Today's the day-- bye bye USAF!

fish314

fish314

Well-Known Member
So, I'm getting ready to fly my T-6 fini today and put the other bookend on a 20 year AF career (or 24 years if you count the academy). And of course I can't sleep wondering what I'm going to say at my retirement ceremony, and just excited about my last flight in the Air Force. I've done literally thousands of Air Force sorties, (just over 1800 in the T-6 and T-37 alone, but who's counting), but somehow the last one hits you right in the "feels."

It's been a great ride, and I've loved every minute (well, MOST of them, at any rate). So anyone wanna take bets on the over/under of me tearing up at the retirement ceremony when I'm supposed to be thanking everyone for coming? The smart money is on "over" since I'm tearing up just writing this post!
 
Congrats on a great career. Welcome to civi life! I only did 9 years and I almost teared up during my little speech to my last command, so get the tissues ready...
 
fish314 said:
. So anyone wanna take bets on the over/under of me tearing up at the retirement ceremony when I'm supposed to be thanking everyone for coming?
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Won’t even bet on it. I did at mine; it’s an emotional day.

I almost forgot to thank my wife for putting up with the AF throughout my career and and missing too many things.

You can forget everything else. You can’t forget that.
 
Thanks for the congratulations, everyone! And for those who were betting, I did ok. My eyes watered a little during the ceremony, but no tears and sniffling... until my thank-you speech. Then one quick pause, sniffle, and the rest of the speech was smooth sailing. But I'm sure I forgot to thank some folks who deserved thanking...

But I thanked my wife first! Didn't want to miss the most important one after @TC_ABM 's story. Good advice!
 
Congrats. Always nice to be done and close one book.

How many years did you end up staying in AETC, as im guessing you did multiple IP tours? Or were you a PIT IP too?
 
MikeD said:
Congrats. Always nice to be done and close one book.

How many years did you end up staying in AETC, as im guessing you did multiple IP tours? Or were you a PIT IP too?
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My track was USAFA, pilot training at DLF, 135s to MCF and then RODN, T37s at CBM which turned into T6s halfway thru, back to 135s at IAB, and then finished with a 4 1/2 year stint teaching T6 PIT.

Pretty good run all things considered! No pentagon, no staff tour... but no O-5 either. So 4 1/2 years of T6s was a more than fair trade for no promotion and I finished off happy. Total was about 8 years of AETC not counting my UPT. But it makes up a little more than 1/2 my flying hours even though it's a little less than half the years because of how often you can fly vs. AMC.
 
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