[Knight Templar]

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/latestnewsstory.cfm?storyID=3607411&thesection=news&thesubsection=world

My question is: Why the hell do they have a targeting range 4km away from a school...... using live ammunition!?

[Rictor]

[Taristin]

Better Question: Why is it being reported in New Zealand and not here?

[ChronoReverse]

Since when did F-16s strafe ground targets with bullets?

[Jetmech Jr.]

Since when was the military so stupid as to mistake a School for a target?

[Corsair]

Yeah, I saw that. What the hell were they thinking?

[Jetmech Jr.]

God, I shudder to think what would have happened if that school wasn't out that day...

[HeX]

Well the article said that they were non-explosive so they pockmarked the roof and concrete a bit.

As long as the kids were inside they'd probably have been okay.

If it was recess however...

[Deepblue]

25 rounds... at least he stopped quickly.

[deep_eyes]

dont matter if it were explosive rounds or not! thats bullets flying into a damn school! only in fuggin NEW JERSEY!

[Night Hammer]

It wasnt even the air force it was the air national guard

[Stealth]

An investigation is being conducted into how the pilot mistook the school, located on Frog Pond Road, for a target range

hahahahahaha that's unbelievable.

i can see very soon this is going to be blamed on bush... just as soon as kazan enters the thread

[MatthewPapa]

I really dont see how an F-16 could strafe a school. Thats crazy if that really happened. I will be looking for that in the paper tommorow!

BTW, does anyone know if the Navy is going to retire the F-14?

[Knight Templar]

Why would they?

And it probably was Bush's fault. He was probably scheduled to be at the school that morning but the National Gaurd being the twats they are got there late.

"Woops! A school? I swear it had the bullseye on it!"

[Bobboau]

you know what the first thing I thought when I saw the words 'New Jersey'. thank god this wasn't in Iraq or Afgahnastan or something.
just think what would have happened, what would be said about us, had this happened somewere else

[Flipside]

Edited coz I consider the joke a bit borderline

Let's just say, it's a good job no kids were in it and leave it at that

[Liberator]

Obviously a mistake, but an agregious one.  Still, with no harm done and only minor damage, I would probably let the pilot off with a week's confinement, loss of flight priveledge for a month and forfeiture of 2 week's flight pay.

[Genryu]

And how about checking if pilots aren't brain dead now ? How the **** can somebody be so retarded as to confuse a frigging SCHOOL with a military target ?!? No wonder that friendly fire is so high in combat situation,sheesh...
If you want to have a professional army, at least train them decently, FFS. I mean, if you take Iraq, before Bush said "Mission Accomplished" (yeah, right....), there was more killed due to friendly fire than to ennemy fire on the US side. If you look at the british, I don't remember the exact numbers, but I'm sure that friendly fire was more than 10 times less of the US ration.

[kasperl]

Genryu: FF taken or FF fired? The British got shot at by US troops too.

As for this incident, placement of that live fire range is off. No air live fire range should be so close to anything populated.

And strafing ground targets with bullets isn't all that unusual, IIRC.

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Liberator
Obviously a mistake, but an agregious one.  Still, with no harm done and only minor damage, I would probably let the pilot off with a week's confinement, loss of flight priveledge for a month and forfeiture of 2 week's flight pay.

I'd just settle for kicking his arse. .... it doesn't matter whether harm was done, what matters is that he strafed a primary school.  5km from his target.

Kick him out altogether, he's obviously not competent if he's making that kind of mistake (he should not only know exactly - visually and by instrument -  where he and his target is, he should also understand the consequences of getting that worng)