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Show A COUNTRY . Twice Monthly Adyniiunnn oonnirad bmnkn do rl oonlituM 388th Fighter Wing supplement to the Hilltop Times ndormfH by th Dwrtimm of Dln th U.S. Aif Foro Of Hilt AFB. Evryttre dvrti d l vilbt without ford to fCA colof. raligkin, April 4, , or uf ollw nonmrtt factor ol th HJchJf, r 1996 mtron. Keeping watch Hard work pays off for wing lieutenant By Wynne Rasmussen Staff writer If at first you don't succeed try, try again. This advice may seem trite but hard work, persistence and determination can chime into one's success as 1st Lt John D. Smith, chief 388th Fighter Wing public affairs, has shown. Smith has been selected for the Funded Legal Education Program and will attend the Duquesne School of Law in Pittsburgh, Pa., near his hometown. To be considered for FLEP, Smith had to be on active duty for two years, take the Law School Admissions Test, be accepted at a law school and interview with the base staff judge advocate. Then a FLEP board reviewed . statements in regard to Smith's abilities. Since it is not easy to be accepted and only a select few are chosen each year, this was the lieutenant's third attempt for FLEP. "I think the big reasons I was accepted were persistence and a lot of help and support from commanders, supervisors and the base staffjudge advocates here and at Lan-glAFB, Va.," Smith said. During his junior year at the Air Force Academy he had an Introduction to the American Legal System class which intrigued him so much he. changed his major from management to legal studies. "During the next year and a half, I found myself not only doing the required work, but doing additional work and readings for my own knowledge," Smith said. "During my senior year I looked into becoming an Air Force attorney." The Air Force can only afford to dedicate so much money a year to the program, so candidates must select their school with funding in mind. Administrators at Duquesne University awarded Smith a $7,000 per year scholarship which makes up any financial differences. At Duquesne, Smith will take the regular academic course load while status. maintaining his active-dut- y During th? summer he will intern with different legal offices in the Air Force. Upon graduation he will become an Air Force judge advocate. lieutenant Smith has done a wonderful job for the wing. They're gain is our loss," said Col. Bentley Rayburn, 388th FW commander and Smith's supervisor. Fbato by SrA. J.C. Woodring During a recent training exercise, MSgt Marc A. McCutchan, 729th Air Control Squadron aerospace ground equipment shop, waits in the bushes to attack a convoy of vehicles from his own unit, i The 729th ACS practices convoy tactics training on a regular basis to help keep their convoys alive if ever attacked in a hostile environment J By ey SrA J.C. Woodring Editor, Fighter Country stalled, When Capt Steve Clapp's F-recovering crashing wasn't on his mind was. Clapp, a pilot in the 34th Fighter Squadron, was a student in High Angle of Attack Training at Edwards AFB, Calif. - The training was invaluable," said Clapp. "I hope I never have to do it again, but if I do, I'm a lot more confident after this training." Clapp is one of six in the 34th FS that have participated in the training since it opened to Air Combat Command pilots last falL ; "Before this training, the only way to this experience was during an actual get emergency," he said. The one-dtraining was in three parts: academics, flying and flame-olanding. The biggest tiling this training did was show me that the flight manual procedures work," said Clapp. "It's not easy to stall an If the aircraft does stall, the jet is designed to recover by itself. It will even move the flight controls for you." ay ut F-1-6. lesson from the Another training is knowing when to say when, according to Clapp. "If you let it try to recover, then you try yourself, and it still doesn't respond before you reach 6,000 feet, punch out There's something else wrong. A life isn't worth it," he said. "If you go down with your jet, the jet still crashes and nothing changes you are dead." According to Clapp, the instructors really know their business, and proved it during the flying portion of the training. life-savi- ng Being accepted to FLEP is an honor and Smith anticipates law school to be very challenging. "I hope my experiences with the Air Force and public affairs have helped prepare me to meet those challenges," he said. experience for pilots First-han- d ' and "We took off in a Block 10 climbed to 35,000 feet," Clapp said. Then, on purpose!" we put it out of control Once the jet was out of control, Clapp, with his test pilot instructor in the back seat, did as he was trained to do. "I just let go of the controls and let the do its thing," he said. jet Just as expected, the Falcon recovered without a hitch. "I wasn't flying," said Clapp. The tail was flapping. The wings were moving. I just sat there and watched." After recovering, Clapp did something that would be unthinkable in the world he did it again. The jet didn't recover every time on its own. "Sometimes I had to apply Critical Action Procedures to recover the aircraft from the condition," said Clapp. ' These procedures help the aircraft recover when it doesn't automatically. The training covered two different types of stalls: upright and inverted. An upright stall is when the aircraft is up. An inverted stall is falling right-sid- e when it falls upside-dow"Falling inverted, you see the ground getting closer and closer while hanging in the straps," said Clapp. The final part of the training was landnon-traini- there's no engine to help you get the jet to the runway at the correct speed. You have one chance to make everything happen and safely land the jet" Clapp, like most other pilots, has practiced a modified version of this before. During normal training, pilots fly low and slow over the runway. Then, they calculate the simulated stopping distance before flying around and landing normally, according to Clapp. This was the first time I actually got to touch down and stop from a simulated flame-olanding," he said. After completing the training, Clapp feels more comfortable, but hopes the training won't be needed. "It's like anything in our profession. Train for the worst and hope you'll never need it" he said. ut Vice commander slated to be 12AF n. ing. "It's called flame-oapproaches," said with "You land your engine out" Clapp. can glide up to 7 miles While the F-drop, according to Clapp, per 5,000-fotouching down on the runway isn't the only hard part getting it stopped without running off the runway is just as difficult "You have to be able to stop before you run off the end of the runway," he said, "and, ut 16 ot inspector general Colonel Michael S. Brake, 388th Fighter Wing vice commander, has been selected for an asstgnement He will travel to AFB, Ariz., to be the next 12th Air Force Inspector General this fall Brake has been with the wing Davis-Month- an since July 1994, The new vice commander will be Col. James E. AH good, currently stationed in Turkey. |