Web hosting Custom Email SiteBuilder

The Flag Exercises are extremely realistic aerial wargames, intended to train our pilots in the finer points of surviving air combat.  There are several types of Flag exercises.  The first, and most common are Red Flag.  In this scenario, a Blue team engages the Red team.  Anything goes, including live bombing and strafing, however, there is no live ordinance used between aircraft.
    Another type is Green Flag.  This is similar to Red Flag, but there is an emphasis on electronic jamming, countermeasure and warfare.
    Coalition Flag emphasizes Allied participation, so one is likely to see a lot of foriegn aircraft and participants.  There have been sitings of MIG-29s in the Nellis area.
    Each Flag runs for six weeks.  Each six week period is divided into three two-week peiods.  Usually, new participants rotate in for each of these two week peiods, so every two weeks during a Flag there is freash meat.
    In between (and sometimes during) Flag excercises are smaller programs called Air Warrior exercises.  These are simply more modest and shorter versions of the full blown Flag exercises.  They also include combined forces, but their simplicity and smaller scale enable more personnel to particapte.
    In general, the defenders hangs out in the area east of Tonopah, south to almost Beatty.  Pretty much the west side of the Nellis Range.  The aggressors lurk far to the east of around the Caliente area.  It is the aggressors' goal to sneak into the area north of the Test Site and south of the Tonopah Test Range and destroy it.

    The forces start mixing it up around Rachel.  However, since Rachel is considered a noise sensitive area, the real low level stuff takes place to the north.  Queen City Summit on Hwy. 375 will often provide a pretty explosive show, as wo;; Railroad Valley.  The participants MUST avoid the R4808 and R4807 airspaces that cover the Groom Dry Lake facility and the NTS.
    Another aircraft viewing spot is on Hwy 95 between Hwy 375 (Pahranagat Valley) and Caliente.  There is a location on Hwy 93, about 15 miles east of Hwy 375, where the road goes through a pass called Pahroc Summit Pass.  The participants call this the "Student Gap", because often this is the point through which the aggressors stream to begin their assault.
    Most aircraft en up returning to Nellis AFB, so an amazing assortment of hardware can be seen on the ramps there most any time during a Flag.