Team BLAZE welcomes Gosney as new commander

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  • 14th Flying Training Wing Public Affairs

Team BLAZE welcomes Col. Douglas Gosney as the new 14th Flying Training Wing Commander at Columbus Air Force Base, Mississippi.

 

Presiding officer Maj. Gen. James Hecker, 19th Air Force Commander, Joint Base San Antonio – Randolph, Texas, handed the guidon to Gosney during a change of command ceremony July 22 in the McAllister Fire Station.

 

Columbus AFB began as an advanced twin-engine flying school during the rearming of America prior to World War II. Pilot training began in 1942, and nearly 8,000 students came to Columbus for training during World War II to become flying officers in the US Army Air Corps.

 

The base received national recognition in Time and Life magazines and the New York Times as the place where the full panel attitude system of instrument flying got its start. Flying evaluation boards were also first used at Columbus AFB.

 

Columbus AFB was closed after the war and remained inactive until 1951. It was reopened as a contract flying school to provide training for pilots during the Korean War. Four years later, Columbus was transferred from Air Training Command to Strategic Air Command. An active building program was instituted to prepare the base for its new mission.

 

In 1969, after more than 10 years as a Strategic Air Command base, Columbus AFB resumed the mission for which it was originally activated to defend the United States of America by building the world’s best warriors, leaders and professional military pilots.

 

Since 1970, Columbus has been home to Air Education and Training Command’s 14th Flying Training Wing and its 1,494 military personnel, 1,777 civilian employees and 3,300 family members.

 

The 14th FTW conducts Specialized Undergraduate Pilot Training for U.S. Air Force and allied officers, as well as tactical training for Afghan pilots and aircraft maintainers in the A-29 Super Tucano at Moody AFB, Georgia. The wing is composed of 244 aircraft, flying 55,000 sorties and 77,000 hours per year, and training over 400 pilots and combat system operators annually. Gosney manages an operations and maintenance budget of $106 million with capital assets exceeding $1.3 billion.

 

Gosney was commissioned through the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps at Utah State University in 1995. He graduated Euro-NATO Joint Jet Pilot Training at Sheppard AFB, Texas, and was operationally assigned to the B-52. He has served in numerous squadron and wing leadership positions including Standardization and Evaluation pilot, Flight Commander, Assistant Director of Operations, Wing Executive Officer, and Squadron Commander. He has also served as a Strike Advisor on the Airborne Command Post for U.S. Strategic Command.

 

Gosney previously served as the commander of the 2d Operations Group, Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana. In this position, he commanded Air Force Global Strike Command’s largest bomb group, with 27 B-52 aircraft, a team of 560 Airmen and civilian employees, and an annual budget of $81.5M dollars. His primary responsibility was organizing, training, and equipping his group to provide the Nation’s leaders with global strike and deterrence options across the spectrum of nuclear and conventional operations.

 

Gosney has deployed and/or supported Operations Desert Thunder, Desert Fox, Allied Force, Enduring Freedom, and PACAF’s Continuous Bomber Presence mission.

 

Gosney is a Command Pilot with over 3,300 hours (including 212 combat hours) in primarily the B-52 and T-38 aircraft, serving as an instructor and evaluator in both.

 

 

ASSIGNMENTS
1. June 1995 – April 1997, Student, Euro-NATO Joint Jet Pilot Training, Sheppard AFB, Texas

2. May 1997 – December 1997, Student, B-52H Pilot Initial Qualification Course, Barksdale AFB, Louisiana

3. January 1998 – December 2000, B-52H Pilot, Stan-Eval Pilot, and Aircraft Commander, 23d Bomb Squadron, Minot AFB, North Dakota

4. May 2000 – May 2004, T-38 Instructor Pilot, Assistant Check Flight Commander, Flight Commander, 25th Flying Training Squadron, Vance AFB, Oklahoma

5. June 2004 – December 2007, B-52H Instructor Pilot, Flight Commander, and Assistant Director of Operations, 23d Bomb Squadron, Minot AFB, North Dakota

6. January 2007 – May 2008, Executive Officer, 5th Bomb Wing, Minot AFB, North Dakota

7. June 2008 – June 2009, Student, Air Command and Staff College, Maxwell AFB, Alabama

8. July 2009 – July 2011, Strike Advisor, JFCC GS/J317 (USSTRATCOM), Offutt AFB, Nebraska

9. Aug 2011 – Jun 2013, Commander, 69th Bomb Squadron, Minot AFB, North Dakota

10. July 2013 – Jun 2014, National Defense Fellow, International Security Program, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School, Cambridge, Massachusetts

11. July 2014 – July 2016, Commander, 2d Operations Group, Barksdale AFB, Louisiana

12. July 2016 – present, Commander, 14th Flying Training Wing, Columbus Air Force Base, Mississippi