think I'll be a plane prop for Halloween

broken record routine

What goes up must come down. Airplane prop, spinning around. Maybe the AF should look into an Embraer instead.

that's a spot of Plane ol' bad luck, right there! 455

Patrick, I assume by EMB that you're talking Tucano. I agree although the EMB 314 Super Tucano is best used as COIN aircraft in S America. For the record, the best Tucano aircraft were the British Short versions as trainers: https://img.planespotters.net/photo/618000/original/zf289-royal-air-force-short-s-312-tucano-t1_PlanespottersNet_618701.jpg

why do air forces still use propeller planes as trainers anyway? The jet age came long ago. It doesn't make sense unless your air force is poor.

Usually, most AFs have both. A pilot moves from the prop basics to jet basics. Also, light jet trainer aircraft can be used as lightly armed combat aircraft. Good examples historically are the Dassault/Dornier Alphajet and BAe Hawk.

Carol: Propeller planes are more agile, more docile and easier to handle than jets. They are easier to fly and therefore better suited for teaching someone to fly than jets. They also consume less fuel. They are used as basic trainers, ground attack planes and jump planes for paratroopers. Most propeller planes today are turboprops, not piston engine planes.

The first turboprop designs were German, but Hungarian Jendrassic made the Cs-1 by 1940 and bench tested it. The Varga RMI.1 bomber was to use two of the engines, but could not get the power needed out of the type. They substituted German Jumo 213 and then DB 605 engines by 1944. The aircraft was however destroyed in a bombing raid. The British mounted two RR Trent turboprop engines on a Meteor for flight during WW2, but relied on jets instead to get operational in 1944. Germany had the most advanced turboprop designs from Junkers with the 012 and Heinkel had a design too, the 021. The Soviets went with the Junkers design and completed the engine in 1947. The powerful Russian NK series is derived from German tech and are the most powerful turboprop engines in the world fitted to several aircraft. In 1939 Heinrich Focke of Focke-Wulf designed a circular aircraft with a proposed turboshaft engine driving a central lift fan and with tip afterburners for added small thrust. It never got built because FW went with the Fw-190TL prototype with a thermal jet engine. They would later start assembly of the FW Ta 183 which led directly to the postwar MiG-15 Fagot. FYI