Airman Magazine: Can you recall a specific time when you failed or took a calculated risk which ultimately propelled you forward, either personally or on a specific mission? Brig. Gen. Leavitt: When I graduated from pilot training, the law had changed to allow women in combat, but the Department of Defense policy did not allow women […]

The Stearman model 75, or Stearman Kaydet, was the primary trainer for Army and Navy pilots for more than a decade. The two-seater biplane’s simple and sturdy design made it ideal for novice pilots. “This was usually the first airplane that they (Army Air Corps cadets) flew, so they got some ground school and then […]

For nearly two decades the T-6A Texan II has been the gateway for hopeful students to enter into the realm of becoming Air Force pilots. The Texan II is a two-seat, single-engine aircraft capable of aerobatic maneuvers and has a zero altitude/zero airspeed ejection seat for student safety. Development In the 1980s, aircraft performance and […]

In December 2018, Airman magazine interviewed Maj. Gen. Mark E. Smith, the Civil Air Patrol’s 24th national commander. He leads CAP’s more than 60,000 members across the United States in fulfilling the U.S. Air Force auxiliary’s Congressionally chartered missions of emergency services, cadet programs and aerospace education, in addition to the organization’s steadily increasing role […]

With its precision, stealth, long-range capability and payload capacity, the B-2 Spirit is one of the most versatile airframes in the Air Force’s inventory. The combination of its unique capabilities enables global reach and allows the Air Force to bypass the enemy’s most sophisticated defenses. The B-2 Spirit’s low-observable, or stealth, characteristics give it the […]

Last year, when Hurricane Irma, a monster Category 5 storm, barreled toward Florida’s southern peninsula and Homestead Air Reserve Base, The Air Force Reserve commander had a lot of decisions to make. Thankfully, history – in the form of Air Force historians – was on her side. The Air Force Reserve Command history office pulled […]

The young pilot struggled against dust and wind that swirled 10,000 feet above valleys sandwiched between Mexico’s Sierra Madre mountains. He had only a rudimentary pair of plain glass goggles to protect his face. Yet he was determined to find the trail of the rebel bandit Pancho Villa who had recently led a raid into […]

Seventy years ago, with Adolf Hitler’s crumbled Third Reich still fresh in their memories and Joseph Stalin’s Soviet Union having a choke hold on their future, Berlin’s children were starving. With the Nazi surrender in 1945, the Allies divided the defeated Germany. The French, British and Americans took the western half of the nation spreading […]

For more than 50 years, the Northrop T-38 Talon has been the principal supersonic jet trainer used by the U.S. Air Force. The twin jet-powered aircraft, which has tandem-seats for the instructor and student pilot, is the world’s first supersonic trainer. Air Education and Training Command is the primary user of the T-38 for joint specialized undergraduate pilot […]

In the Air Force, squadrons are the basic level of operations, its “beating heart” as Chief of Staff of the Air Force Gen. David Goldfein calls them. To better understand how significant the squadron is to the Air Force, it’s also important to know what a squadron is. Within the Air Force, the squadron is […]