his paper work for him and he had to admit that he did. Another friend of mine was on exchange to Belgium and along with other folks, he had mission planners. Their job was to plan the mission, load it into the Data cartridge and complete the line up cards/ mission materials.

Such a big difference in working hours must be a major tactical advance. If US pilots do 4 hours more work I'd guess that their tactical awareness is much greater than other air force pilot's.

Snakehandler wrote that when pilots are not flying they'll be studying. I'd think that it contains all kind of material about tactis or enemy's equipment, highly classified naturally. Am I right?

Oh and thanks for the detailed answers!

Forum: General

Applying to USAF; Hopeful Viper Pilot