The Air Force allowed up to 1,000 recently-retired pilots, combat systems officers and air battle managers to return to active duty. But so far, far fewer have expressed interest in the program.
The Air Force’s roughly 2,000-pilot shortfall has been one of its most vexing — and public — problems over the last two-plus years. In 2019, the Air Force will see if its efforts to resolve it start to bear fruit.
Defense Secretary Jim Mattis has thrown down the gauntlet for the Air Force’s maintainers: Get four out of every five F-16, F-22 and F-35 fighter jets ready to fly at any given time. It’s not going to be easy.
The percentage of manned aircraft pilots accepting hefty bonuses to stay in the Air Force stopped its slide in fiscal 2018. But turning on the cash spigot appears to have had limited effect in some areas.
Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson told lawmakers Wednesday that the Air Force trained 1,160 new pilots in fiscal 2017, and expects to train 1,311 in fiscal 2019, before expanding further to 1,500 by 2022.
The Air Force is making its case for the biggest expansion since the end of the Cold War — swelling its number of operational squadrons by 24 percent, from 312 to 386 by the end of 2030.But getting there will be tricky — not only financially, but also logistically.
The Air Force should make greater use of contractors to bolster its pilot training capabilities as it works to fix its festering pilot shortfall once and for all, according to a new report.
Nearly two years after top Air Force leaders began sounding the alarm on a worrying shortfall of pilots, the key elements of a solution are finally falling into place.
The Air Force this year is offering some bomber, fixed-wing combat search-and-rescue, special operations, mobility, and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance pilots the same massive retention bonuses as fighter pilots.