AF wastes money doing missions CAP can do at little cost

[DNall]

That's us calling 20-30% unusable - as in blurred, bad GPS, etc so we toss them out to have room on the thumb drive. The customer has more specific needs on target & no doubt throws out a much higher percentage. If a sortie comes back with 500 shots (which is ballpark) and the customer gets a couple dozen frames that meet their need, then that's a successful sortie.

Just so you understand, we're shooting well over 20,000 photos on this current mission. While the front end customer has specific needs, the back end users want a lot more. That's (ex) state insurance board adjusting rate maps, academic researchers, weather service, etc. What they'd like out of this is a systematic mapping of the entire damage area that they can't get from satellites. It's hard to meet that need.

[Viper QA]

What that article did not say is that those missions provided extremely valuable training for the B-52 aircrews. The AF, specifically Air Combat Command (ACC), very recently began testing the AN/AAQ-33 Sniper targeting pod on the B-52H. This was in response to the capability that the USAFR Command has on their B-52s with the AN/AAQ-28 LITENING II targeting pod. Even though Barksdale is an associate unit, ACC did not fund for the LITENING pod, USAFR Command did. Sniper pod integration recently began at Barksdale. I would venture to guess that the Buffs used to fly those SAR missions were equipped with the Sniper pod, serving two purposes; valuable training for the aircrews & SAR intel.

[BuckeyeDEJ]

DNall: I totally understand, having shot on CAP flights before. It's really not much different than professional shooting, so my point was that 20-30 percent going out the window first thing is pretty average.

When I come back from a game, I might shoot 200-300 frames and come back with three I'd be more than happy to use, and another 5-7 that I'm comfortable with. Of the others? Some will be out of focus, a split second too late for the action, or something.

When I shoot from a CAP airplane, my odds are much better. That's because I'm shooting stationary objects. That you need certain angles and you have to make several passes to satisfy an end user, well, I totally understand where you're coming from. If you're coming back from a sortie with an average of 500 frames, it sounds like you're shooting multiple targets....

Before everyone else drools over the B-52's equipment -- you don't need a 22MP camera to do the job. Sure, there are some images that will be better than others, but for someone to say that to shoot in a CAP plane, you need an elephant gun of a lens (like an f2 800?! That's NASA territory) and a multimegapixel CCD, well, I'd be inclined to believe the image itself isn't as important as the bragging rights!

[SJFedor]

What I understand as a taxpayer is that the B-52s cost approximately $25,000 per flight hour to operate and that CAP flights cost only $120 to $160 per flight hour.

What I understand as a CAP member is that while the USAF is trying to come up with creative new reasons -- like taking images of disaster areas -- to justify keeping and maintaining their B-52s, our SDIS system is more than adequate to do the same task and is already paid for.

Bottom line is that when assistance is needed, the USAF would rather spend hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to do something CAP already knows how to do at little cost.

What a waste for everyone.

PS to Flying Pig: Thanks for sticking up for Sparky. Now I know he has a least one friend.

...you've never actually used the SDIS system, have you?

[Auxpilot]

What I understand as a taxpayer is that the B-52s cost approximately $25,000 per flight hour to operate and that CAP flights cost only $120 to $160 per flight hour.

What I understand as a CAP member is that while the USAF is trying to come up with creative new reasons -- like taking images of disaster areas -- to justify keeping and maintaining their B-52s, our SDIS system is more than adequate to do the same task and is already paid for.

Bottom line is that when assistance is needed, the USAF would rather spend hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to do something CAP already knows how to do at little cost.

What a waste for everyone.

PS to Flying Pig: Thanks for sticking up for Sparky. Now I know he has a least one friend.

My guess is the forward thinkers at the Pentagon see the need for the B-52 as it has always been used, as a strategic bomber. Check the recent news articles about our friends over in Russia flexing their muscles again.

As a former member of the 96th Bomb Wing that spent a lot of days and nights underground in an alert bunker, the need for the 52 will never go away. The platform may change but the mission will always be there.

I would like to be taking those photos as much as the next guy but we still need to train our 52 jocks and my guess is that taking shots of EXACT geographic coordinates such as oil wells is great practice for laying ordinance in the back yard of the nuts that want to do us harm

[DNall]

When I shoot from a CAP airplane, my odds are much better. That's because I'm shooting stationary objects. That you need certain angles and you have to make several passes to satisfy an end user, well, I totally understand where you're coming from. If you're coming back from a sortie with an average of 500 frames, it sounds like you're shooting multiple targets....

I don't think you're understanding the mission. We're not shooting a set of selected targets - well to qualify, we did have a couple sorties like that from FEMA, but mostly not. The state stuff, which is the overwhelming bulk of the air mission, is a modified grid pattern with shots every so many seconds at an angle that we train and must have good GPS loaded on the frame. If that doesn't happen then the sortie is wasted, customer doesn't pay, and we do it again from scratch the next day.

In other words, there are no multiple passes. It's photographic mapping of the entire area, not specific targets. From that take, they will absolutely blow up frames to massive size & decide property by property where they are going to move the flood plain boundary lines, etc. We don't fly those "grids" (for lack of a better word) several times, we fly them once. We have to cover thousands of square miles.

[BuckeyeDEJ]

DNall: I think you're right -- I wasn't understanding the mission. That's gotta be a canine of the feminine gender to fly.... you have my sympathies.

[DNall]

I didn't really do any flying myself. I worked on ops, went out on the high profile GT sortie, and ran a POD site for a couple days. The most significant thing I did was working things out with Coast Guard on the ELT portion of the mission.

[RiverAux]

Gee guys, if the AF is already paying all their pilots and fuel costs to do training missions anyway, lets just go ahead and scap CAP since we apparently have nothing to offer and are just an excess expense. 

[PHall]

Gee guys, if the AF is already paying all their pilots and fuel costs to do training missions anyway, lets just go ahead and scap CAP since we apparently have nothing to offer and are just an excess expense. 

Sounds like a plan. I'm sure my congressman will be happy to get right on that.

The money they will save could be put to a better use, like maybe some bridges in Alaska!

[RADIOMAN015]

Well actually, the cost per hour for CAP aircraft is calculated differently than the AF cost per hour on their aircraft.  The AF takes into account the entire maintance & other base support overhead costs (including standard salaries calculations) to come up with a cost per flying hour.   CAP is basically looking at the operational/maintenance cost and doesn't really look at the overhead costs to run the program which at very least should be all the costs associated with HQ CAP in the operations directoriate.  (based upon total flying hours projeted for the year divided into total opeating costs).
I think CAP still is a very good deal cost wise.  HOWEVER, the AF has to fly training missions anyways "sunk costs" so if they have the capability to do some recon while on those training flights than there really isn't any additional cost because of this.

RADIOMAN

This story in the Sherevport Times has me scratching my head.

Why would the USAF be proud of the fact that very expensive bombers were used to take pictures of disaster areas when CAP can do it for so much less cost to the taxpayers?

In fact, according to CAP, we offer our clients:
3. Can accomplish missions at a fraction of the cost of other agencies. Members are volunteers who are reimbursed only for expenses.
5. Typically $120 - $160 per hour of flight time, depending on aircraft used.

Anyway, read the aricle below and tell me that as a CAP member and taxpayer you aren't annoyed.

[Eclipse]

Well actually, the cost per hour for CAP aircraft is calculated differently than the AF cost per hour on their aircraft.  The AF takes into account the entire maintenancece & other base support overhead costs (including standard salaries calculations) to come up with a cost per flying hour.   CAP is basically looking at the operational/maintenance cost and doesn't really look at the overhead costs to run the program which at very least should be all the costs associated with HQ CAP in the operations directorate.  (based upon total flying hours projected for the year divided into total operating costs)..

Not exactly - while actual "receipt cost" for a CAP flight is about $85-100 an hour depending on fuel costs, our bill-to rate is usually about $250 an hour.

Just like the USAF, no cost calculation is ever really going to be accurate.  The salary, capital, and related costs are fixed if the Airman is sworn and the airframe is procured.  The only "real" cost is any extra expense of fuel, per diem, and other costs incurred specifically for the mission itself, which could potentially be zero if the activity is scheduled during a training situation where the planes are in the air anyway.