New study shows grim outlook for future of Air Force pilot shortage • Hacker News Board

Re: New study shows grim outlook for future of Air Force pilot shortage

#31

Post by NikolaNovak » Wed, Apr 17, 2019, 2:28 PM UTC

driverdan wrote: post #18

> A recent RAND study found the cost of training a basic qualified fighter pilot ranges from $5.6 million for an F-16 pilot to $10.9 million for an F-22 pilot. Those numbers seem outrageous to me. Why does it cost so much? Are there frequent plane crashes?

Cost of flying F-22 for an hour is reported anywhere between $33k and $70k, with most estimates in the $60k range. Let's assume $50k/hour to be safe - 200 hours of flight time gets you to the $10 million figure on its own, with no other costs accounted for.

Pilot still ends up the cheap part of the equation, given ~$200mil+ per airplane cost.

Whee - are we having budgetary fun yet :-)

Re: New study shows grim outlook for future of Air Force pilot shortage

#32

Post by zip1234 » Wed, Apr 17, 2019, 2:33 PM UTC

jwally wrote: post #14

An Anecdotal "I quit" I read a couple of years ago about the (then impending) pilot shortage: https://www.jqpublicblog.com/punching-out-latest-dear-boss-l... Dear Boss, I’ve fucking had it. I’m finally giving up on my Air Force and I’m throwing in the towel. Flying fighter jets is no longer cool enough to outweigh the bullshit, and so I’ve broken the mach for the final time. You’re going to believe that I’m leaving b…

The Air Force wants fighter pilots to end up as generals. In order to do that and compete in the promotion system that is in place in the Air Force, they need to do more than just fly. The fact is that the Air Force wants officers first and pilots second. Perhaps the answer is that pilots should just be warrant officers like in the Army. They can fly their entire career and do just that and nothing else. There would be really good pilots. However, the Air Force wouldn't have fighter pilot generals. The training now takes so long and is so expensive that it seems like a huge waste for a pilot to go through all that and do other things most of the time.

Re: New study shows grim outlook for future of Air Force pilot shortage

#33

Post by nradov » Wed, Apr 17, 2019, 2:33 PM UTC

The Army also has a pilot shortage, but they've done a little better than the Air Force due to allowing warrant officers to fly. Many pilots just want to fly, they don't want to deal with all the other management responsibilities and staff assignments that come with being a commissioned officer. When the Air Force split off from the Army they decided they only wanted commissioned officers as pilots and eliminated WO ranks.

Re: New study shows grim outlook for future of Air Force pilot shortage

#34

Post by briffle » Wed, Apr 17, 2019, 2:34 PM UTC

driverdan wrote: post #18

> A recent RAND study found the cost of training a basic qualified fighter pilot ranges from $5.6 million for an F-16 pilot to $10.9 million for an F-22 pilot. Those numbers seem outrageous to me. Why does it cost so much? Are there frequent plane crashes?

How much do you think it costs to fill up an F-15 with Jet Fuel?

Not to mention the maintenance requirements on the planes (and the ground crews to do it) and the cost of ammunition used in training (missles aren't cheap)

Re: New study shows grim outlook for future of Air Force pilot shortage

#35

Post by wil421 » Wed, Apr 17, 2019, 2:37 PM UTC

driverdan wrote: post #18

> A recent RAND study found the cost of training a basic qualified fighter pilot ranges from $5.6 million for an F-16 pilot to $10.9 million for an F-22 pilot. Those numbers seem outrageous to me. Why does it cost so much? Are there frequent plane crashes?

Think about the logistics of getting a class of pilots from the training sites, simulators, classrooms, housing, etc. Not to mention the costs to keep all those places open. Pilots have 100s or more of hours in simulators before they even touch a plane. Now add the costs of training in the actual plane and related training missions bombs, fake targets, bombing ranges etc...

Re: New study shows grim outlook for future of Air Force pilot shortage

#36

Post by openasocket » Wed, Apr 17, 2019, 2:37 PM UTC

This is probably part of the reason why the USAF is leaning so hard towards unmanned systems in the future, because it opens up a lot of doors here. Drone pilots can be put pretty much anywhere in the world so they don't need to be forward-deployed, which will probably help attract people. The physical standards can be strongly relaxed, no need to worry about eyesight or their ability to handle 8Gs, which increases the pool of possible pilots. You can to some degree "oversubscribe" and have fewer pilots than aircraft (alternatively, fewer pilots on shift, meaning pilots don't have to work as many hours), since not all of your planes will be in the air at once. Some of the more mundane tasks can be automated or distributed (maybe have air traffic controllers control taxiing, takeoff and landing directly?) like in-air refueling. It's not a panacea, and there are missions drones will not be able to do anytime soon, but I imagine it will help with the pilot shortfall.

Re: New study shows grim outlook for future of Air Force pilot shortage

#37

Post by vonmoltke » Wed, Apr 17, 2019, 2:37 PM UTC

tyingq wrote: post #23

umvi wrote: post #6

Seems like the Air Force is trapped in a vicious underhiring/overhiring cycle. When I was in college I did Air Force ROTC. A lot of my peers had pilot slots; I was poised as a 17D (Cyber Ops). After graduating, my training date was put on hold virtually indefinitely. Eventually I got an email that the Air Force had commissioned way too many officers and were looking for people to voluntarily leave with no commitment/…

That's interesting. I'm curious how much of your college costs that ROTC participation covered. Just tuition, or housing too, or also a stipend?

When I was accepted into the Army's ROTC program in 1998 (which I ended up declining), they were willing to pay up to $14,500 per year. I assume the other programs were about the same.

Re: New study shows grim outlook for future of Air Force pilot shortage

#38

Post by Moru » Wed, Apr 17, 2019, 2:38 PM UTC

mmsimanga wrote: post #16

matt4077 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the spouses, naturally, are supposed to get along with the program.

I am guessing when you say "I do" you must have a pretty good idea of the person you are marrying.

Weren't we talking about people in their twenties? Do you people often get married at that age? I thought it was more common to delay marriage and kids to later in the career nowadays?

Re: New study shows grim outlook for future of Air Force pilot shortage

#39

Post by nradov » Wed, Apr 17, 2019, 2:38 PM UTC

openasocket wrote: post #27

driverdan wrote: post #18

> A recent RAND study found the cost of training a basic qualified fighter pilot ranges from $5.6 million for an F-16 pilot to $10.9 million for an F-22 pilot. Those numbers seem outrageous to me. Why does it cost so much? Are there frequent plane crashes?

I'm guessing it has to do with flight time. Flying a jet is expensive. A jet will consume something like $10,000 of fuel per hour of flight time. Not to mention maintenance costs, the costs of the maintenance crew, the cost of having dedicated f-16s and f-22s for training is probably included in there as well. Not to mention what is probably a high dropout rate. All that adds up. $5.6M still sounds high to me, but I…

A lot of it is allocation of fixed costs. It costs a fortune to operate training programs. Lots of buildings, runways, infrastructure, staff, maintenance, security, etc. So they take that annual cost and divide by the number of pilots trained every year.

Re: New study shows grim outlook for future of Air Force pilot shortage

#40

Post by chrischattin » Wed, Apr 17, 2019, 2:41 PM UTC

jwally wrote: post #14

An Anecdotal "I quit" I read a couple of years ago about the (then impending) pilot shortage: https://www.jqpublicblog.com/punching-out-latest-dear-boss-l... Dear Boss, I’ve fucking had it. I’m finally giving up on my Air Force and I’m throwing in the towel. Flying fighter jets is no longer cool enough to outweigh the bullshit, and so I’ve broken the mach for the final time. You’re going to believe that I’m leaving b…

I'm a former Air Force pilot and was going to writeup a long post about my experience. But, this pretty much sums it up.

I loved the people, and LOVED the flying. Some of the best times of my life. But, the organizational bloat, bureaucratic BS, and constant deployments just became too much.

As you can imagine, it really wears on you to be gone 6 mo's every year risking your life for a counterproductive endless war that the American public barely knows is happening.