Continued failure to place the correct lunch order at Chennault...

To be fair, I am certain that I would have made a horrible T-38 pilot.

 

Well that is an easy one isn't it? Red beans with rice and sausage isn't it?
Of course it stays with you for the next 3-4 hours too! Or is it shrimp Po'Boy?
Now I'm confused!

USMCFLYR

 

In my pipeline of training the highest washout rate was in the T-41. We lost almost 25% in a 5 week class. UPT and RTU came nowhere close to that added together over the next two years.

The washout rate has nothing to do with how challenging the airplane is to fly, but how challenging the instructors/evaluators make the course to pass, then filtered by how much leverage or willpower leadership has to actually enforce those standards.

I was an F-16 instructor for a million years (no kidding, one million) and more than one kid who snuck through because we'd already washed out one or two and we didn't have the backing of upper echelons to wash out another. It was considered our fault for not being able to train them.

F-16 RTU is in my opinion is more technically oriented now than it was 10-25 years ago with a lot more missions to cover. The kids we get are for the most part, pretty smart. But the mission has gotten much safer (medium altitude, less visual a/a, smaller formation scenarios, no nuclear mission, IAMs vs blue bombs) and that's covered for the weak swimmers.

 

If I had to guess, I will say the AF will be back to single track pilot training with the T-X (T-38 replacement). The numbers of fighters we are not buying in the future does not justify buying a 20-30 million dollar jet (T-50, T-100), for the 8 guys, who track select fighter track, for 3-4 dudes to get a fighter at the end of UPT. The T-1 did a great job of extending the life of the T-38, by having fewer people fly the T-38. The T-1 has been put through what no corporate jet could ever imagine in its life cycle. By the time the T-X is on property, the T-1s will be at the end of their usefulness. Economy of scale will drive the AF back to single track training. Bottom feeding catfish will be gone between solo and the first contact/transition check just like in legacy UPT before the T-1 was unleashed at Reese on class 93-12.

 

Navy used to be the same way WRT carrier qualifications. You had to prove you could land on the boat, then you went on to your specific pipeline.

 

TWICE!
You say "used to be the same way".
Has something changed? It sounds like you are saying that CQ isn't part of the process.

USMCFLYR

 

No, I mean WAY back in the day. When everyone CQ'd first then went on to their pipeline. Helo, TACAIR whatever, everyone was a tailhooker first.

 

This. Washouts have mostly to do with the flavor of the day regarding the willingness to wash someone out, not the airplane used for training.

I agree there will be a single track, but it will probably be a RPA track.

 

I know from my experience, 26+ yrs (141's-C-17's) the new pilots we send to UPT are much better qualified than the studs I went through with in 1986-87. I'm in the Reserves so we can be picky, but it seems that nowadays the AF is much more selective on who we send to UPT and then trying to insure these "highly qualified" candidates graduate UPT, whereas when I went through they let more guys/gals into the program and TRIED to wash-out as many as possible. My class was hit hard, more than a 60% wash-out rate and we were'nt an abberation at the time, started with over 60 students and graduated around 24. Some of the younger pilots entering my unit tell me they started with 25 and graduated 23, one said Nobody washed out of their class! hell we washed out about one stud every 10 days. I do believe that the T-38 was an equalizer and am eternally grateful I got to fly such a machine, but the T-1 has produced some exceptional pilots from my perspective.

 

Agree 100%. The reason guys in the T-38 track currently get non-fighters is because the Air Force needs bodies to fill the seats---otherwise, Congress would make them shutdown all but one or two T-38 squadrons.