Six F-16 fighter jets and 120 personnel from the 31st Fighter Wing, Aviano Air Base, Italy, will begin a joint training operation Thursday at Lask Air Base, Poland, through Oct. 8, Pentagon spokesman Army Col. Steve Warren announced Sept. 3. In addition to Air Force units headed to the Baltics, members from the 31st FW will also participate in Ample Strike, a NATO-led exercise with 11 other nations in the Czech Republic. Farther east, Rapid Trident — the first exercise to include 200 U.S. ground troops since the Kiev government began fighting pro-Russian separatists — will take place Sept. 15 to Sept.…
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The Air Force’s chief legal officer wants to know what you think it will take to reduce sexual assault in the military. General Counsel Charles A. Blanchard asks airmen and civilians alike for feedback on a blog post this week. Blanchard oversees Air Force lawyers around the world. The call-out comes just more than a week after the chief of the Air Force’s Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office was arrested for sexual battery in Arlington, Va. Lt. Col. Jeff Krusinski is accused of grabbing the breasts and buttocks of a woman he didn’t know outside a Crystal City restaurant…
Approximately 1,000 mourners came together Feb. 6 to pay their respects to Maj. Lucas Gruenther, the F-16 pilot who was killed after his viper went missing off the coast of Italy on Jan. 28. Gruenther, who went by the callsign “Gaza,” was posthumously promoted to major. He had been selected but was waiting to pin on the rank. “Nothing I can say can put the emotional stress on the life and the hope and the ambition that he has given everyone he’s known,” said Maj. Travis Winslow, 555th Fighter Squadron pilot, according to an Air Force write-up of the memorial.…
