Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne on Friday spent some time at the New York Air National Guard’s Hancock Field, near Syracuse. Rep. James Walsh (R-N.Y.) arranged the visit “to ensure the highest-ranking officials within the Air Force recognize the full value this base brings to our nation’s air defense system.” Hancock was not one of the facilities that USAF targeted for closure during BRAC 2005, but the 174th Fighter Wing, which calls Hancock home, is slated to lose its F-16s. And, before the BRAC cuts came out, Walsh already had gotten USAF to say it would place a Predator unmanned aerial vehicle unit at the facility.
The crash of a T-38 trainer jet this May—which caused a weekslong pause in flights across the fleet—was caused by an improperly installed pin for one of the jet’s horizontal stabilizers, according to a new accident report released Oct. 30. When the pin disengaged midflight, it created the slightest amount…