First Week In Jets!

This week marked an important milestone in my fledgling Air Force career.  I had my dollar ride in a T-6.  A dollar ride is someone's first flight.  I'll try to describe it here, but words can't really capture how awesome/overwhelming it was.  The instructor I had was previously a T-38 guy, so I knew it was going to be a fun ride. I'll talk more about it when I discuss flying later.

A bit about the T-6.  The T-6 is a new, 5 million dollar plane which replaced the 50's era T-37 in the early-mid 2000's.  It is much more powerful with its 1,100 hp turboprop.  It cruises at 200 knots, can easily go 240, and tops out at 316. It can pull -3.5 to +7.0 g's, and has performance compared to the P-51 Mustang of WWII.  It's wingspan is about 33', and it weighs 6,500 lbs fully loaded with 1,100 lbs of fuel, of which probably 700 will be burned on a typical 1.3 to 1.5 hr mission.

This week was also the first week in the flight room.  I'll walk you through what seems to be a typical day.  Luckily (for us, not for them) some guys from Class 14-13 got washed back into our class due to budget reasons.  They have been really helpful getting us up to speed on all that goes along with being in the flight room for twelve hours a day.  I'll take a minute to go over a typical day.

We are given a schedule the night before telling us what time to show up.  Its usually between 0700 and 0730, and sometimes depends on what we have scheduled that day, or what we had the day before.  We are required to get 12 hours of crew rest, and are limited to a 12 hour duty day, so if we stay later than 7:30 pm, we can't report in any earlier than 12 hrs later the next day.  Anyway, the class meets up outside the building to ensure we all start our 12 hour day at the same time.  A minute prior to our show time, we go into the flight room and start preparing the morning's formal brief. The formal brief consists of informing the class on the day's weather, expected ops for the day, op notes, previous day's runway supervisory unit comments for each particular student, and an emergency procedure brief.  The briefer, and the emergency procedure briefer rotate daily.  Following the brief is a mad rush to get the people scheduled for the first 'go' ready for their mission brief.  This involved creating a mission data card, which has the mission objective,training objectives (goals you want to accomplish, i.e. maintain altitude within 150', no improper radio transmissions, etc), mission profile (where you want to go, and what you plan to do when you get there), expected weather,  and JOKER and BINGO fuel levels.  If you're flying the first go, you then sit down with your instructor pilot (IP) and brief what you are going to do, otherwise you study stuff you should've read the night before and make sure popcorn is ready by the time the guys who flew the first go get back.  As for the brief, some of this is briefed by the student, other parts by the IP.  You will usually step (finish the brief, go put on your g-suit and harness, and test your mask, ad then go to the supervisor and get your assigned aircraft) a half hour before your scheduled takeoff time.  After that you will go outside and get a ride to your jet if its far, or walk if its close. 

Once you get to the jet you will check the documentation for things like ensuring all the required inspections are either not overdue, or signed off if they are overdue, etc.  Then its time to hop up on the wing, do some cockpit checks, a preflight inspection of the exterior, and finally strap in. Once you are all strapped in and have followed your checklist to check all the switches in the cockpit its time to close the canopy and start the engine.  This is simple thanks to a computer that pretty much does everything for you.  Once started, its time to turn on what you need (most importantly the air conditioning) and do some final checks before taxiing to the runway.  Once there you do some more checks, arm your ejection seat, call for takeoff clearance, and then take off. 

This is where it gets exciting.  When the power is moved to MAX, there is a short delay while the turbine spools up, but once it does the plane goes!  Its off the ground in about 1,500 feet.  The landing gear and flaps are retracted a few seconds later, and by now the plane is going 130 knots, on its way to cruising speed of 200.  Stuff happens so fast on departure that it takes some getting used to.  My IP did this part of the flight during the dollar ride, but I got to fly pretty much the whole mission for my second and third flights.  During my third flight on Friday I noticed time slowed down a little, as I was getting used to flying the plane and some tasks that used to require conscious effort were now becoming second nature.  Anyway, we will leave Laughlin and fly 18 or so miles to the Southeast. There are blocks of airspace assigned for military operations that we use to practice maneuvers.  They are fairly big (~14 nautical miles long by maybe 10 nautical miles wide, depending on which one you get assigned to) but at 200+ knots you go almost 4 miles a minute, so they aren't as big as they seem, and three of them have the Rio Grande as a border, and you don't want to bust that boundary that otherwise you are in Mexico, and you have to wear a sombrero the next day.

For my dollar ride, MOA work consisted of an intro to the T-6.  My instructor demonstrated a roll and a loop, and then I got to do one. We pulled 4.5 g's, which is harder than I thought it would be and is border-lining on becoming uncomfortable.  To put it in perspective, your body weight, if you weigh 200 lbs, now feels like 1,200 lbs.  Needless to say you really feel yourself getting pushed into the seat.  Also being pushed downward is blood from your head.  This is counteracted by the g-suit inflating and your anti-g straining maneuver, in which you tense up your leg muscles and abdomen and push back against the g-suit, and breathe in an abrupt manner that I really can't describe in words.

Following area work, you will let air traffic control know you're ready to come back and you will an assigned arrival thats pretty straight forward.  There were clouds at or around my assigned altitude on my dollar ride and my flight on Friday. For my dollar ride they were perfect for "cloud chasing" where you get to fly through the contours of the clouds like they are valleys, sometimes rolling inverted and pulling to hug the "peaks" of the clouds below.  On Friday, however, I was inside the clouds and had my first exposure to real instrument flying.  It was a little disorienting, but it should get easier with time.

Once back in the pattern, we usually take a few laps and practice landings.  I think I'm starting to get the hang of it, but have to remember that I'm not flying a Cessna anymore, and pattern turns are to be done at 60 degrees of bank and 2 g's (which is more than you would think, and is enough to start inflating the g-suit), as this minimizes your time exposed during a turn.  There can be up to 12 jets in the pattern, all going 200 knots so this is important.

Following the mission will be a debrief where your instructor goes over what you did poorly/well, usually discusses an emergency procedure, and then tells you what to prepare for on the next flight.

While not flying time in the flight room is spent studying, making jalapeno popcorn, and on some other formal events.  These might include "Standup" where each student stands at attention and recites a note, warning or caution from an emergency procedure(EP) of the IP's choice (the required EP's for the day are assigned the previous day). If you get it wrong, you remain standing until the IP goes the rest of the way around the room and comes back to you.  While there are a lot of notes, warnings and cautions, the system is gamed by assigning certain ones to each student so we only have to know 2 or 3 each, 4 at most.  This makes it manageable.

Other than that I can't really think of too much more to talk about at this point.  I really should get back to reading for tomorrow's EP quiz.

A row of T-6's, with one airborne in the background.

Walking out to the jet for my dollar ride.

Over the rail check.

Putting on helmet, getting ready for first flight in the T-6.

Getting ready to fire up the engine.

Checking mask before my flight on Wednesday

Testing mask.

Hitting the Flight Line...

I haven't been very good about keeping this blog updated.  I try harder in the future...

Anyway, Phase 1 wrapped up on Friday with the weather test.  Phase 2 starts tomorrow, and that's when we start flying real planes.  Its going to be a big change from Phase 1.  Our class has been split up and assigned to Flights; B Flight and E flight.  Since my name starts with a letter in the second half of the alphabet, I was assigned to E Flight (Elvis Flight).  On Friday we met with our new flight commander and instructor pilots in what will become our new flight room.  This flight commander welcome was starkly different to the one at OTS, as it was not a show to make us feel like we did everything wrong.  Instead, I get the impression that at UPT you are treated as adults until you prove otherwise... for the most part.  We will be on a relatively short leash, and start off on formal release.  This means things will be a little more structured than Phase 1.  The days will be fairly long, and we will be required to stay in the flight rooms until we are formally released (probably 12 hours later- the AF limits duty days of pilots to 12 hours) by our flight commander.  The good news is the flight rooms seem to be fairly comfortable, with amenities such as a coffee maker and a popcorn machine (which must have fresh popcorn in it when the instructor pilots and students return from flights). If nothing else, it will afford us with plenty of time to study, especially since my phone doesn't get service in it.

I'll wait until I actually experience that, and will share more when I get around to posting again.

Like I said, we hit the flightline tomorrow.  I get to fly tomorrow for real.  Up until now we have only flown in simulators (See pictures below).  I've been told your brain works four times slower in a plane than it does on the ground, and I have experienced that in the sim. Lets hope it doesn't get any worse in a real plane.  The good news is your first flight, called a "dollar ride," is a free ride.  You can't hook (fail) it.

Below is the T-6 Texan II, the type of plane that is flown in Phase 2.  They are relatively new planes, entering service to replace the T-37 Tweet in the mid 2000's.  They have 1,100 hp turboprop engines, top out at 360 mph, are capable of -3.5 to +7.0 g's, and are very maneuverable.

Below is an OFT.  I forget what that stands for, but its the type of simulator that we use which has full visuals, almost 360 degrees.  It really gives you the sensation of flying.

This is me inside the OFT. You can tell it's the OFT because my visor is not down.

Finally, the picture below shows us in our flight room on a Sunday.  We are having what is called a "pattern party."  The carpet has a traffic pattern on it, and we are practicing "flying" it, complete with radio calls and traffic conflicts.  The military overhead traffic pattern is very different from a civilian one in that is designed to accommodate lots of planes going fast (in our case, 12 jets going 200 knots (230 mph).

UPT: Phase One, Part One: It Finally Started!

Its been a while since I last updated this blog, so this is going to be a long one. In the time since then class officially started. Undergraduate Pilot Training (UPT) Class 14-15 began on 6 September 2013. Its been over two years since I started the process of testing and applying for a pilot slot. It feels good to finally be here, and I'm still amazed at how different everything is from Officer Training School- no one's out to get you for having a loose thread on your uniform! Class 14-15 is a relatively big class; 31 students. Thirty really. One guy, Paul, is a former Army Blackhawk pilot who is getting his fixed wing qualification and has a different syllabus than the rest of us. But anyway, the class has a good mix of active duty, guard and reserve from all of the commissioning sources (AF Academy, ROTC, OTS, and AMS). The class is mostly males, but there are two women. Three of us are form the same OTS class, so it was nice to know a few guys before I even got here. I spend most of my time with one of those guys, who used to be a PJ, and the former Army balckhawk pilot. Us old guys must like to stick together. At 29, I think I'm the third oldest in the class. A vast majority of the class is around 22-24, and are recent ROTC college graduates.

 Anyway, UPT is broken into three phases. Phase 1 lasts for about six weeks and consists of mainly of academics and simulator rides. This is the phase we're in right now. Phase Two is flying T-6's, and Phase Three is flying another aircraft depending on your track select (fighters go to T-38, airlift/tankers fo to the T-1). The following website does an excellent job describing the phases of pilot training: http://baseops.net/militarypilot/ . I won't go into details about anything I haven't experienced yet. The picture below shows the three different aircraft that UPT students fly. Everyone starts off in the plane in the middle- the T-6 Texan II, a relatively new plane used by both the AF and Navy to train new pilots. From there, students will track either T-1's (left) or T-38's (right). This picture was taken on a class' graduation day (all the families were out looking at the planes)from the cafeteria/snack bar place where I tend to eat lunch. Planes on the ramp for families to look at following a class' graduation

The picture below is from the first day. This is where we were issued our publications. In here is (almost) everything we would have to learn/memorize in the next few months.

The first part of Phase One is aerospace physiology. This consists of a few things; learning about the limitations of the human body (actual physiology), basic survival (we will all go to a several week long survival school in the future, but they want us to have some basics in case we eject and are on our own for a while), and aircrew flight/life support equipment. My main takeaway from the physiology portion was that the human body and sensory systems work fine at sea level, upright, at 1 g, at walking speed. They are not good at orienting ourselves to our surroundings at conditions other than that. Evidence of this the record of about one or two fatal crashes resulting from unrecognized spatial disorientation that happen in the USAF every year where a perfectly good airplane is flown right into the ground. We also learned about the effects of altitude, culminating in our altitude chamber ride. In the chamber the pressure was pumped down to what you would experience at 25,000 feet. We then removed our masks and simple tasks like a maze, wordsearch and even reading became difficult. The scary part is it was hard to notice how limited your abilities became. Evidence of this is those F-22 crashes that occurred a few years ago because of the faulty oxygen generating systems which led to hypoxia. The pictures below are from the alititude chamber.

The last part of aerospace physiology was learning about all the crap you have to wear, what it does, how you strap into the seat, and what happens when you eject. This included PLF's (parachute landing falls). This consisted of practicing jumping with your feet together, contacting the ground in the appropriate manner. We also go to practice releasing our parachute risers while being dragged on the ground by classmates. Luck would have it that we had to do these outside on the only rainy day in Del Rio in months. It was actually sort of fun. The picture below is from the practical where the learned how to strap in and egress the T-6 cockpit. I got bored and started inflating my g-suit through the hose. Probably not a good idea since it could introduce moisture to the air bladders, but whatever...

Following aerospace physiology, and the three exams that went along with it, we began a series of aircraft systems classes. Here we learn about al the different aircraft systems, how they work, and how to operate them. These systems include things like the propulsion system, electrical system, fuel system, environmental control sustem, radio and navigation systems, etc. Most lessons are taught in the form of "computer aided instruction" where you sit in front of a computer in the computer lab and work through the lesson. Reveiws are then held with cilvilan instructors (all retired pilots) where a group of lessons are reviewed prior to a test. We had our first systems test last friday, and have our second one tomorrow. A quick note about tests; they aren't that difficult, except the passing score is an 85. Pretty much three test failures and you're out, so there is always motivation to study. The class as a whole has been doing well on them so far (I don't think anyone failed one yet), so hopefully that'll continue. 

We've also started some simulator classes with instructors. So far they have just been cockpit familiarization type lessons in cockpit familiarization trainers. Everything in them functions like the real plane, and you can fly the plane, you just cant see any visuals outside the cockpit because there's no screen. These will definately be helpful for working on checklist flows until they are like second nature. This should hopefully spare us some ridicule from the IP's (instructor pilots) when we finally hit the flight line at the end of October. The picutre below is one of those trainers.

Weekends have been spent pretty much the same way every week. A handful of us go to Lake Amistad for swimming, cliff jumping, BBQ'ing and beer drinking. Its very relaxing and fun. I imagine we'll be doing this for another month or two since most of us are from the northern part of the country, and we don't consider 80 degrees too cold to go swimming like people from Texas (or at least the lady at walmart who was ringing me up) apparently do.

Every three weeks a class has their drop night at the Officer's Club. This is where they find out their assignment when they graduate UPT. The O club is definately the place to be on these nights. I forget if its the OG commander or the wing commander, but one of them is new and wanted to continue the tradition that dates back to WWII of burning a piano on the most recent drop night. I think the tradition stems from an American squadron in Britain. One guy would always play the piano at the bar at night. One day he didn't come back from a mission, so it was instructed that the piano be burned since no one would be able to play it as well. The name of the pilot and exact location are lost to history, but its a tradition nonetheless. The picture below is from a drop night. This probably shows about 1/10th of the people in attendance- that place was really packed.

2,100 miles later...

On the 18th I left home for a 2,100 mile drive to Laughlin AFB in Del Rio, TX. I was accompanied by Alida, which was nice. We stopped in Dayton, OH, Tulsa, OK, and Austin, TX. Austin was a pretty nice city that I will definately return to. I reported in to the transition flight here on the 22nd and began inprocessing. Of course it is not going smoothly because the miliary personnel flight (MPF) at Maxwell never put in the paperwork to update me in DEERs, so the MPF here had to do it, and now I have to wait until that goes through. We went to the officers club on Friday night. It was "drop night" for class 13-14 who graduates next week, which is a party where they find out their assignments (airframe and location). It was pretty cool and I'm looking forward to many more nights at the officers club because the beer was cheap and there are no bars in Del Rio that are worth going into. We also checked out Amistad Reservoir, which is just outside of town. We found a cool place to go cliff jumping. See the pictures below. The final picture is of the Riverwalk in San Antonio. Its a pedestrian walkway right alongside a river that is in the middle of downtown. It is lined with stores and restaurants. This week I have more inprocessing stuff to do. I also have an appointment to get issued equipment and fitted for a g-suit. Other than that time is pretty much mine to spend how I need to so I'm ready to start class the following week. I'll check in again once class starts.

Dining out

I, Timothy John Nonna, having been appointed a second lieutenant in the United States Air Force...

I'm finally back in Saratoga. Commissioning was yesterday morning. My father, Pop and fraternity brother Lt. Andrew Moyer, USN, all came down. It was an honor to have my oath of office administered by Drew (the oath has to be given by an officer). Following the oath, my father and Pop pinned second lieutenant rank on the epaulets of my service coat. Overall it was a great day. Looking back on it, I really had a good experience at OTS. It was certainly not easy. The first few weeks, which consisted of 17 hour days (17 hours of doing stuff without ten minutes to relax) were tough, but worthwhile. I met a lot of good people, some of which will be in my UPT class at Laughlin. I'll keep this post pretty short. In the days and weeks leading up to OTS, I viewed it simply as a formality that I had to go through so I could start doing what I really wanted to do- fly jets. I have a different viewpoint now. They must have done a real good job at OTS because they definately got me to drink the cool aid. Now I realize that I will be an officer first, and a pilot second. This is not to be confused with having flying as a second priority; its not. You need to be one before you can become the other. Even though I'm done with OTS, things are only going to get harder. Now its time to get ready for what will probably be the most challenging year of my life- USAF undergraduate pilot training.

Apparently OTS is not over until we leave Maxwell

Last Friday the Goldhawks had a no-notice inspection by my flight commander. This was a problem because we had just been inspected by the MTIs (miitary training instructors- the guys with the "drill sergeant" hats) the previous day,AND we had to change from blues to ABUs at lunch time, so people took shortcuts and didnt really have their rooms in inspection order. Anyway, he waited for us to get back to the dorms and yell at all of us in the hall, and then proceed room by room what was wrong. After going down one side of the hallway, he said "Now for my favorite room- lets see." Myself and my two roomates knew exactly which room he was talking about. It was ours. One roommate was convinced we werent getting inspected so he left all his shit on his desk, didnt make his bed, didn't empty the trash can, etc. The counseling that happened in our room next was hilarious, and definately worth the OTMR (Officer Trainee Memorandum for Record) that went in our file. When I reported in to sign the OTMR for that, he said that there would be one more inspection- but he didn;t know who it would be- goldhawks, tigers, or hoyas. Anyway, the reason I'm telling you this story is there was another inspection by the MTIs yesterday for the upper class of all three suqadrons. Goldhawk rooms were all perfect. The same can not be said for the other two squadrons. It was so bad for the other two squadrons, in fact, that they had their privledge level knocked down from Phase four to Phase three. This means they can't wear civilian clothes any more, they have to formally report in, etc. It wasnt just bad, it was eally bad. The most ridiculous story had to do with a pizza box in a room- with pizza in it AND there was pizza crust in the toilet. I'm not sure what those people were thinking, but I can't really blame them. There is a general attitude of "not giving a fuck" at this point and most people are checking out mentally since we only have like 4 more days here and we have so much more freedom now that we have Phase Four privleges. We were reminded by the MTIs yesterday and parade practice that OTS is not over until we leave Maxwell.