Daily Report

Aug. 18, 2009

Joint STARS Re-engining in Limbo

The Air Force’s plans to install new engines on its fleet of E-8C Joint STARS ground-surveillance aircraft reportedly may fall victim to other funding priorities. So reported the Warner Robins Patriot Aug. 13. According to the newspaper, officials with the...

GPS Satellite Launch

The Air Force on Monday successfully placed the last of its modernized Global Positioning System IIR satellites into orbit. A United Launch Alliance Delta II Rocket fired from Cape Canaveral AFS, Fla., carried this satellite, designated GPS IIR-21(M), into space....

A Little Rain Must Fall

The launch of the first space based infrared satellite, GEO-1, may slip again, this time beyond 2010. When we inquired about this, the SBIRS Wing at Los Angeles AFB, Calif., a unit of the Space and Missile Systems Center, offered...

Lasting Partnership

The Air National Guard should remain in the unmanned aircraft systems business, says Col. Bob Becklund, chairman of the Air Force’s UAS weapons system council and commander of the 119th Wing in Fargo, N.D., one of the Air Guard’s four...

Groundbreakings

Air Force officials launched construction projects last week at Kadena AB, Japan, and the Air Force Research Lab’s research site in Rome, N.Y. Kadena officials on Aug. 10 held the groundbreaking for the new Erwin Professional Military Education Center that...

Space and Missile Pioneers Inducted

Gen. Robert Kehler, Air Force Space Command leader, last week inducted the command’s 2009 Space and Missile Pioneers during a ceremony at Peterson AFB, Colo. This year’s five inductees are Benjamin Blasingame, Roger Easton, retired Col. Vernon Hastings, Robert Naka,...

Scanning the Horizon

The Air Reserve Personnel Center in Denver on Aug. 4 reached an important milestone by electronically scanning the last paper copy of a personnel record from an Air Force Reserve Command unit. Over the past year, employees at the center,...

Blackbird Sighting

Earlier this month, airmen at Edwards AFB, Calif., towed the SR-71A Blackbird that is part of the Air Force Flight Test Center Museum at Edwards over public roads to the base’s corrosion control facility for some primping. This SR-71, serial...

Big Gulp

The F-35 stealth fighter program on Aug. 13 completed the first in-flight refueling of an F-35B test aircraft that uses the probe-and-drogue refueling system common to Marine Corps and Navy aircraft and those of many international air forces, announced F-35...

More Veterans’ Centers Coming

Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki announced Aug. 14 that 28 additional vet centers will be established next year across 19 states and American Samoa to address the growing need for readjustment counseling and other assistance for combat veterans. “VA is...

Air Sorties in War on Terrorism, Southwest Asia

Aug. 14, 2009 Sortie Type OIF OEF OIF/OEF Total YTD ISR 23 27 50 9,625 CAS/Armed Recon 24 83 107 21,567 Airlift 159 159 29,546 Air refueling 50 50 10,503 Total 366 71,241 OIF=Operation Iraqi Freedom OEF=Operation Enduring Freedom ISR=Intelligence-surveillance-reconnaissance...