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~The FReeper Canteen Presents~ Road Trip: Moody Air Force Base, GeorgiaMoody Air Force Base (AFB) is a United States Air Force installation near Valdosta, Georgia. The base is in northeastern Lowndes County, Georgia, with the eastern border of the base following the Lanier County line. Georgia State Route 125 runs through the western side of the base, leading southwest 11 miles to the center of Valdosta and northeast 6 miles to Ray City.The 23d Wing organizes, trains and employs combat-ready A-10C, HC-130J, HH-60G, Guardian Angel Weapons System. The 23d Wing is home to the Air Force’s legendary “Flying Tigers”...

Afghan Air Force pilot training program in US ends after nearly half go AWOL WASHINGTON – The Pentagon quietly ended a program to train Afghan Air Force pilots in the United States after nearly half of the course attendees disappeared, according to a Defense Department watchdog report released this week. More than 40 percent of the Afghan pilots sent to train on the AC-208 Combat Caravan lightweight reconnaissance aircraft went absent without leave while in the United States, according to a quarterly report of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, or SIGAR. The report, which was released Tuesday, did...

The latest case involves two airmen who were last seen at Moody Air Force Base near Valdosta, Ga., on Dec. 4, two weeks before they were scheduled to graduate and return to duty in Afghanistan. They are still being sought...Most of the Afghan airmen now being trained at Moody Air Force Base are pilots and maintenance crews for 20 new Brazilian-made A-29 light attack planes, bought for the Afghans by the United States at a cost of $427 million...Colonel Lawhorn said a total of 80 Afghans were now being trained at eight American air bases. General Wardak gave a higher...

LOWNDES CO., GA (WALB) - Two Afghan national flight team members, maintainers, or aircraft mechanics, who have been training to fly with the 81st Fighter Squadron at Moody Air Force Base, are missing. Multiple law enforcement agencies received an alert from Moody Officials. They referred all initial calls to the Air Force Press Desk at the Pentagon. Phone calls to that office have not yet been returned. Moody Air Force Base later issued a release by email: Two male Afghan air force students did not report for duty yesterday at their regular maintenance training at Moody AFB in Valdosta, Georgia....

JACKSON, Miss. -- As the forced evacuation of New Orleans continues, Air Force helicopter crews here are flying fewer rescues and conducting more ferry missions from evacuee collection points. Though aircrews still have a high operations tempo and their helicopters are flying much more than usual, it is different from the first hectic days after Hurricane Katrina left a path of death and destruction along the Gulf Coast. “There was plenty of rescue work to go around then. You could fly over New Orleans and it was like a scene right out of a movie. There were helicopters everywhere,” said...

VALDOSTA, Ga. (AP) -- Three Moody Air Force Base airmen have been arrested in an alleged scheme to take bulletproof vests from the base and sell them to drug dealers for $100 each. Airman 1st Class Brian Aubray Skelton, 22, was arrested on a charge of theft by receiving stolen property and remained in Lowndes County Jail on Tuesday. Airman Todd Louis Boutte, 22, and Airman 1st Class Jared Wayne Roberts, 21, were in military custody, said Lowndes County Sheriff Ashley Paulk. Boutte and Roberts were accused of taking the vests from the base while Skelton was accused of distributing...