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Seems like the Air Force is trapped in a vicious underhiring/overhiring cycle. When I was in college I did Air Force ROTC. A lot of my peers had pilot slots; I

• nabla9 8y ago
  > had pollen allergies on a form and was instantly disqualified (like you would ever be breathing pollen at altitude). Any form of rhinitis (nose irritation or inflammation) after age 12 is disqualifying (allergic, nonallergic or vasomotor). The reason for this is because anyone who has rhinitis has higher risk of getting the reaction at least sometimes from changes of humidity, barometric pressure, irritants like chemicals, dust, stress, etc. Having runny nose or puffed eyes is no-go for fighter pilot in a breathing mask. Spending millions to train someone who has a change of not being able to fly is not a good investment. It's the same for the eyes. They estimate how the eye conditions develop for the rest of the career. Small things that don't matter now can become problematic later.
• fbelzile 8y ago
  Canadian Air Force, but same issues with the overly stringent medical requirements. A minor form of scoliosis disqualified me from ever using an ejection seat. Although I wanted to fly transport planes, the training required the use of an aircraft with ejection seats.
  • 52-6F-62 8y ago
    Eyesight for me. Didn't join, but part of me still wishes I'd joined anyway and had them pay for school. Now I learn they actually started allowing laser surgery corrected vision some time ago. C'est la vie.
• jcurbo 8y ago
  Yes, this has been a thing forever. (Former 33S/17D here) I went through two separate instances of reductions in force (aka "force shaping") - 2006 and 2010 - but there were others as well. (I chose to separate in 2010) They believed they brought too many officers on board in the 2001-2004 timeframe and were looking to trim down, especially because of budget cuts. I remember hearing about your situation as well (letting ROTC accessions off the hook). Yet the USAF periodically seems to cycle through "we have too many"/"we are way short" phases and this has now come back to bite them for their most critical asset, pilots. (Cyber retention is an issue as well - how do you keep them from getting out and working as contractors? The incentives don't line up)
• tyingq 8y ago
  That's interesting. I'm curious how much of your college costs that ROTC participation covered. Just tuition, or housing too, or also a stipend?
  • vonmoltke 8y ago
    When I was accepted into the Army's ROTC program in 1998 (which I ended up declining), they were willing to pay up to $14,500 per year. I assume the other programs were about the same.
    • tyingq 8y ago
      Sure, I ask because some programs, like the Navy uses for nuclear engineers, offer a much higher number. I'm somewhat curious how much the US government gives away due to poor planning, where the candidate is released because there's no spot for them at the end.
  • alexhutcheson 8y ago
    Currently, ROTC cadets who are offered a scholarship (not all are), receive: 1) Full tuition and fees OR $10k/year to cover room and board. Cadet chooses. I'd expect at most schools the tuition+fees is worth more, but some cadets have other scholarships that might cover all or part of tuition. 2) $1200/year for textbooks 3) $300-$500/month (depending on year) living stipend
    • alexhutcheson 8y ago
      Actually it looks like the Air Force offers scholarships in 3 tiers: https://www.afrotc.com/scholarships/high-school/types/ https://www.afrotc.com/scholarships/high-school/types/ In addition to the offer I described above, it looks like a "Type 2" scholarship is the same, but with tuition+fees capped at $18k/year, and "Type 3" is the same, but with tuition+fee capped at the in-state rate at a public university.
      • jl2718 8y ago
• DiffEq 8y ago
  And...there is the other end. My brother is a pilot and was retired by the Air Force because he had been in so long...so out he goes. Now he is a contractor flying drones for them getting paid 3x as much while drawing a hefty retirement. My brother loved the Air Force and wanted to stay...now he gets to stay and get paid a boat load more. Air Force brass not very smart.
  • chrisseaton 8y ago
    > Now he is a contractor flying drones for them getting paid 3x as much while drawing a hefty retirement. Contracting him could easily still be cheaper than having him still be in.
    • tomohawk 8y ago
      Not in this case. He's already going to get retirement benefits. Now, he's being payed a lot more, and part of that pay is for an additional retirement benefit. Contracting is really for short term needs. You pay short term wages (which bundle in insurance, retirement, profit, etc) for contractors. However, if the organization will continue to have that same need for several years, then paying people short term wages for that long is very expensive.
      • fatbird 8y ago
        But now he doesn't fly planes, which saves them a lot of money, and I doubt he'd have voluntarily transitioned within service from jets to drones, no?
        • jessaustin 8y ago
          ,,,voluntarily transitioned within service... My impression is that very little about the military is voluntary. If they need pilots to fly different craft, the pilots will fly different craft.
          • chrisseaton 8y ago
• chrisseaton 8y ago
  > looking for people to voluntarily leave with no commitment/obligation - seemed like a good deal How’s that a good deal? Presumably you wanted to join and now that’s something you’d never get to do?
  • wefarrell 8y ago
    The key word being voluntarily. If they really wanted to join for the sake of joining they weren't going to be forced out. Otherwise you get free college (worth up to 200K in the US) for a small amount of weekly training. That's an insanely good deal.
  • whorleater 8y ago
    ROTC paid him for some amount of college without him ever needing to join.
  • deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  • kelnos 8y ago
    The deal is that when you join ROTC, the military agrees to pay a certain amount of your your college costs (depending on scholarship, could be most of it), and in return, you agree to a certain number of years of service. Even if OP did really want to be in the Air Force, having an obligation washed away like that with no penalty sounds like a pretty good deal.
• WalterBright 8y ago
  Hay fever causes problems with wearing the oxygen mask. Edit: Downvote me if you like, but that's the reason I was given when I asked an Air Force pilot.
  • umvi 8y ago
    Aren't you breathing super pure oxygen/nitrogen mixture in a fighter jet?
    • souprock 8y ago
      I believe the F-22 uses air that is oxygen-enriched by a mechanical device that does some sort of filtering/diffusion process. Picture this: It's time to go fly. The alarm is going off, and you need to get in your jet. Boogers are streaming down your face, and you are experiencing sneezing fits that have you bent over with your eyes closing and tearing up. You can put on a mask with nice clean air, but it'll take an hour before you are in condition to fly. Sitting there on the runway waiting for your allergies to stop acting up is not acceptable.
      • WalterBright 8y ago
        I wouldn't want to be dealing with itchy eyes and sneezing when I need my full attention managing the airplane in combat. The hay fever drugs make one dizzy (and it says on the label to not take them when operating machinery). (I have hay fever. One nice thing about getting older is my hay fever symptoms have steadily declined. They were rather bad when I was fighter pilot age.) You'll also need a HEPA filter to filter out pollen, just a dust filter won't do it.
      • umvi 8y ago
        Not all allergies are like that. I would wager the vast majority are pretty mild symptoms easily treatable with anti-histamines. I myself have allergies, but I never even notice because the air at work is filtered and I'm not outside long enough for symptoms to manifest as I travel to and from my car. Maybe the case could be made for fighter pilots (though I still think it's a non-issue for 99% of people with seasonal allergies), but what's the excuse for disqualifying for all aircraft? Airline pilots can have allergies and fly. How is that much different from a heavy cargo plane?
• Jtsummers 8y ago
  If this was around 10 or so years ago, my understanding for the stricter pilot requirements was that same glut of recruits. The Air Force flip-flops on how strict or lax they are on some of those based on the need for pilots at any given time. When there's a deficit, suddenly someone with 20/70 vision can get a slot as a heavy (cargo or bomber) pilot, but when there's a glut they want everyone to have 20/20 vision. It's an arbitrary discriminator because they don't have more effective methods.
  • closetohome 8y ago
    And the long-term consequence of that is that even if they relax the requirements later, a large number of people who might have considered it as a career simply wrote it off. I know that's what happened with me. I heard nothing but nightmare stories about how hard it was to get a pilot slot, so I let that go and went to college instead.
• drharby 8y ago
  Yea afpc decision making is always short term 3year scale thinking with real consequences rarely analyzed, just number crunching whether or not current training pipelines are optimized for minimal idle time of trainees. When a t34 rudder issue it a fleet in the navy pipeline, numbers for 92T slots dropped accordingly, so the marker for pilot qualification is as much luck as it is merit