That’s the question an upcoming study from the University of Texas at Arlington aims to find out. The yearlong, $200,000 study, funded through the Department of Defense via a sub-grant, will use virtual reality simulations to track aspects of observation and recall in subjects with and without navigation aids.

Steven Weisberg and Hunter Ball, associate professors of psychology at the university and the leaders of the study, said findings could help inform the design of computer interfaces and even guide personnel assignments in a unit, based on how much technological support troops need and how their brains respond to it.

“If you’re fostering a scenario in which people are overrelying on things, they might not be able to use their own cognition when the time comes for them to do so, and so we want to identify … the specific design features that help out with that,” Ball said. “We also want to identify — more long-term — individual differences. If I’m someone who has really low cognitive ability, I might always be relying on that external [guidance] source, and that’s going to be really good for me, but I’m going to suffer really bad whenever that goes down.”

Ball continued that if commanders have a sense of troops’ cognitive abilities in these areas, they can make more effective role assignments.

While overtly ranking troops by cognitive performance seems a little far-fetched, performance on the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery prior to entering military training does help determine what jobs troops are eligible for.

It’s plausible that a new test during the physical and academic evaluation process could assess how troops interact with technological aids and gain job-assignment insights from that.

For the study, which kicks off Aug. 1, undergraduate volunteers will be asked to navigate a small city using a combination of desktop and head-mounted virtual reality.

“We’re using that environment to see how well people can remember routes and buildings and landmarks while they have access to certain kinds of navigation support,” Weisberg said. “And then we viciously take it away from them.”

Researchers will then collect behavioral data, including how well the subjects under different guidance conditions remember routes and other environmental features. They’ll also capture eye-tracking data, Weisberg said, showing what they’re spending the most time observing and absorbing.

As a side benefit, the researchers expect the study to help demonstrate the value of behavioral research in virtual reality, which may also have implications for how the military employs VR simulators and training aids.

“We can apply this into these more in-depth and applied settings. We can do the real-world training, we can have soldiers go through this training with the virtual headsets and navigating in these environments and understanding what things might actually look like,” Ball said. “But we have to first understand what are the cognitive mechanisms under there, and that’s what we’re trying to figure out at this point.”

The study will run through next year, with a complete write-up of findings delivered by next summer. The researchers are hopeful they can land a follow-on grant, which they say would help, among other things, observe how teams interact as they monitor a wide range of data sources and screens, and dig deeper into collected eye-tracking data to learn about what information troops retain and remember based on what they observe.

Founder and CEO Brenden Borrowman is a retired Army veteran who was medically evacuated after being wounded in Afghanistan in 2011. During his recovery and time in a Warrior Transition Battalion, he was surrounded by service members dealing with post-traumatic stress, traumatic brain injury, addiction and suicidal ideation.

After leaving the military, Borrowman lost friend after friend to suicide and became convinced that existing treatment models were missing something fundamental.

“What I saw was that these guys could function at an incredibly high level overseas,” Borrowman, who earned a PhD in Philosophy and is currently working on a PhD in Neurology, told Military Times. “But when they got home and were alone with their thoughts, everything fell apart. That told me there was a physical injury component we were not addressing.”

Borrowman spent years researching the process by which blood flow and oxygen delivery support brain function. His work led to the founding of Neurova Labs, a software company focused on treating what he describes as a physiological injury underlying conditions like PTSD and traumatic brain injury.

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Instead of relying on traditional talk therapy or exposure-based models, Neurova Labs uses immersive virtual reality gameplay to influence how the brain regulates blood flow under stress.

The system runs on a commercially available virtual reality headset paired with Neurova’s proprietary software. Users enter a fast-paced, first-person environment designed to alternate between heightened stimulation and controlled calming states. According to Borrowman, the goal is not entertainment for its own sake, but to force the brain to rebalance how it allocates resources while the body is under pressure.

“We are not therapists,” Borrowman said. “We are not here to give closure on trauma. We are here to heal the injury so the brain can function properly again. Everything else works better when the foundation is solid.”

That foundation has resonated with veterans who have spent years cycling through medications, therapy appointments and coping strategies without lasting relief.

Ladd Sheppard, a retired Marine Corps lieutenant colonel who served more than two decades with deployments to Iraq, Afghanistan, Africa and the Middle East, first encountered Neurova Labs through professional work before becoming a user himself. Sheppard lives with PTSD and traumatic brain injury and relies on a service dog to navigate daily life.

During an early demonstration, Sheppard noticed something unusual before anyone explained the science.

“My service dog was losing her mind at first,” Sheppard said. “She was circling me, trying to interrupt, trying to calm me down. About fifteen minutes in, she laid down in the middle of a room full of strangers and fell asleep. That was my first clue that something real was happening.”

Sheppard went on to complete a four-day protocol after years of therapy, medication and adaptive strategies. The change, he said, was immediate and tangible.

“Before, when my kids pushed my buttons, my response was rage,” Sheppard said. “Four days later, I actually stopped and thought, should I yell or should I teach. That pause did not exist before. I had done years of work and never got that pause.”

He deliberately waited weeks before repeating the experience to see if the effect would fade. It did not. When stress builds now, Sheppard uses the system as needed rather than as a constant intervention.

“It reset my brain,” he said. “That is not marketing language. That is what it felt like.”

Similar experiences have emerged outside the veteran community, particularly among first responders who face repeated trauma over long careers.

Scott Stemmer, a Marine Corps veteran who served during Operation Iraqi Freedom and now works as a firefighter paramedic with Las Vegas Fire and Rescue, joined a Neurova Labs study earlier this year. Stemmer has dealt with PTSD for nearly two decades and previously sought help through the Department of Veterans Affairs, where he said treatment often meant heavy medication and little follow-up.

“I basically gave up hope that anything would actually work,” Stemmer said. “Sleep was terrible. Nightmares were constant. Irritability was through the roof.”

After four consecutive days using the VR system, Stemmer noticed changes he had not experienced since before military service.

“For the first time, when my head hit the pillow, I went to sleep,” he said. “My wife noticed before I did. No twitching. No yelling. And when I got called out at work in the middle of the night, I could come back and actually fall asleep again.”

When life interrupted his routine and he stopped using the headset for several weeks, the symptoms returned. Restarting the sessions brought relief again, reinforcing for him that the change was not a coincidence.

“This is the first PTSD related treatment I have ever done that felt tangible,” Stemmer said. “You can see it in how you feel, how you act, and even in clinical markers. That matters to people like us who have been burned before.”

Borrowman emphasizes that Neurova Labs is not positioned as a cure or replacement for therapy. Instead, he views it as a way to make other forms of care more effective by restoring basic neurological function.

“If the brain is stuck in survival mode, you cannot think your way out of it,” he said. “You would never send someone with a broken leg straight to physical therapy and expect them to run. You fix the injury first.”

The company has tested its technology with veterans, first responders, athletes, international partners and even with soldiers on the front line in Ukraine. Neurova Labs is also expanding into non-combat applications through partnerships with organizations like the YMCA and professional sports groups, including the UFC.

Privacy concerns, particularly among veterans wary of data misuse, are addressed by a deliberate design choice. According to Borrowman, the system does not collect personally identifiable information during normal use and can operate entirely offline, reducing the risk of data exposure.

For users like Sheppard and Stemmer, the appeal is not the technology itself but what it gives back.

“I can finally think,” Sheppard said. “Not just react.”

Stemmer echoed that sentiment, especially when talking about younger service members and firefighters he mentors.

“This gives people a chance to slow down before they hit the breaking point,” he said. “That matters.”

For veterans and first responders who have grown skeptical of new treatments after years of false starts, Neurova Labs does not promise miracles. What it offers, according to those who have used it, is something far rarer. A moment of quiet in a brain that has been stuck on high alert for years, and a chance to rebuild from there.

Neurova Labs is preparing for broader commercial availability while continuing research and pilot programs. More information about the company and its approach is available at https://neurovalabs.com.

Training, which will be conducted at bases in the continental United States, includes instruction in a variety of combat and non-combat missions, and using numerous types of demilitarized or commercially derived aircraft, according to the RFI.

The Air Force Security Assistance Training Squadron, as part Air Education Training Command, trains more than 9,000 students annually from 142 nations under the Foreign Military Sales program. The RFI is aimed at assessing what capabilities industry can provide for this work.

The RFI specifies training foreign pilots from among a menu of nine types of missions: combat support and light attack; reconnaissance and observation; intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance; search and rescue; maritime patrol; electronic warfare; medical evacuation; transport and airlift; and VIP transport.

The Air Force envisions a comprehensive curriculum that includes pilot and crew training in “basic flight skills, advanced combat maneuvers, mission planning, and execution tailored to the specific requirements of each aircraft and operational environment.” This will be accompanied by support training in communications, intelligence analysis and logistics.

Training will be provided through classroom instruction and electronic courseware, including interactive simulation and virtual reality systems. In addition, contractors will also provide simulator training in practicing emergency procedures and mission rehearsals.

The Air Force already trains foreign pilots on advanced aircraft such as the F-15, F-16 and F-35. However, the long list of potential military and civilian aircraft types — manufactured by multiple nations — in the RFI consists of older and simpler aircraft of the kind that might be found in less developed parts of the world.

The list includes jet and prop trainers such as the T-38, L-39, AT/T-6 and PC-9, and civil aviation models such as the C-172. Contractors must also be prepared to handle a wide range of cargo and passenger aircraft, including lighter types such as the C-208 and C-145, medium types such as C-26 and KA-350, and larger models such as the C-212 and C-130.

Training aircraft may involve business jets such as the Lear Jet, C-500 and Gulfstream, as well as the bigger passenger jets such as the Boeing 707 and 737. Potential helicopters include the MD500, UH-1, S-70 and Mi-17.

Training will have to meet international flight regulations and Federal Aviation Administration flight rules. Instruction will be at the industry partner’s facilities, utilizing their aircraft and infrastructure, said the RFI.

Companies will be asked to describe their “methodologies for pilot and crew training, the use of high-fidelity simulators, academic training delivery methods, maintenance and technical training procedures, and aircrew and operations support training,” the RFI said. “Discuss any innovative solutions or emerging technologies your company employs to enhance training effectiveness.”

Not surprisingly, the Air Force wants companies that know how to work with international students. Bidders will be asked to describe their “experience in addressing cultural considerations and the specific operational requirements of partner nations under the [Foreign Military Sales] program.”

Given the menagerie of U.S.- and foreign-made aircraft involved, contractors must be capable of maintaining planes under difficult conditions. Bidders must show they “understand the current market landscape and capabilities of potential suppliers to meet the unique needs” of international partners under the Foreign Military Sales program, the RFI noted.

The deadline for the RFI is March 4.

Since 2023, the Museum and Memorial “has been carrying out a multi-year upgrade plan, the most expansive changes to the buildings and grounds since opening in 2006,” according to its landing page.

The modifications, the announcement continued, “will not only see upgrades in technology to tell new and interesting narratives from WWI, they will create a richer and more immersive visitor experience.”

Opening over Memorial Day weekend, the museum’s latest exhibit, “Encounters,” will take viewers through the lives of 16 individuals that include: Allied and Central Power combat soldiers; British colonial Indian soldiers; women working in munitions factories; and dissenters arrested and tried for anti-war stances.

Crafted from diaries, letters and photos, “Encounters” includes state-of-the-art media displays that will feature 1.25 mm Pixel Pitch LED Display technology from Nanolumens — the first installation of its kind in a museum in the U.S.

The museum aims for “Encounters” to go beyond the simple showcasing of artifacts and historical data. Delving into more than troop movements and the number of rivets on a Sopwith Triplane, the installation aims to fully engage its visitors visually and audibly on “a deeply emotional level, focusing on the human side of the war through the stories of individuals who lived it,” according to a museum press release.

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This isn’t the museum’s first foray into immersing cutting edge technology and meshing it with the past.

In 2021, the National WWI Museum debuted its impressive virtual reality experience, “War Remains,” which allowed visitors to take a trip through time to the battlefields of World War I. The initiative was designed for viewers to feel — as much as possible — the true trench experience.

“We wanted to simulate what it was like to lose your hearing to an explosion,” director Brandon Oldenburg told Military Times in 2021. “Skywalker sound does an amazing job of putting ringing in your ears. You feel it, but you can’t hear it. … I think it makes a lasting memory of what it was like even though it is not even coming close to the real thing. You can walk out alive [and] unscathed.”

Now, the museum is once again leading the way when it comes to what museums of the present can and should be, with “stations” boasting recreated virtual scenes from the front lines, the home front and military hospitals replete with interactive soundscape technology found in just one other space in the U.S. — the Las Vegas Sphere.

According to the press release, “the spatial audio used in this exhibit creates a 360-degree sound environment, making it feel as if the voices, sounds, and stories are unfolding around visitors in real time.”

Despite more than a century separating museum-goers from the war’s end, the lives of the ordinary man and woman caught up in this titanic clash will once again be seen — and felt — like never before.

Renovations at the National WWI Museum and Memorial will continue through 2025.

“Encounters” opens Memorial Day weekend, 2025.

It was something I had done a dozen times before, but in a flash I was on my back, ears ringing, lungs full of dust.

The blast knocked me out cold. When I came to, nothing was where it had been. The explosion left me with a traumatic brain injury and partial deafness in my right ear, with tinnitus that still rings to this day. I deal with memory loss, light sensitivity and sudden moments of confusion or panic that attack without warning.

So, when the possibility to test a virtual reality therapy program developed by Neurova Labs became available, I took it — not as a paid endorsement or promotional experiment, but as a disabled veteran looking for something that might actually help. I went into the process cautiously. PTSD and traumatic brain injuries do not present the same way for everyone, and there is no universal solution.

I am not a medical professional nor can I explain the underlying science in clinical terms. What I can offer here is a firsthand account of what this three week experience looked like and what, if anything, changed.

The therapy, first launched in 2024, follows a structured but approachable format. The program is designed as a three-week regimen, with two active weeks of VR sessions conducted four days per week.

Each session lasts between 45 minutes to an hour. Every session begins with a warm-up using a commercially available application that emphasizes fast-paced interaction with a virtual pistol. It is engaging and requires focus, coordination and quick reactions.

That warm-up is followed by the core Neurova Labs environment, which centers on a target practice-style scenario. Each session includes five rounds, roughly lasting five minutes apiece. The pace is steady and immersive, requiring sustained attention without becoming overwhelming.

The session ends with a cooldown phase that is intentionally slower and more abstract. This final segment uses calming sounds, soft music and shifting colors, with only limited interaction. The goal is clearly to bring the body down from heightened alertness into a calmer state.

I was skeptical going in, particularly about whether something so technology-driven could meaningfully impact symptoms rooted in trauma. What surprised me most was how quickly I noticed the changes, starting with my sleep regimen.

Before starting the program, I routinely woke up very early in the morning, often around 4 or 4:30 a.m., and struggled to fall back asleep. By the second week of therapy, I was sleeping later and more consistently, often until around 8:30 a.m.

The time it took me to fall asleep also shortened. That alone had a noticeable effect on my mood and energy throughout the day.

Sleep was not the only area where I saw improvement. Over the course of the three weeks, I noticed a shift in how I reacted to stress. As a freelance writer and creative, my work involves deadlines, travel and uncertainty. Combined with the broader stress of daily life, it is easy to slip into a constant state of anxiety.

During this period, I found that my fight or flight response did not take over as quickly, and when it did, I was able to step out of it faster than before. The stress was still there, but it felt more manageable.

That distinction matters.

For many people with PTSD, the challenge is not avoiding stress altogether, but shortening the amount of time the body stays stuck in a heightened state. Being able to regroup more quickly can change the course of an entire day.

Another encouraging aspect of the experience was seeing how actively the software is being developed. The program is still in its testing phase, and during my three weeks of use the program received multiple updates. That signaled an ongoing effort to refine and improve the product rather than treating it as a finished, static solution, which happens with a lot of the treatment programs offered to veterans today.

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Accessibility may be the most significant strength of the Neurova Labs approach. Traditional treatment pathways, particularly within the Department of Veterans Affairs, can be difficult to navigate. Appointments, long waits, unfamiliar clinical environments and administrative hurdles can themselves become sources of stress. For many veterans, that friction leads to disengagement from treatment entirely.

This model removes many of those barriers. As long as you have the headset, therapy can be done at home, on your schedule and in an environment you control. Morning sessions with coffee, afternoon sessions between work obligations or evening sessions after a difficult day are all possible. That level of autonomy changes how treatment feels. It becomes something you opt into rather than something you endure.

I spoke with other users who approach the program differently. One former Marine described using the therapy as a situational tool — logging sessions before or after known stressors rather than following a strict schedule. That flexibility suggests a broader range of use beyond structured programs, which may be especially helpful for veterans balancing work, family and ongoing care.

It is also important to be clear about what this is not. This is not a cure-all, and it is not a replacement for counseling, psychiatric care, or other evidence-based treatments. Neurova Labs does not present it that way.

What it offered me was an entry point. Feeling tangible improvement in one area made me more open to continuing therapy elsewhere, including reengaging with the VA and seeking additional counseling when needed.

Over the last three weeks my quality of life improved. I slept better. My mood was steadier. Social interaction felt less overwhelming.

As the company continues to refine its product and explore wider availability, accessibility may ultimately be its most meaningful contribution: Treatment that meets veterans where they are, rather than forcing them into systems they distrust.

That alone has the potential to keep more people engaged in care. For me, the biggest takeaway was simple. For the first time in a long time, I felt hopeful. That alone made it easier to keep going.

Laughlin’s last Jayhawk, from the 86th Flying Training Squadron, took off from the base Dec. 17. It joined a pair of T-6A Texan IIs and a pair of T-38C Talons as the centerpiece of a five-plane flyover, which twice passed over Laughlin’s airfield and air traffic control tower. After the other planes split off, the T-1 continued to its final resting place at “The Boneyard,” an airplane graveyard at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Arizona.

“We stand on the shoulders of giants,” Lt. Col. Nathan Hedden, commander of the 86th, said in a Thursday release. “All of the [pilots] who have done this before have left a legacy of excellent performance and excellent training. This unit has offered so much to the Air Force.”

Airmen have learned the basics of piloting cargo planes or tanker aircraft by flying T-1s for more than three decades.

But the twin-engine jet — originally built by Raytheon subsidiary Beech — is aging, and the Air Force started paring down its fleet of 177 T-1s in 2023. The Air Force had 75 T-1s last year, and aims to further cut them to 53 in 2025 as the service prepares to bring on the new T-7A Redhawk trainer.

The Air Force said in early 2022, when announcing plans to start retiring the Jayhawk, that new pilot training techniques, such as virtual reality, would allow it to phase out the T-1. Improvements to the T-6 would also let aspiring pilots learn to fly mobility planes on a single aircraft, the Air Force said. This is allowing the service to retire the least-capable T-1s, which would otherwise need to have their engines replaced.

Aspiring Air Force pilots first fly the T-6 during undergraduate pilot training, and then roughly 900 students are selected to move on to learn to fly mobility aircraft. Under the old system, those students flew the T-1 for about five months before moving on to more mobility-specific lessons. But the Air Force is moving to a simulator-based system that allows those students to learn advanced flight skills much more quickly.

Laughlin’s 47th Flying Training Wing will keep teaching students to fly in the T-6 and T-38C Talon until the T-7 comes online.

The 99th Flying Training Squadron at Joint Base San Antonio-Randolph in Texas said goodbye to its last Jayhawk in July 2024, which also flew to Davis-Monthan for retirement.

California-based Anduril formerly assisted Microsoft with the $22 billion program by integrating the Lattice platform into the Integrated Visual Augmentation System, or IVAS. Lattice allowed soldiers to see threats in real time by removing delays in processing signals between devices, according to a company statement.

Anduril will assume oversight of production, future development of hardware and software, and delivery timelines, according to a joint release from the two companies. Microsoft will continue to partner with Anduril on the project. Microsoft Azure will be the “preferred hyperscale cloud” for Anduril on all things related to IVAS.

Anduril Founder Palmer Luckey, the designer of the virtual-reality headset Oculus Rift, laid out his vision for the future of the IVAS program Tuesday in a blog post titled, “Turning Soldiers into Superheroes.”

“For me, this announcement is deeply personal. Since my pre-Oculus days as a teenager who had the opportunity to do a tiny bit of work on the Army’s BRAVEMIND project, I’ve believed there would be a headset on every soldier long before there is a headset on every civilian,” Luckey wrote.

He wrote that IVAS will allow troops to “surpass the limits of human form and cognition, seamlessly teaming enhanced humans with large packs of robotic and biologic teammates.”

The Army has conducted IVAS-controlled drone flights for microdrones, such as the Black Hornet and other squad-level drones. The device is also used for inter- and intra-squad communication, both through voice and chat. Users can share map information, coordinates or other data via the headset.

In his blog post, Luckey said his involvement with IVAS signals his return to the forefront of technology. He maintains that the program is more than just a headset.

“IVAS isn’t just another product, it is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to redefine how technology supports those who serve,” Luckey wrote. “Whatever you are imagining, however crazy you imagine I am, multiply it by ten and then do it again. I am back, and I am only getting started.”

The Army has worked closely with Microsoft on IVAS since 2018. The current system was originally built on the commercially available Microsoft HoloLens device.

The service is working on the third of five prototypes of the device since the program began.

The current version, IVAS 1.2, is the second engineering validation build, Army Times previously reported. This version includes some design changes that must be implemented in the next prototype, as the service continues gathering troop feedback.

The following updates are in the works for IVAS 1.2:

• A low-light camera with increased sensitivity
• Improved low-light focus mechanism, especially when wearing gloves
• More robust bumpers, cables, bungees and tethered solar caps
• Hinge improvements for usability, display clarity and durability
• Improved transport case and mission bag for better storage and protection
• Minor visor and display improvements for greater clarity and durability
• Software improvements

This spring, soldiers with the 4th Infantry Division at Fort Carson, Colorado, will conduct a battalion-sized operational field assessment of the device. Following the development of its 1.2 version, the Army will be poised to award a production contract to build the device for full fielding.

VA officials have seen a dramatic growth in virtual reality pilot programs in the last year, adding 17 new pilot programs across 120 VA medical centers. Among them are programs where veterans don a headset to walk through a surgery ahead of the actual operation, or to travel to cyber campfires to chat with fellow veterans to de-stress, or even to go on virtual fishing trips with their peers to exercise their aging muscles.

Officials say the programs cover a wide range of clinical issues, including pain management, mental health care, physical therapy and social outreach. And they expect the offerings to grow even faster in coming years.

“We’re already talking to offices about how to hand these pilots over, making them a regular part of care,” said Dr. Anne Lord Bailey, lead of VA’s Immersive Programs at the department’s Office of Health Care Innovation. “The technology is already native to a lot of our younger veterans. And our older veterans have been open to it and fascinated by the possibilities. So, we’re ready to push this further.”

About 200 VA administrators and outside medical experts are gathered in Washington, D.C., this week, with another 200 joining online, for the annual VA Immersive Summit, showcasing how virtual reality can augment in-person care.

VA has only spent about $12 million on virtual tech in the last two years, against more than $200 billion in total Veterans Health Administration spending — but proponents say that could rise significantly in coming years.

“In five to 10 years, we will see immersive technology being as common in medical care as cell phones, tablets, and other personal devices,” Dr. Steve Lieberman, Deputy Under Secretary for Health at VA, told attendees at the conference. “It’s the new reality in healthcare.”

About 2,000 staffers and roughly as many veterans are currently using virtual reality headsets as part of their medical care regimen. For some, that means home-bound veterans connecting with friends thanks to virtual chat rooms. For patients with post-traumatic stress, it can mean using virtual headsets to re-live past horrors in a safe space, with guidance from medical professionals to work through their emotions.

One physician, featured in a video at the event, said a patient with multiple sclerosis was able to quadruple her grip strength over a year by playing virtual reality games online with other veterans.

“There is mental health therapy and physical therapy and occupational therapy you get through this technology,” said Grace Esposito, a Navy veteran who had been dealing with the after-effects of a military spinal injury for more than 30 years. “I just completed some neuro-balance therapy from home. This is an advanced future, and I hope more people get on board.”

In addition to running patient-focused pilot virtual reality programs, VA officials are developing staff training protocols as well. Those include teaching staff how to teach veterans to use gun locks for personal firearms. Instead of just reading instruction sheets, VA staffers can manipulate the locks in the virtual world, and then walk vets through the same process in person to ensure they understand the tools.

Bailey hopes demand will grow as more patients and staff understand how much they can accomplish in the virtual world.

“We’re already running multi-state pilots with a very small investment,” she said. “There is a huge opportunity for even more.”

“Army aviation is not cheap; it costs a lot of money to train aviators, so from a cost perspective, from a fundamentals of flight perspective and then that all being influenced by bringing in a future aircraft with a tiltrotor, we’re doing a lot of analysis right now on what is the optimal way forward,” Maj. Gen. Mac McCurry, who is now the Army Futures Command chief of staff, said in an interview just prior to the change of command at Fort Novosel, Alabama, last month.

The Army selected Textron Bell’s next-generation tiltrotor design for its Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft, or FLRAA, in December 2022. Earlier this year, the service decided to cancel the development competition of another manned helicopter for attack and reconnaissance missions in favor of using more unmanned aircraft for the role.

“I think that there will be some decisions made within the next year primarily centered on the branch chief down here and having to look at what is the institutional training model before we get into the operational force,” McCurry said.

One consideration is whether the service has the right basic training aircraft. The Army retired its Bell-manufactured TH-67 single-engine training helicopter following a decision to restructure its aviation fleet in late 2013. The service replaced the trainer with roughly 200 dual-engine LUH-72A Lakota light utility helicopters, a move met with some controversy over the aircraft’s operational cost and complexity.

“Nothing has been excluded. Everything is on the table as far as what kind of aircraft does that look like and what does the training look like,” McCurry said.

Additionally, with the improvement of simulation technology, the aviation training curriculum relies more on simulator hours than ever before.

“With the increase in virtual reality, augmented reality, where can we gain efficiencies in training with that kind of thing where you don’t have to be in either an aircraft or full motion simulator? What parts of flight training can really be assisted and optimized using those technologies?” McCurry questioned.

The pressure to get basic aviator skills training right is high as the Army aviation branch continues to experience frequent Class A mishaps, which the service defines as incidents involving the loss of life or loss of equipment totaling more than $2.5 million.

Earlier this month, an AH-64 Apache helicopter crashed during a routine flight training on Fort Novosel, killing the flight instructor and injuring the student. The circumstances of the crash are still under investigation.

In the first half of fiscal 2023, more than a dozen Army aviators died in helicopter crashes, a startling number that prompted an aviation-wide stand-down in April 2023. The Army lifted the stand-down after a thorough review, but five months later, an MH-60 Black Hawk stealth helicopter belonging to the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment crashed during a training mission, killing five on board.

The accidents kept coming, with fiscal 2023 logging the highest death rate for Army soldiers since the U.S. withdrew from Iraq in 2011, with a total of 14 dead across 10 Class A mishaps.

In an average year, Army aviation mishaps typically kill six crew members, with the average Class A mishap rate hovering just under one accident per 100,000 flight hours. The current rate as of this spring was 3.22, more than double the highest rate of any fiscal year in more than a decade, according to Army Combat Readiness Center data.

The branch is “constantly keeping our finger on the pulse of accident rates and causal factors,” McCurry said. “We have definitely taken a look over the last two years at specifically formation flying, flying aircraft in close proximity to each other and evaluating those tasks and adding some conditions upon those tasks and then, most recently, focusing on how our aviators respond to changes in tail rotor effectiveness based on environmental conditions.”

Earlier this year, the Army unveiled more training enhancement efforts to get back to the basics that it called an aviation standup.

“Anytime we break the momentum on accidents and focus on fundamentals, it tends to have some effect,” McCurry said.

This is leading the branch to consider encouraging or requiring every aviation unit to dedicate time each year to focus on aviation safety awareness, regardless of their accident rate.

“Do you just do it routinely, once a year to kind of call everybody’s attention to it, rather than waiting for spikes in rates, so we’re, we’re considering that,” McCurry added.

The changes start at the bottom. Rather than welcoming new enlisted recruits with screaming drill instructors, Air Force boot camp now begins with a crash course in stress management, cleanliness and military values. The service bets that building up budding airmen, not tearing them down, will forge stronger troops without sacrificing discipline or talent.

The service is also pushing recruits to think on their feet and learn from experience, through mock deployments, better wargames and a sharper focus on how their lessons will apply to real-life operations.

That’s a core piece of the new curriculum at the Air Force’s Officer Training School, which launched a revamped program in October. The service is trying to keep more people in that pipeline, too: Trainees who struggle will be held back until they’re ready to move on, not sent home.

Other measures are in the works to help the Air Force catch up to civilian schools that are years ahead in technology use, classroom collaboration and curriculum design. Tablets, augmented- and virtual reality headsets and other tools aim to give new airmen more control over their studies, particularly at the technical schools where troops learn their first — or their next — trades.

And a new set of professional development seminars are designed to help enlisted airmen tackle everyday leadership challenges, from mental health to unit cohesion. Those lessons are currently optional.