12th Flying Training Wing
The 12th Flying Training Wing (12 FTW) is a United States Air Force unit assigned to the Air Education and Training Command, and formerly of the now inactivated Nineteenth Air Force. It is stationed at Randolph Air Force Base, Texas. The wing is also the parent organization for the 479th Flying Training Group (479 FTG), a geographically separated unit (GSU) located at NAS Pensacola, Florida.
The 12 FTW is the only unit in the Air Force conducting both pilot instructor training and combat systems officer training. The Wing's predecessor unit, the 12th Tactical Fighter Wing fought in combat during the Vietnam War. It was the host unit at two major air bases in South Vietnam. Its F-4 Phantom II aircraft flew thousands of combat missions between 1965 and 1971, before being withdrawn from combat as part of the United States drawdown of forces in Southeast Asia. Its World War II predecessor unit, the 12th Bombardment Group as part of Twelfth Air Force supported the Allied drive from Egypt to Tunisia during the North Africa Campaign, then reassigned to Tenth Air Force in India and flew most of its missions in Burma between April 1944 and May 1945, supporting the British Fourteenth Army.
The commander of the 12th Flying Training Wing is Col Gerald V. Goodfellow. The Command Chief Master Sergeant is Chief Master Sergeant Avery V. Woolridge.
Famous quotes containing the words flying, training and/or wing:
“Dreams pursue death as winds a flying fire,
Our dreams pursue our dead and do not find.”
—A.C. (Algernon Charles)
“The area [of toilet training] is one where a child really does possess the power to defy. Strong pressure leads to a powerful struggle. The issue then is not toilet training but who holds the reins—mother or child? And the child has most of the ammunition!”
—Dorothy Corkville Briggs (20th century)
“But he her fears to cease
Sent down the meek-eyed Peace;
She, crowned with olive green, came softly sliding
Down through the turning sphere,
His ready harbinger,
With turtle wing the amorous clouds dividing,
And waving wide her myrtle wand,
She strikes a universal peace through sea and land.”
—John Milton (1608–1674)