Boeing announced Monday
that the Air Force has tasked it to develop a C-17 distributed training center at Scott AFB, Ill., headquarters of Air Mobility Command. The center, projected for standup in January 2012, will serve as the hub for networking the Air Force’s 10 existing C-17 training sites across the US and will expand the current capabilities of those sites to participate in distributed planning and training exercises. Sean Carey, AMC’s program manager for distributed mission operations, said the DTC will enable the command “to conduct continuation and mission-qualification training, execute mission-rehearsal operations, develop tactics, and participate in large-force exercises in a realistic environment at a fraction of live-fly costs and with very little risk.”
A provision in the fiscal 2025 defense policy bill will require the Defense Department to include the military occupational specialty of service members who die by suicide in its annual report on suicide deaths, though it remains to be seen how much data the department will actually disclose.