Capt. Francis Gary Powers posthumously received the Silver Star medal during a Pentagon ceremony, honored for his heroism during 21 months of Soviet captivity in the early 1960s. Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz presented the high military decoration to...

OTV-2, the Air Force’s second unmanned X-37B reusable spaceplane, returned to Earth after 469 days on orbit during its maiden mission. The orbital test vehicle—about one-quarter the size of the space shuttle—landed on the morning of June 16 at Vandenberg...

The 36th Rescue Flight at Fairchild AFB, Wash., transferred from under the organizational control of the base’s 336th Training Group to the 58th Operations Group at Kirtland AFB, N.M. Despite the shift, the training flight’s mission of providing helicopter support...

The 13th C-5 Galaxy landed in Marietta, Ga., for transformation into a Super Galaxy on the modification line at Lockheed Martin’s aircraft plant there, announced the company. This airplane, serial number 87-0036, is the second C-5B from Travis AFB, Calif.,...

Polish air force C-130s earlier this month made the NATO ally’s first appearance in a Red Flag training event, flying alongside Australian, German, Japanese, and USAF assets from JB Elmendorf-Richardson, Alaska, announced base officials. Flying through Alaska’s mountains is “a...

The Air Force’s aeromedical evacuation schoolhouse procured a second C-130 fuselage section to accommodate training the current volume of students at Pope Field, N.C. Operating with only one decommissioned C-130 meant that students have had to rotate through the aircraft,...

Pentagon officials announced that they recovered the remains of Lt. Col. Charles M. Walling of Phoenix and Maj. Aado Kommendant of Lakewood, N.J. These two airmen had been missing in action since their F-4C Phantom fighter crashed in 1966 during...

The Navy’s experimental X-47B Unmanned Combat Air System demonstrator aircraft successfully completed basic air-worthiness testing at Edwards AFB, Calif., announced contractor Northrop Grumman. Trials at Edwards “demonstrated convincingly the maturity, durability, and performance of this revolutionary new unmanned system,” said...

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta released a video message thanking lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered troops for their service. The message, which also honored LGBT family members for their “dedicated service to our country,” coincided with LGBT pride month. It was...