Local News

Actions

Air Force conducting Red Flag 21-1 starting next week

PHOTOS: 2016 Aviation Nation at Nellis AFB
Posted at 12:38 PM, Jan 22, 2021
and last updated 2021-01-22 15:56:42-05

Southern Nevada residents may notice increased noise from military aircraft as the Air Force conducts Red Flag 21-1 from Jan. 25 to Feb. 12.

More than 80 aircraft are scheduled to depart Nellis Air Force Base twice a day and may remain in the air for up to five hours during Red Flag. There may be night launches as well to allow air crews to train for nighttime combat operations.

The Red Flag exercise is organized at NAFB and hosted north of Las Vegas on the Nevada Test and Training Range -- the U.S. Air Force's premier military training area with more than 12,000 square miles of airspace and 2.9 million acres of land.

With 1,900 possible targets, realistic threat systems and an opposing enemy force that cannot be replicated anywhere else in the world, Nellis and the NTTR are the home of a "peacetime battlefield," providing combat air forces with the ability to train to fight together, survive together and win together.

Red Flag gives aircrew an opportunity to experience advanced, relevant, and realistic combat-like situations in a controlled environment to increase their ability to complete missions and safely return home.

It also prepares maintenance personnel, ground controllers, space and cyber operators to support those missions within the same tactical environment.

The 414th Combat Training Squadron is responsible for executing Red Flag and this exercise is just one of a series of advanced training programs administered at Nellis and on the NTTR by organizations assigned to the U.S. Air Force Warfare Center.