F16 - MOA Operations

[fish314]

Max, fish is a UPT Instructor Pilot. He'll end up probably going back to the tanker world when he finishes this AETC tour.

That's right. I'm the instructor, but I came up through the heavy side, which means that I won't ever go to a fighter (although I've had some incentive rides in an F-15 and a T-38).

Actually, after this tour, I'm probably destined to fly a desk for about 3 years. After that, I'll probably be back to the tanker.

 

[granlistillo]

Something stinks here. The avweb article says that he did no wrong. So why the reprimand?

AOPAs article:

"The F-16 pilot, based out of Luke Air Force Base, was reprimanded. Luke officials have told AOPA that they will alter their local training program to avoid this type of encounter in the future."

uh, the word "reprimand" may be misused here, or may not.

UIF? punitive letter? "letter of reprimand"? arse chewing from the old man?

These are not things that are done to an officer on a whim. If he was officially reprimanded, then he did something wrong.

Seems that the public affairs people screwed this up. Either
1. he was in the right and should not be reprimanded
or
2. he joined up on this guy and the AF public affairs guy just told a big stinking lie to the public.

The discrepency is odd, and I would lean toward scenario 2. The AF was sugar coating an individuals poor decision making in a big CYA maneuver.

If he was 500 ft away from the plane then I retract my statements.

 

[Hacker15e]

uh, the word "reprimand" may be misused here, or may not.

UIF? punitive letter? "letter of reprimand"? arse chewing from the old man?

These are not things that are done to an officer on a whim. If he was officially reprimanded, then he did something wrong.

My bet is that there was nothing on paper for the Viper pilot. Probably a YFG speech in the Wing CC's office telling him that there was no reason to go actually intercept the civil aircraft and admonishing him for creating a situation where the AF looks bad, even if nothing illegal occured. As such, the "reprimand" is not an acknowledgement that something against the rules happened.

This satisfies the public that leadership acknowledged that the situation wasn't satisfactory, and showed that they took action based on that fact. For the pilot, it won't result in any career-busting long term effects, reflecting the fact that he didn't actually break any rules.