Lt. C
ol. Michael Brill, an Air Force Reserve pilot assigned to the 421st Expeditionary Fighter Squadron at Balad AB, Iraq, on May 2 became the first-ever pilot to accumulate more than 6,000 total flight hours in the cockpit of the F-16 fighter. He surpassed the mark during a combat mission over Iraq. “I love to fly. I don’t remember ever wanting to do anything else,” said Brill, who is assigned to the 419th Fighter Wing at Hill AFB, Utah. “The fact that I’ve flown 6,000 hours of incident-free flying is a testament to an amazing machine and our dedicated maintenance support airmen.” Brill is no stranger to breaking aviation records. In 1993, he became the world’s first F-16 pilot to reach 3,000 flight hours. Five years later, he crossed the 4,000-hour threshold; in 2002, he surpassed 5,000 hours. Six thousand hours equates to 250 days in the cockpit, not counting all the time preparing for the flight and then the post-mission activities. (Balad report by 1st Lt. Lisa Spilinek)
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.