Air Force base’s vice commander involved in fatal jet training crash
The No. 2 commander of Laughlin AFB’S training wing was one of three pilots involved in the Nov. 19 crash of two T-38C Talon jets that killed a student and badly injured another aviator.
Three sources familiar with the incident said Col. Nathan A. Thompson, vice commander of the 47th Flying Training Wing, walked away from the crash. Two of them said the jets were making a risky but permitted maneuver called a formation approach when they went down.
The Air Education and Training Command and Laughlin officials have identified the pilot who was killed as 2nd Lt. Anthony D. Wentz, 23, of Falcon, Colo., but have not released the names of the other aviators.
Col. Todd Vician, the AETC’S chief spokesman, said the Air Force typically releases the names of those killed in crashes but not the injured. There have been exceptions to that practice, however, over the years — including crashes that involved Laughlin-based pilots.
Laughlin and the AETC would not even say if the supersonic trainer jets were landing or taking off. The planes crashed close to each other on a stretch of runway around 10 a.m. Nov. 19, one of them upside-down.
“The circumstances of the accident are still being investigated and we’ll provide additional information after the investigation is completed,” Vician said.
Some who saw photos of the crash scene at Laughlin, near Del Rio, said it looked similar to an accident two years ago at Vance AFB in Enid, Okla., where a pair of pilots were killed while making a formation landing. A mishap report on that crash blamed it on pilot error and led to the Air Force banning that maneuver.
Formation approaches, in which two aircraft approach the runway
until one lands while the other splits off, are allowed by the Air Force. Vician did not know how closely the planes typically fly or their altitude above the runway before one of them breaks off. Formation takeoffs also are allowed. Thompson, a command pilot with more than 2,100 hours in jets that include the T-38A, T-38C and F-15C/D, was treated and released from Val Verde Regional Medical Center in Del Rio after the crash. A 2000 Air Force Academy graduate, he became vice commander at the wing last June and in 2013 had led the 469th Flying Training Squadron, EURONATO Joint Jet Pilot Training, at Sheppard AFB in Wichita Falls.
The other instructor pilot in last month’s crash, who was flown to Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, remained in critical condition Wednesday. The 47th Flying Training Wing’s commander, Col. Craig Prather, said in a statement after the crash that “losing teammates is unbelievably painful” and added, “Our hearts, thoughts, and prayers are with our pilots involved in this mishap and their families.”
The pilots were flying a version of a plane that first took wing late in the Eisenhower administration and saw service in Vietnam as the F-5 Freedom Fighter. The Air Force uses its two-seat version, the T-38 Talon, to train pilots learning to fly a range of aircraft that include the F-15E Strike Eagle, F-15C Eagle, F-16 Fighting Falcon, B-1B Lancer, A-10 Thunderbolt and F-22 Raptor. Students in advanced training fly the T-38C in aerobatics, formation, night, instrument and cross-country navigation training.
A military source in San Antonio pointed to pilot retention problems, high operations tempo, less experienced instructor pilots and flying curriculum changes as possible contributing factors to the trend of T-38 mishaps.
Aviators who recently graduated from flight training and those whose primary experience is in non-fighter aircraft, such as cargo aircraft like the C-17 Globemaster III , are serving as T-38 instructor pilots.
Some fear the lack of experience raises safety risks during flight training. That fear was realized on Feb. 19 when a Columbus AFB,
Miss.-based T-38 crashed in Montgomery, Ala., killing the instructor pilot and student.
According to the accident report, the instructor, Air Force 1st Lt. Scot Ames, 24, was considered “an inexperienced instructor pilot” who lost “situational awareness on final approach” and “failed to take timely and necessary actions as a dangerous situation developed.”
Five fatal T-38 crashes since 2017 have claimed eight pilots’ lives across the fleet, with Laughlin-based Talons involved in three of those. There have been at least three other nonfatal accidents in the same period.
The instructor in the Nov. 21, 2019 crash at Vance, Lt. Col. John “Matt” Kincade, 47, and his student pilot, 2nd Lt. Travis Wilkie, 23, died when their plane collided with another T-38 to their right, while landing in formation.
An Air Force mishap report said their aircraft became briefly airborne after touching down, rolled rapidly to the right and touched down, skidded, crossed the runway centerline, lifted off again and struck the second plane.
A report in late 2020 by the National Commission on Military Aviation Safety studied more than 6,000 aircraft mishaps across the armed services from fiscal years 2013-18 and concluded pilots had lost proficiency because a lack of consistent funding had prevented them from flying enough.
It said crews made do with inadequate training and were slammed with administrative duties while struggling to get funding. They endured risky maintenance practices and a crushing operations tempo, a term that refers to the pace of troops training and deploying.
Criticism of formation landings ensued after the crash that killed Kincade and Wilke in Oklahoma. Air Force Magazine reported that Rep. Scott Peters, a California Democrat, wrote AETC’S commander, Lt. Gen. Brad Webb, to express concerns about formation landings and the T-38 itself.
Peters asked for pushing up the timeline for replacing the Talon and asked that the training command end formation landings. The T-7A Red Hawk is slated to replace the nearly 60-year-old T-38 fleet beginning in 2023. However, the T-7 program continues to experience delays.
Responding to Peters and Wilkie’s family, the magazine said Webb wrote that “formation flying has been an integral part of military training and operations” and that “has been the case throughout modern aviation.”
Webb said the maneuvers are “built into the tactics, techniques, and procedures of current USAF platforms enabling increased survivability in combat and providing options for safe recoveries of aircraft during certain avionics malfunctions.”