Afghan Air Force pilot training at Moody AFB winds down

The five year programme for training Afghan Air Force (AAF) pilots on the A-29B Super Tucano at Moody Air Force Base (GA) is finished. The final class graduated on 13 November 2020.

At Moody AFB, the 14th Flying Training Wing, responsible for the 81st Fighter Squadron Panthers, operated the Afghan A-29B Super Tucanos. The unit was officially re-activated on 15 January 2015. On 5 March 2015, an AAF student pilot flew for the first time in an A-29B Super Tucano. The flight followed completion of a course of classroom instruction and simulator training.

In total 26 A-29Bs were delivered to the 81st FS for training Afghan pilots. Twenty aircraft were delivered between March 2015 and December 2016.

An additional order for six aircraft was delivered from April 2018.

With the final class recently graduated, the seven aircraft still based at Moody AFB will soon be delivered to Afghanistan.

The status of the AAF A-29Bs as per November 2020 is as follows:

81st FS: 13-2001, 13-2002, 13-2019, 13-2020, 17-2030, 17-2031 and 17-2032
Kabul Air Wing: YA1403, YA1404, YA1405, YA1406, YA1407, YA1408, YA1509, YA1510, YA1511, YA1512, YA1513, YA1514, YA1516, YA1517, YA1518, 17-2027, 17-2028 and 17-2029
w/o: 13-2015 on 6 March 2017 (US) and an unknown aircraft on 9 July 2020 (Afghanistan)

The Afghan serials for the additional batch of six aircraft is not known by us. If you have information on this please go to the Afghanistan military database and use the update form at the bottom of the page.

Photo: Dougie Connery