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Going from a civilian to fighter pilot

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flyf15

Well-known member
Joined
Jul 13, 2004
Posts
548
Going from a civilian to military pilot

Hey guys,

I am extremely unknowledgable with anything to do with the military, but lately my interest has been growing greatly. I like the idea of serving my country and I'm very interested in joining the military and, well, flying jets. Fighters, bombers, transports, it all sounds good to me...

I'm currently a pretty young guy with a B.S. in engineering under my belt as well as being a CFI with about 600 hours. In good health, eyesight good enough to pass a First Class medical without glasses.

So, my three questions...
1) Do I stand a chance? I'm already done with college so no academies or ROTC for me.
2) Is is possible to be guarenteed to fly before officially signing up?
3) How do I go about starting all of this? Like I said, I'm clueless... just a wide-eyed kid with big dreams.


I'm sure stuff like this comes up a lot, thanks much all for the help.
 
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First of all, I'll let you know I spent almost 7 years asking myself, "Do I stand a chance?" until I finally bit the bullet and decided to apply and here I am 4 years later as a pilot in the AF. You'll never know unless you try. From what you say above, you've got as much of a chance as anyone else, if not better. Of course, above average AFOQT and BAT scores, as well as a high PCSM score are going to help even more. Having a CFI will help you with that stuff.

I went the OTS route. You can apply for a pilot slot/nav slot and will find out as a civilian whether or not you got the slot. You will also go through a Flight Class I physical in the application process and I believe they now send you to Brooks for the FCI and medical flight screening at the same time. In the past, you just did the FCI and then did the medical flight screening at Brooks AFB, TX after you were commissioned. This was a slight risk because you could still be DQ'd out of UPT at Brooks after you were commissioned and be reclassified to another career field. But, as I said, I believe they are knocking everything out at once, which makes sense (they should have done it like this all along IMO).

If you don't get the slot, you are still a civilian and can choose not to go to OTS and even better, you can try again. With your qualifications, as long as you found a good recruiter, jumped through the right hoops with the application paperwork, got good scores on your AFOQT/BAT tests, got a few good recommendation letters, etc... I see you being very competitive. Now, this is for Active Duty Air Force. You can also try the Air National Guard or AF reserves route, which is sorta a different ball game.

If for any reason you feel that you wouldn't want to serve in the Air Force if you weren't able to fly in the Air Force (in other words, as an unrated officer in another career field), I wouldn't recommend you take this route. The only reason I say this is, I see so many of these posts from "wide-eyed kids with big dreams" wanting to be a jet jock wearing a green suit (or more like a tan suit these days) and really don't know what being an officer in the AF is all about. It's not all about flying and a lot of the time, you'll be doing stuff totally unrelated to flying. Trust me, I was in your shoes 4 years ago with "big dreams" and a lot of the stuff I do on a daily basis as an officer was not in my big dreams. Call it being naive and not doing my homework. Do your homework and know exactly what you're getting yourself into, because the recruiters won't necessarily tell you these things. You walk into their offices and what do they have plastered all over their walls? Pictures of F-16's, 15's, KC-10's refueling F-16's/15's, C-17's kicking up dust on an unprepared strip, you name it, cool stuff indeed, but they don't show you the picture of the desk you will work at 4-5 days a week while you're not flying. Yes, there are other things pilots (officers) do in the AF. Having a CFI already, I can see you've put some significant time and money into flying. You probably want a flying career. Being a pilot in the AF may not be what you consider a flying career.

That said, it's a great opportunity to fly some cool stuff that noone in the commercial world in their right minds would allow you to put your little mitts on with 300 hours of flight training. The most fun I've ever had in an aircraft was in UPT flying the T-6. Just know that you may not fly as much as you may have thought, especially if you fly fighters. These guys/gals fly about 250-300 hours a year. You will, however, spend a gazillion hours in a vault studying weapon parameters and tactics. You go out, do your 1.2 hour sortie, run out of gas and return to base. Heavy pilots get about 600-800 hours a year. I've flown about 600 this past year in the KC-135. 400 of that is combat time over Iraq/Afghanistan.

Good luck. Look for recruiters that deal with Air Force Officer Training School accessions.
 
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1.2 fighter hours != 1.2 anything else hours

TankerDriver said:
The most fun I've ever had in an aircraft was in UPT flying the T-6. Just know that you may not fly as much as you may have thought, especially if you fly fighters. These guys/gals fly about 250-300 hours a year. You will, however, spend a gazillion hours in a vault studying weapon parameters and tactics. You go out, do your 1.2 hour sortie, run out of gas and return to base. Heavy pilots get about 600-800 hours a year. I've flown about 600 this past year in the KC-135. 400 of that is combat time over Iraq/Afghanistan.

How can I put this politely...

When that 1.2 hrs of flying is the most intense/fun/challenging 1.2 hrs that you have ever spent in your life, it more than makes up for any BS you have to put up with the rest of the time.

There are billions of people in the world that would pay millions of dollars (if they had it) to go do what I get to do every day - and I get paid for it!

I'll let everyone elses' comments stand on the commitment/non-flying duties/family issues, because they're all true. But my point is this: there is NOTHING else in the world to compare with flying a fighter. Period.

Cheers,
Jason
 
I agree with Mongoose69. There is no comparison. Eating a box lunch on your way home from the AR track isn't quite the same as having snot trickle down your throat in a high-G turn, trying to keep sight.

Don't get me wrong, SAR bubbas and Tanker drivers don't pay for beer if I'm in the bar too, but there is nothing...NOTHING like flying a fighter.
 
Occam's Razor posted
having snot trickle down your throat in a high-G turn, trying to keep sight.

You obviously haven't spent much time in Miss'ippi. We had to contend with streams of sweat pouring down the visor,too!;)

That being said I gotta jump on this bandwagon. Any BS you have to put up with is worth it when it's time to step to the jet.

Another thing, you will serve with the best people you will meet in your life. Yeah, like everywhere else, there is the occasional tool, and the military attracts some first-class tools, but, overall, you'll serve with some truly outstanding folks.
 
Go talk to a recruiter. Keep in mind that the USAF eye exam is going to be a lot more extensive than a FAA First Class Medical. FAA medicals are a joke compared to a USAF exam.
 
I went through OTS also. Ditto above. You could also consider going through ROTC if you want to finish a masters program, BUT remember the age cutoff....if you are close to it I say go OTS....
 
Mongoose69 said:
How can I put this politely...


I'll let everyone elses' comments stand on the commitment/non-flying duties/family issues, because they're all true. But my point is this: there is NOTHING else in the world to compare with flying a fighter. Period.

I guess the only thing I would compare it to is a rectal exam. Considering I have done neither..the fighter or the exam, the people I have met look like they just did both. Just kidding with you Jason. Just for the record, real men and women fly Herks. There I said my part. Enjoy the ride and the deployments if you go any route. Seriously Jason I have nevr had an exam.
 
Mongoose69 said:
How can I put this politely...

When that 1.2 hrs of flying is the most intense/fun/challenging 1.2 hrs that you have ever spent in your life, it more than makes up for any BS you have to put up with the rest of the time.

There are billions of people in the world that would pay millions of dollars (if they had it) to go do what I get to do every day - and I get paid for it!

I'll let everyone elses' comments stand on the commitment/non-flying duties/family issues, because they're all true. But my point is this: there is NOTHING else in the world to compare with flying a fighter. Period.

Cheers,
Jason

Put it however you want (thanks for sparing me with politeness, though :rolleyes: ), but there are actually people out there that don't enjoy flying fighters and would have rather gone heavies (I personally know one of them). Of course, you'll probably find more people in the heavy world wishing they had gone or gotten fighters, but there are a few who go the other way.

I would agree that there probably is nothing in the world like flying a fighter, but yet, there are people that decide, for whatever reason, they do not want to go that route.
 
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