B-1B, Ellsworth, all eject

[Warlock]

Trying to stay flying as a commissioned RA Army Officer, I reverted to Warrant Officer for five years and then reverted back to a Reserve Commission officer. Later I declined promotion twice to stay in Aviation Units and flying positions…some think I made a mistake retiring as an O-4 , but I was in flying jobs for 20 years and never staff positions except for my last year as Corp Level G3 with promotion on the horizon and a another deployment as a contracting officer in Afghanistan…as far away from Aviation as possible…stop loss was lifted for a few months and I retired. Even pushing the aviation envelope and compromising promotion, I had a little over 2500 hrs of military flight time as a MTP that was always in the Attack side of Army Aviation. Last week spending some time with my kids, I watched my son in law who flies F-35s and going through a FLUG upgrade flying five or six sorties a week and time in the simulator…so optempo and competence is really situational depending on airframe and location. The failure has been well briefed along with a F22 incident where a crew chief was cut in half by ammo bay doors closing on the ground…they are aware of the problems at the user level but what is happening who knows.