Daily Report

April 29, 2009

Into the Belly of the Beast

AA-1, the first F-35 test aircraft arrived last week at Eglin AFB, Fla., to give base officials and residents of the local community a chance to experience the aircraft up close and personal. Two days after touching down on April...

Parting Tanker Thoughts

John Young, who relinquished his post as Pentagon acquisition executive on Monday to Ashton Carter (see below), reiterated his support again for the idea of awarding the KC-X tanker contract to the bidder that offers the best price. During his...

Parting UAV Shot

In his exit interview Monday, John Young was critical of the Air Force for, in his view, not moving more quickly to incorporate an automated landing capability for its MQ-1 Predator unmanned aerial vehicles, as the Army has done with...

Carter Takes Helm of DOD Weapons Portfolio

Ashton Carter was sworn in on Monday as the Pentagon’s acquisition czar, replacing John Young, who had stayed on for the interim after the Bush Administration left office. President Obama nominated Carter, a Harvard physicist, for the post in March...

An Air Guard First

CMSgt. Allen Usry, the current command chief for the Continental US NORAD Region-1st Air Force (Air Forces Northern) at Tyndall AFB, Fla., will take over as NORAD-US Northern Command’s command senior enlisted advisor in Colorado Springs, Colo., from Army Command...

Airship Project Takes Off

DARPA announced Monday that it has selected a Lockheed Martin-led industry team that includes Raytheon to develop a sub-scale stratospheric airship to demonstrate the utility of using high-altitude airborne sensors of unprecedented proportions for theater-wide surveillance. Manufacture and flight testing...

Ex-Astronaut Glenn Honored

Former astronaut and ex-US Senator John Glenn received the 2008 Thomas D. White National Defense Award April 22 at a ceremony at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo. Named in honor of former Air Force Chief of Staff...

Hogging the Spotlight

Lt. Col. Drew English, test director for the 59th Test and Evaluation Squadron at Nellis AFB, Nev., reached his 3,000th flight hour in an A-10 cockpit on March 26 during a force development mission to the Nevada Test and Training...

Air Sorties from SWA

Air Sorties in War on Terrorism, Southwest AsiaApril 25-26, 2009 Sortie Type OIF OEF OIF/OEF Total YTD ISR 50 40 90 4,582 CAS/Armed Recon 54 150 204 11,358 Airlift 310 310 15,581 Air refueling 82 82 5,108 Total 686 36,629...