Hola

I feel like I should make each of my blog entries in Spanish as that's all I hear when I get off this base. 3 miles from Mexico and it seems like all the immigrants that made it into the US decided to set up shop right here in Del Rio.

Not a bad couple days. We are in a week of Aerospace Physiology and had our first test today on Survival. It was a pretty poorly written/explained exam but I passed and that's all that matters! We went through the egress system and how to "punch out" of the T-6 in our full g-suit, harness, helmet and mask which was interesting. We also went over some of the oxygen system and techniques to ensure the mask is on properly. The mask will take some getting used to but it definitely looks cool...

Next test is Monday so I'll have the weekend to be ready for that. Besides that I just have to keep up with the Bold Face & Ops limits which is this sheet of emergency procedures and operational limits of the T-6 that you have to know word for wore, number by number. They give us blank ones to fill out and I think we won't get to come to class in flight suits until everyone gets it right 3 days in a row. Good stuff heh. I've got it down fine so hopefully we'll have it down in the next couple weeks. 

Good to go

Just wanted to let you know that the physical went fine today. Not without a little concern, but I passed and that should be the end of the medical issues unless I get ill. My bp was high the first time (of course) but came down to acceptable levels (by 3 points i believe) and also for some reason it took me a few takes on the glaucoma test where they blow the air at your eye. The numbers would change and each eye has to be within 3 points of the other eye - and it took me a few times to get that spread.

So a little pressure off with that being done and now I can enjoy my weekend and take a look at some of this information i have in my box of pubs and materials. I think Josh (TN ANG), Aaron (Alaska ANG) and I are going to get together over the weekend and hang out and go over some materials for a little guard study session. I don't think I mentioned before but I found out on Wed that we'll be splitting up into 2 groups when the flying starts and I'll be separated from both of them, but it's yet to be seen how that effects us studying together and stuff like that so yeah kind of a bummer but we'll deal. 

Have a nice weekend!

Books-A-Million

Alright - So Day 2 is over and tomorrow is just a physical (hopefully the BP will be low). Yesterday was mainly lots and lots of briefings. We met our Boss of sorts for the next year and he's a great dude from the looks of things, they seem to have our best interest in mind as they want to get the most out of us in the coming months. The big story for the day was picking up all my Pubs and Study Materials. Some of it applies for the entire program but much of it is only on the T-6. It's pretty amazing that there's this much material involved!

I took a picture but it doesn't do it justice. I have a box that holds 10 reems of paper and it was completely full. So as long as tomorrows physical goes well I'll be in the clear and we'll get rolling into our first class on Monday which is the survival portion of aviation physiology I believe. It looks like I'll probably be hanging in Del Rio this weekend since Josh and I will possibly be meeting his parents in Dallas next weekend to pick up his jet ski. 

On a side note, today was actually the first somewhat nice day since I've been here. the hurricane stuff kept the temperature down and it only just recently started raining and the wind picked up - but overall very pleasant. Hopefully I'll have good news to report on about the physical and I'll let everyone know soon.  Adios.

Welcome to Active Duty...

Aye what a night. So yesterday afternoon I get a call from one of the captains nicely telling me that I'v been selected to be "on call" and that I might get a phone call with further instructions. Later I get a call from a Lt. Colonel explaining that I needed to be available at a moments notice to be able to show up in uniform at a to be determined location at a tbd time to do what will be explained at the time. Now of course I'm very curious about what might be going on here. Is this some sort of emergency scenario? Is this some kind of hazing event they do before you start pilot training? I have no idea. Anyway, so I hang around the base and don't drink any alcohol per the instructions and get to sleep around 1215 thinking I'm probably in the clear now. 

Wrong. I get a call at 215AM telling me to be at the Seminar Hall at 320, which of course I wasn't too excited about, I decide at this point it's not worth sleeping another half hour and risk not waking back up and decide to very slowly take my shower (in a very bad mood) and get ready to leave. I show up to find out they're doing mass dorm "safety (drug) inspections" and drug testing on all the unaccompanied enlisted folks living in the dorms. Of course since this is active duty, the reggies had the inspection directions in sealed envelopes and it was all very cloak and dagger and nonetheless I found it somewhat amusing. 

Myself and the 5 other guys (this by the way somehow included all 3 guard guys even though there's like 40 people in the transition group right now...odd) were put on the drug testing observation team and had to watch people pee in cups for 3.5 hours. I definitely felt bad for all these enlisted kids, i say kids because most looked like they were between 18 and 20 though there were some older ones. I definitely can't imagine an episode like that being much of a morale booster but I guess someone decided it was necessary to completely invade their evening and privacy. Perhaps the guard has just made me soft ~

 So that's how I spent my first Saturday night on base at Del Rio. Leasson learned: Go to San Antonio every weekend :)

I should say that our current boss was kind enough to let us sleep in tomorrow and not show up for the roll call we do at 0830. I'm pretty much done all my in-processing stuff now and ready for class on Wednesday! 

Dorm Pics

Hey everyone. 

Not much new here. Went out and checked out Lake Amistad and the Laughlin Services marina where we can rent boats and stuff. Josh might be having his parents bring his jet ski to Dallas where he'd meet them and bring it down to Del Rio which would be very cool. I took a few pictures of my dorm room and stuck them on a slideshow here: Slideshow.

Hope everyone has a nice weekend I'll catch ya later.

6 Days and counting...

I was wandering around today and snapped a few pics of the flightline. The first picture is the T-1's and the next two are the T-6's. Today I was fitted by life support for my Helmet, Mask, Harness and G-Suit which was pretty cool. I didn't know we'd be wearing g-suits during T-6's so I get to be a fighter pilot of sorts for 5 months - good stuff. This weekend I'll be staying in Del Rio and probably try and see the new Batman movie tomorrow, it looks like it should be as good as the previous edition. 

A couple pictures...

Eventually I'll take some pictures of the base and my room and such but here's just 2 quick pictures from San Antonio. First a picture from the boat ride on the River Walk that Megan and I went on and then a picture of the Superman Roller Coaster at Six Flags. Finally, a quick picture of me trying on my flight suit! All my pictures will be from my phone for now until I either find my camera or buy a new one. 

PRE-PHASE 1 / Arrival

Hello everyone. I am starting this blog to hopefully keep friends and family updated and give some info on UPT to the strangers scouring the internet for such gouge. 

I arrived at Laughlin AFB on 9 July after a nice 5-day drive consisting of stops in Charlotte NC, Pensacola FL, Houston TX, San Antonio TX and finally Del Rio Tx. It was a fun 2000 miles that Megan joined me on and we had a great time although it ended in her departure :(

My class starts on 23 July and until then I spend the majority of my time doing in-processing paperwork here, faxing orders and travel voucher stuff to my unit in NY, moving into my dorm, and trying not to get too bored. 

I just got my internet and television hooked up today so that's great and I'm fortunate to have another guard guy in my class that went through AMS (my commissioning program) with me, and we've been hanging out a lot and keeping busy. We were only here 2 days and decided to cruise out to San Antonio for the weekend and do Six Flags which was a lot of fun

I guess I'll describe the program here a bit in my first post to everone. 

Our class only has 3 guard guys, the rest are active duty folks along with 3 Italians that just arrived. It's definitely nice to be ANG because we already know what aircraft were flying and where were going to be after UPT (aka: home)

I start Phase I on 23 July which lasts 6 weeks and is all classwork and tests and NO flying. 

Phase II begins right after that and lasts 4.5 months. This will be the most difficult part of my training but also the most fun if I get a chance to enjoy it. I'll be flying the T-6 and working on a number of different facets of military flying. 

Phase III is the final part of my training and lasts about 6 months. I'll be flying the T-1 which is the track aircraft for those going to Cargo or Refueling missions. This won't be as intense as phase II and will consist of a lot of cross country and instrument flying which will be very cool.

That's about all I have for now. I'll do my best to get some pictures and keep this page updated and things move along and try to keep everyone informed. Thanks for keeping tabs!