Pacific Air Forces aircraft in South Korea and Japan recently dropped dummy bombs where they shouldn’t, but Stars and Stripes reports that officials at Osan AB, South Korea, are not yet ready to say whether they will cease training with the BDU-33. After a second such incident involving fighters from Misawa AB, Japan, Misawa officials put a temporary ban on the bombs until they could complete an investigation. The Stripes reports that the Osan bomb fell from an A-10 into a two-story wire factory, causing panic rather than injuries. There were no injuries from the Misawa fighter accidents either.
With a shrinking fleet and growing operational demand, Air Force Special Operations Command sees the new OA-1K combat scout aircraft as key to a “new era,” officials say.