Col. Eric Mathewson, head of USAF’s unmanned aircraft system task force, who recently helped brief reporters about the service’s new long-range UAS flight plan, is on the road drumming up help on designing the next-generation of unmanned aerial vehicles. According to an Associated Press report (via Forbes.com), Mathewson visited the University of North Dakota Aug. 4 during a three-day conference on unmanned systems to encourage students and researchers to work on new UAS capabilities. He said, “We don’t have the time or the brainpower in the Air Force to answer all these questions [concerning new concepts].” The service’s flight plan envisions a UAV-dominant Air Force.
The crash of a T-38 trainer jet this May—which caused a weekslong pause in flights across the fleet—was caused by an improperly installed pin for one of the jet’s horizontal stabilizers, according to a new accident report released Oct. 30. When the pin disengaged midflight, it created the slightest amount…