The Air National Guard’s Enlisted Aircrew Academic School at Little Rock AFB, Ark., has trained its final loadmaster, bringing its total to 4,182 students over a 20-year period. The school got a one-year reprieve last year when the Air Force realized that its plan to create a single enlisted aircrew center of excellence at Lackland AFB, Tex., initially would mean it wouldn’t have the needed capacity to train enough students. However, the Air Guard’s Little Rock instructors are not quite done: The Marine Corps wants them to train six loadmaster classes in Fiscal 2009, and they are working to develop a syllabus for two ANG-centric enlisted aviator courses. (189th Airlift Wing report by MSgt. Bob Oldham)
The Air Force and Boeing agreed to a nearly $2.4 billion contract for a new lot of KC-46 aerial tankers on Nov. 21. The deal, announced by the Pentagon, is for 15 new aircraft in Lot 11 at a cost of $2.389 billion—some $159 million per tail.