The Air Force is now letting enlisted personnel, not just officers, fly radio-controlled drones.
Produced for Dec. 21, 2015, but can air a few days later.
The Los Angeles Times reported Dec. 17 that the Air Force is now taking enlisted personnel as drone pilots for the first time, because they need so many soldiers to fly the drones. Intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, or ISR, is the military's growing sector. "If you talk to combatant commanders around the world, which I do regularly, and ask them, 'What is the one more thing you need from the Air Force?,' they will always reply, 'I want more ISR,'" said Air Force Secretary Deborah Lee James. Enlisted personnel are only handling surveillance so far, not firing missile and killing targets from remote control. Officers, for now, will be the only ones operating MQ-1 Predator and MQ-9 Reaper drones. "In fiscal year 2014, the most recent data available, the Air Force trained 180 drone pilots, and 240 veterans left the field," The Los Angeles Times reported.
Enlisted personnel in the Air Force can now fly drones for Dec. 21, 2015
Radio news about radio waves.
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Dec. 21, 2015
Produced at Wave Farm/WGXC in the Hudson Valley, New York.
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