The Civil Air Patrol has flown 50 sorties—roughly half the Air Force total—for Hurricane Rita, providing photo reconnaissance of potential damage, oil spills, traffic congestion, flood assessment, and live multispectral imagery for state and federal agencies.
Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall doesn’t see great value in trying to break the Sentinel ICBM program off as a separate budget item the way the Navy has with its ballistic-missile submarine program, saying such a move wouldn’t create any new money for the Air Force to spend on other…