Post by Admin on Aug 28, 2020 18:29:06 GMT -5
Fighter Sweep
Your average fighter mission takes anywhere from six to 10+ hours from start to finish.
Here’s how it breaks down:
Mission planning: One to two hours. Depending on what we’re doing, there’s planning involved.
Briefing: One hour to ninety minutes.
Step (Walk for you Navy types)/Start/Taxi/Takeoff: Forty-five minutes to an hour. You didn’t think we just hopped in the jet and took off, did you?
It’s a little bit different between the Air Force and Navy, but the basics are the same. After your brief, you’ll get suited up (G-suit, harness, etc). Then you will figure out what jet you’re flying (Air Force will do a step brief whereas Navy has pilots sign the jet out in Maintenance Control). At that point, you’ll go out to the jet, do a preflight, strap in, and start.
Actual Sortie: One to nearly two hours. This is the fun part, but it’s still missionized. You’re not just goofing off.
We fly with specific training objectives in mind based on the mission we’re flying. For dogfighting, we’ll do specific set-ups to practice various phases (offensive, defensive, or neutral). For Close Air Support, we’ll go out and work with Joint Terminal Attack Controllers in specific scenarios.
Maintenance debrief: Twenty to 30 minutes. After landing and doing a postflight walkaround, we go back to maintenance control, let them know whether the jet is good to go or requires maintenance, and log our hours appropriately.
Debrief: One to four (or more) hours. Again, it depends on the mission.
This is the most important part of the mission. We never get better unless we analyze what happened. This usually involves reviewing our tapes, watching the playback on ACMI/TCTS, discussing execution errors, and coming up with lessons learned so that we can get better for next time.
I’ve seen an hour and a half sorties take nearly 12 hours, from start to finish, to debrief.
Your average fighter mission takes anywhere from six to 10+ hours from start to finish.
Here’s how it breaks down:
Mission planning: One to two hours. Depending on what we’re doing, there’s planning involved.
Briefing: One hour to ninety minutes.
Step (Walk for you Navy types)/Start/Taxi/Takeoff: Forty-five minutes to an hour. You didn’t think we just hopped in the jet and took off, did you?
It’s a little bit different between the Air Force and Navy, but the basics are the same. After your brief, you’ll get suited up (G-suit, harness, etc). Then you will figure out what jet you’re flying (Air Force will do a step brief whereas Navy has pilots sign the jet out in Maintenance Control). At that point, you’ll go out to the jet, do a preflight, strap in, and start.
Actual Sortie: One to nearly two hours. This is the fun part, but it’s still missionized. You’re not just goofing off.
We fly with specific training objectives in mind based on the mission we’re flying. For dogfighting, we’ll do specific set-ups to practice various phases (offensive, defensive, or neutral). For Close Air Support, we’ll go out and work with Joint Terminal Attack Controllers in specific scenarios.
Maintenance debrief: Twenty to 30 minutes. After landing and doing a postflight walkaround, we go back to maintenance control, let them know whether the jet is good to go or requires maintenance, and log our hours appropriately.
Debrief: One to four (or more) hours. Again, it depends on the mission.
This is the most important part of the mission. We never get better unless we analyze what happened. This usually involves reviewing our tapes, watching the playback on ACMI/TCTS, discussing execution errors, and coming up with lessons learned so that we can get better for next time.
I’ve seen an hour and a half sorties take nearly 12 hours, from start to finish, to debrief.