Daily Report

That is the view of the Air Force’s ongoing efforts to “reclaim” excellence in its nuclear enterprise that Defense Secretary Robert Gates expressed during a visit Dec. 1 to Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota. Gates traveled to Minot,...

Defense Secretary Robert Gates, during his visit this week to Minot AFB, N.D. (see above), noted that he should receive this month the Schlesinger task force’s report on the nuclear enterprise oversight structure for not only the Air Force but...

Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England, frequent critic of the Air Force’s desire to gain more than 183 F-22 Raptors, on Dec. 2 announced his plan to leave his post at the Pentagon rather than remain on with Defense Secretary Robert...

The Air Force is running short of fighter aircraft to play adversaries in training sorties so has co-opted T-38Cs of the Introduction to Fighter Fundamentals units like the 434th Fighter Training Squadron at Laughlin AFB, Tex., to provide about 30...

Late last month, one of the RQ-4 Global Hawk operator teams with the 12th Reconnaissance Squadron at Beale AFB, Calif., got to fly a milestone sortie that marked the seventh year of Global Hawk operations in the war on terror....

KC-135 crews from the 100th Air Refueling Wing at RAF Mildenhall, England, got real close to Air Force Special Operations Command’s new CV-22 Ospreys on their first overseas deployment, but not to refuel them. Instead, the 100th ARW crews provided...

Airmen deployed to the 5th Expeditionary Air Mobility Squadron, either at its main base with the 386th Air Expeditionary Wing or its geographically separated APOD (for aerial port of debarkation), perform maintenance on USAF C-17 and C-5 strategic airlifters and...

There’s a new term for airmen and others working outside their specialties—they are filling joint service solution taskings. (We don’t know if this term replaces or simply supplements in-lieu-of taskings.) One such airman is MSgt. John Blackburn, an aerospace control...

The Air Force has awarded Bronze Star medals to CMSgt. David Nordel and TSgt. Michael Allen for the efforts while deployed to Iraq. The Chico (Calif.) Enterprise Record reports that Nordel, a medical service NCO currently assigned to Fairchild AFB,...

Training sorties at the Iraqi Air Force’s primary rotary wing base are slowly improving, and the Iraqis are training with more advanced equipment and newer tactics, Air Force advisers told the Daily Report during a visit to Iraq in November....

The space shuttle contingency recovery team at Edwards AFB, Calif., conducted a “picture perfect” recovery of Endeavor on Nov. 30, according to Reserve Brig. Gen. Jim Hogue, individual mobilization augmentee to the Air Force Flight Test Center commander, who oversees...

Air Sorties in War on Terrorism, Southwest AsiaNov. 30 – Dec. 1, 2008 Sortie Type OIF OEF OIF/OEF Total YTD ISR 56 31 87 12,412 CAS/Armed Recon 57 129 186 34,571 Airlift 240 240 43,635 Air refueling 92 92 16,845...