“Those who went straight to Rucker and had no other experience and no T-6 rides had very little clue when they arrived, but after six months they were pretty good. “We have five courses in varying states,” comments Wills. Experiments have been run with sending students straight to the TH-1H Huey at Rucker, and other groups have trained with a civilian contractor before heading to the TH-1. Traditionally, students have flown the T-6 before moving to helicopters, but Helicopter Training Next ultimately accelerates their path to training on helicopters at Fort Rucker in Alabama. The USAF is overhauling its rotary-wing track too. A lot of students have civilian flying experience when they join the air force, and this is the perfect way to accelerate them through training, and this program is especially good for the Air National Guard and the Air Force Reserves when the students have existing pilot experience.” Two more of these classes are on the way, and we really believe in the program. With UPT 2.5 we have been able to create T-1 capacity in the short term. They caught on really quickly and by the end of the program, our check pilots reported they were indistinguishable from an ordinary T-1 pilot who had previously completed T-6s. They flew really well, although as you would expect their airmanship and experience were lacking at the beginning of the program.

“They look exactly the same as any other T-1 student pilot, except they didn’t fly the T-6 at all.

“Fundamentally, in seven months versus the usual 12 months we graduated seven of the eight, and the last student will graduate imminently,” Wills explained.

Jet fighter pilot