According to Gen. Michael Moseley, Air Force Chief of Staff, most of the explosive ordnance disposal work being done in Afghanistan and Iraq is accomplished by Air Force and Navy EOD specialists. And, Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne told lawmakers at a House Appropriations panel hearing last week that USAF “is losing” EOD airmen. He called it a “stress career field.”
Dirty hydraulic fluid and freezing weather led to the loss of an F-35 stealth fighter in Alaska this winter when its landing gear froze and convinced the aircraft’s computer that it was on the ground rather than in-flight.