Two Louisiana Air National Guard F-15 pilots from the 159th fighter Wing responded to an alert last week, intercepting a small civilian aircraft that turned out to be pilotless—because, according to various news reports—pilot Marcus Schrenker had bailed out in an attempt to fake his own death. Maj. Matt Rippen and Capt. Josh Fogle were on alert at their base in Belle Chasse when their unit received a task to find an airplane that the FAA said had made a distress call. The two F-15 pilots picked up the airplane as it headed toward the Gulf of Mexico and saw that there was no pilot. They shadowed it until it crashed and directed local authorities to the crash site. (For more on Schrenker, read this Associated Press report) (Louisiana Guard report by Capt. Beverly Couto)
A combined Navy and Air Force program is seeking to build a smaller version of a ubiquitous air-to-air missile that could give advanced aircraft, such as the Collaborative Combat Aircraft, greater magazine depth in a high-end fight.