The mentality of flying a fighter...

[CALL911]

I've got two buddies in IFF right now (Intro to Fighter Fundamentals). Its a program you go to after you graduate pilot training if you are going to be flying something that potentially has the capability to shoot down other aircraft. It's basically where you learn the basics of air to air combat.

One of my buddies sent me this vid to give me an idea of how nutz/funny some of these instructors are in IFF. I spent an hour last night laughing over and over at it. Perhaps its more funny to me since I am a pilot, and a recent graduate, and the experience of flying with an screaming instructor behind me in the plane is still fresh.

Let me know what you think


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQORXWmGMGk

[Z28pr0jekt]

lol I enjoyed it

[Toronto_LT1]

hahah, hilarious. what kind of plane is the bogey?

[Fastbird]

That was HYSTERICAL!!!!!!! Nate sent this to you I'm guessing?

[Ricehammer]

THAT looks like FUN!

[CALL911]

hahah, hilarious. what kind of plane is the bogey?

The bogey is the same as the aircraft flying. All of them are the T-38.
http://i48.tinypic.com/2zf3l0p.jpg


That was HYSTERICAL!!!!!!! Nate sent this to you I'm guessing?

Actually no. It was sent to me from my buddy at Vance who was my OTS roomate (and still good friend) who is at IFF at Vance right now. Coincidentally he is also going to fly the A-10 like Nate, but my buddy at Vance is an A-10 Reservist from Barksdale. I sent the video to Nate (who should have just started the IFF program at Columbus), but haven't heard his reaction to it yet.

[Neil350]

Thats pretty funny, how do they come up with the call signs? Being a fighter pilot has got to be one of the coolest jobs ever.

[CALL911]

Thats pretty funny, how do they come up with the call signs? Being a fighter pilot has got to be one of the coolest jobs ever.

Callsigns are given to you at different periods during your career. There are some given in pilot training. Fighter pilots give their newbies callsigns upon entering their squadron. Heavy pilots don't really get callsigns, or if they do, its more of a nickname, not something placarded on the side of the jet.

I would agree that PILOT would be one of the coolest jobs ever, and go conclude that it would also be cool to be a fighter pilot. However, what most don't realize about becoming a fighter pilot is that its not all just going fast and blowing shit up. What you don't see is that the real life of a fighter pilot can actually suck. Fighter pilots usually wake up extrodinarily early to mission plan for a good 5 hours straight. Getting everything from weather, tactics, weapons employment, formation, flight plan, coordination with other units and centers, and much much more all laid out perfectly, all to go fly and have fun for about an hour on average (more in actual combat), all to get back on the ground and debreif over absolutely every last detail of the mission, from takeoff, to "at 6 minutes 28 seconds into the flight, the #2 aircraft seemed to be out of position by 5-6 feet for a good 15 seconds. What the hell were you thinking #2?!". They love to get on one anothers case and treat everything as a competition to one another. And the debriefs last longer than the mission planning did. Making the day a solid 12 hours mostly of pain in the ass work. Having done mostly this life for the last year and some change, let me tell you, this kind of perfection and planning and briefing is enough to make you want to stab something sharp into your eye just to make it all stop. But wait! Theres more! Not only do they do this on a regular basis, but they usually only fly around their specific base, unless maybe once a year they might go for a training excercise somewhere like Nellis for Red Flag. Then they usually will deploy at some point in time to some place very miserable, and then eventually come back home. And not all of the flying is awesome as it looks. Let me tell you from experience that pulling G's is painfull. You fit into a G suit that wraps so damn tightly around you, that you can barely walk to the jet, then when it actually inflates under pulling G's in the plane it squezes the sh*t out of you, but thats actually good becuase the blood is being forced into your legs and feet and without straining yourself and the G suit, you would black out, and if the blood doesn't return in enough time to your brain, you will die.

Next you have the life of a heavy pilot (like me :D). Life is extremly laid back. We don't have to plan much of anything (someone else does it for us). We show up a few hours till takeoff just to go over the basics. We sit in an actual comfortable aircraft where you have an actual bathroom and oven to cook food, and even bunks to sleep in, and plenty of standing room to get up and stretch your legs during the flight. We get to fly for much longer periods of time (more fun time), and when we fly, we usually get to travel all over the world going places fighter pilots could only dream of as they just don't get to travel like we do. In four years of flying around in a KC-10 (I was a boom operator before I became a pilot), I got to go all over South America, Asia, Europe, Africa, Australia, pretty much every continent other than Antartica, all while usually staying in 5 star hotels and collecting a ton of extra pay for it. When we deploy, we usually end up at much better places than the fighter guys (my last deployment I lived in a dorm not a tent, had an olympic sized swimming pool, a movie theatre, a gym, even a place to play pool and darts, and video games. When we do land, we pretty much debrief the sortie on the bus ride from the plane to the squadron, and then we just go home.

It may seem like the fighter pilot is the best job in the world, but trust me, the best job is actually to become a heavy (tanker, cargo) pilot. :cool:

[Fixxer99TA]

Hahahah!

"KILL THAT MOTHER****ER"!

"I'm trying!"

[Neil350]

It seems like a fighter pilot would be high stress, makes sense though. My brother was military, a lot of the jobs you almost have to have a certain type personality to do them. Being a heavy pilot, would that make for an easy transition to flying comercial stuff?

[tomsws6]

"He's out in front He's out in front now kill that mother F#cker!!!!!!!!!!" omg I cant stop cryin !:laugh::cry::laugh:

[CALL911]

I just watched it yet again :laugh:

[BLK95-Z]

That's hilarious lol I would have thought that kind of training to be all business, it's ccol some of it is fun.

Does anyone ever radio the tower and request a fly bye? :D

[CALL911]

That's hilarious lol I would have thought that kind of training to be all business, it's ccol some of it is fun.

Does anyone ever radio the tower and request a fly bye? :D

The only fun you are allowed to have, is via permission of the IP (instructor pilot). In this particular case, the IP was having fun via the student, but as the student in this situation, it was probably a little fun for him as well.

It's simple. In pilot training, you get :owned:.

Everything is expected of you. No mistakes are permissable, and if there is anything that goes wrong, you are to blame. If you even thought about doing something silly like requesting a flyby from tower, it would be the last thought that would go through your mind while in the cockpit, because that would be the end of your student pilot career right there. Just as Viper stated in Top Gun, "The rules are there for your safety. They are not flexable, nor am I". They have an absolute zero tolerance for anything like that. Theres plenty of fun to be had just flying by the rules though. I am sure past the screaming IP in the back seat that the flying portion IFF is probably fun.

Back when I was in pilot training flying solo (with no IP in the back) we would get a chance to go out to the MOA (Military Operating Area), which is basically a big area of airspace you are assigned to go out and practice or fly whatever you want to (inside the aircrafts limits) until you reach your BINGO fuel and you need to return to base. You'd get to go as fast as you want, as much aerobatics that you would want, or even just get to cruise around and have fun.