I’m specifically interested to help with a story I’m writing, but in general I’m somewhat curious: I know that anyone who wants to pilot a fixed-wing aircraft in the US military starts by getting a commission, presumably through a service academy or ROTC. After they’ve gotten a commission, what are the steps between “You scored a pilot slot” and “Here’s a squadron, a plane, and a job description”? I’m particularly interested in what the training environment is like, and how they divide up and organize all the various required skillsets into schools.
There are a few routes in the American military. My own route in the USAF was that I was prior enlisted and then finished my degree. After the BA, I was qualified for a commission as an officer. I tested for a variety of apptitudes and scored high enough to land a pilot’s slot. I went to Flight Screening Program- Officer Training (FSPOT) at Lackland AFB in Texas. We flew out of Del Rio. After completion of that, I went to OTS for the commission to 2nd Lt. While I was there, I broke my foot, leading to a medical reassignment, but I would have gone to a flight school specialized to a specific type of aircraft after OTS. I was scheduled for A-10s with a back up of C-130s. Hope that helps.
It’s a fairly arduous process, with a significant failure rate. Once you’re commissioned and identified to be a pilot you go to Undergraduate Pilot Training, where they hammer you with academics out the wazoo and make you fly many different kinds of aircraft. If you fail at any point you’re done. Once you’re through that you train on your specific airframe. Again, you fail any part of that and it’s over.
Then you get to your unit and go through their qualification process. They will go through hell to get you qualed, but if you can’t do it they’re not going to keep you in a pilot slot. Then you have to fly for currency, keep up to date on all local regulations, re-qualify in a simulator once every two years or so, and get a qualification checkride every 18 months.
As an enlisted aviator the only difference between me and a pilot is the initial qualification training. I still get checkrides, I still have to keep up with all local regulations, and I still have to keep current with my equipment and publications. The pilots get more intensive training out of necessity but anybody who flies gets trained out the wazoo, with washouts common in every flying career field for every conceivable reason. Can’t pop your ears in the altitude chamber? You’re done. It can be that simple.
The people who actually fly in the military are extremely well trained and have gone through a lot of barriers to get there. You know the joke about the difference between a pilot and God? The reason that holds true is because they can look at all the people who didn’t make it. They believe they are great because when you look at it they actually are in a sense.