Weapons School Patch Night and Graduation

I'm officially now a USAF Weapons Officer.  Having "the patch" put on my left shoulder this past Thursday night is something I will never forget.  The part of Patch Night where we receive our patches is only attended by those who have previously received one.  The night started with the history of the F-16, followed by us all making fun of each other for some funny things that happened throughout the course.  Eventually we each had a patch put on our shoulder, with a punch to "ensure" it was securely in place.
 

Since F-16 Weapons School started back in the early 80's, 679 pilots have gone through the course. I'm patch #676. A lot has changed since I drove away to Officer's Training School (OTS) back in 2003 with my goal at the time to hopefully get an F-16 out of pilot training!

It was nice to have friends and family in town for Graduation on Saturday. The ceremony was quite a bit bigger than I anticipated with about 1,000 people in attendance. The class started with 108 students (across all airframes) and ended with 90. Thank God I made it through and had the chance to walk across the stage and receive a graduation certificate. The gravity of what we all went through over the past 5.5 months will settle in later I'm sure.

Lana and I are currently in Boulder, CO on our way back across the USA.  We're on our way to Michigan and Ohio for Christmas and New Years before we drive back to South Carolina.  It's a 2,000 mile drive, so we have about 2.5 days of driving left.  Looking forward to decompressing at home for a couple weeks with family!

Graduation Video: