Word: aircrafting
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...pilots have been considered the essence of the Air Force. But in reality, they're just a tiny slice of the service. They account for only 13,202 of the 324,191 active duty personnel wearing Air Force blues, and the service is now buying more unmanned than manned aircraft. It's a trend that experts say will only accelerate. So this week the Air Force, acknowledging that it no longer makes sense to spend $1 million training a pilot to fly drones from a desk halfway around the world, declaring that future drone drivers will not have...
...first eight months of 2008, Air Force drones have logged more than 80,000 hours flying nearly 4,500 missions over Afghanistan and Iraq. While most were surveillance - transmitting video back to their ground-based controllers - many involved launching missiles at enemy targets. "The combat contributions of unmanned aircraft systems in today's fight have surpassed all expectations and hold even greater promise for the future," said General Norton Schwartz, the Air Force's new chief of staff, in announcing the staffing shift...
...Moseley also differed over whether non-pilots should be able to operate weapons-carrying drones. Like other previous Air Force leaders, Moseley argued that only a trained pilot had the mental and moral heft to deliver bombs and missiles, or could avoid mid-air collisions with other aircraft. Last April, Gates complained that while running the CIA in 1992 he discovered "the Air Force would not co-fund with CIA a vehicle without a pilot." That stubborn thinking, he suggested, makes no sense as drones have flooded the skies over Afghanistan and Iraq and stretched the Air Force's pilot...
Schwartz, significantly, is the first non-fighter pilot to head the Air Force in a generation (he is a pilot, but primarily of special-operations aircraft). To meet the soaring demand for drone operators, he says fledgling pilots will be used. But the service soon will "develop an unmanned aircraft systems operator career field with specialized training potentially distinct from current manned pilot training," he said. That will come as a relief to many young pilots who have feared having their flying careers crimped by being ordered to fly drones from Nevada's Creech Air Force Base. Schwartz said...
...blow up transatlantic commercial flights using liquid explosives hidden in plastic soft-drink bottles were found guilty of conspiracy to commit murder, but the jury failed to reach verdicts on four of the men (one was acquitted of all charges)--and even on whether the cell had actually targeted aircraft. Prosecutors said the suspects' early arrests made it difficult to collect enough evidence to convince the jury of an imminent threat. Meanwhile, restrictions on carrying liquids aboard planes--measures sparked by the 2006 plot--remain in place at many airports around the world...