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.