Latest news with #B-1
Yahoo
12-06-2025
- Yahoo
Ukraine's Defence Ministry codifies Volyniaka bomber drone
Ukraine's Ministry of Defence has codified and approved the use of a domestically-produced Volyniaka unmanned aerial system by the armed forces. Source: Ministry of Defence of Ukraine, as reported by Mezha Media, a technology and IT news platform within Ukrainska Pravda's holding company Details: The ministry stated that Volyniaka is a bomb-dropping hexacopter designed to destroy various enemy targets. The first modifications of this drone have been deployed at the front since the early months of the full-scale war. Quote: "They have destroyed hundreds of pieces of enemy military equipment, dugouts and concentrations of enemy personnel. They can carry out combat missions in any weather, at dusk and in strong winds. The latest versions have significantly improved specifications." Details: The ministry noted that the unmanned system consists of a control panel, pilot goggles, a signal repeater and a reusable hexacopter equipped with six powerful brushless motors. The UAV is specially designed to transport cargo under challenging combat conditions. Quote: "It can drop munitions on enemy targets with enough destructive power to destroy heavily armoured targets. In addition, the Volyniaka can perform logistical tasks by delivering essential equipment to frontline positions." Background: In April, the ministry codified the domestically produced B-1 unmanned aerial system – an ultralight strike drone for attacking enemy personnel, vehicles, armoured targets and military facilities both at the line of contact and in the rear. In May, the ministry approved the use of the strike drone system White Wolf by the Armed Forces of Ukraine, which includes a UAV with a digital combined camera, a control and monitoring station, a set of power batteries, and more. At the beginning of June, the ministry codified the Chief-1 unmanned aerial system. This drone is designed to strike enemy aircraft or personnel using a module that fires shotgun shells. Support Ukrainska Pravda on Patreon!
Yahoo
10-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
New Carrier Authorities Are Surging in Surprising Places
If you think you know where new trucking companies are planting roots, think again. Yes, Texas and California still lead the nation in raw numbers of new MCs granted. But something very different is happening when you zoom in. Quiet ZIP codes like 93722 (Fresno, CA) and 78045 (Laredo, TX) are quietly leading the nation in new authority issuances. And it's not random; it's not just about about the way America's trucking landscape is being reshaped—zip code by zip code—by a complex combination of regulation loopholes, international labor dynamics, and a post-pandemic market still struggling to find its footing. Using verified authority history data from it's time to pull the curtain back. It isn't just about where the growth is, it's about what kind of growth we're seeing—and whether current systems are equipped to handle far this year, 26,394 new motor carrier authorities have been granted according to FMCSA data, compiled via Just in May, here's how the top 10 states stack up: California – 694 Texas – 664 Florida – 404 Illinois – 288 Pennsylvania – 259 Ohio – 252 Georgia – 249 North Carolina – 192 New Jersey – 175 Indiana – 148 Nothing shocking there—until you get below the state line. When we narrowed the lens, the picture changed. These were the top ZIP codes for MCs granted in May 2025: These ZIPs represent more than numbers—they reflect nodes in a freight network that's under growing scrutiny. Fresno now leads the nation in MCs granted last month. Being the fifth largest city in California, at first glance, it looks like a win for entrepreneurial trucking. The Central Valley has long been home to a thriving Punjabi trucking community—deeply experienced, asset-based, and critical to ag and reefer beneath that foundation is a rising pattern of 'one and done' authorities. Many of these MCs are linked to short-lived LLCs. They file, run for a few months under one DOT number, then vanish—sometimes popping back up days later under a different MC. The phenomenon is called 'ghost fleeting' and leads us to question how many of these fleets we are missing. Laredo shows up twice in the top 10 ZIPs. As the largest land port between the U.S. and Mexico, that's not surprising. But multiple FreightWaves investigations have uncovered deeper issues: Carriers domiciled in Laredo have been linked to misuse of B-1 visa drivers—Mexican nationals who are only permitted to cross the border but are often found running domestic freight. FMCSA has limited enforcement powers on visa status, leaving a massive gap in oversight. The labor cost advantage is massive—so large, in fact, that compliant U.S. carriers are being undercut in their own backyard. And now, with two dozen new MCs popping up in just one city last month, the oversight burden is growing faster than enforcement can keep up. These ZIPs are hotspots for immigrant-led companies—many with strong business acumen and solid ties to major reefer shippers. But just like Fresno, the risk is not with the community—it's with the system failing to verify who's legitimate and who's laundering safety scores through shell MCs. In many cases, FMCSA isn't auditing these carriers until months past the 18-month new entrant window, if at all. According to the FMCSA Pocket Guide and analysis of audit completion records: 2021: 119,872 MCs were granted. Only 45% (54,149) received their required safety audit. 2022: 108,019 MCs were granted. Just 44% (47,404) were audited. That means nearly 60% of new entrants were operating without a formal FMCSA review during the most critical time in their company's lifecycle. And if we believe the 2025 numbers are on pace, we're looking at another 15,000+ carriers potentially slipping through the cracks this year alone. FMCSA's proposed English Language Proficiency (ELP) crackdowns are looming. Once in place, carriers employing drivers who can't meet minimum language requirements face being flagged or revoked. But the rule isn't law yet—and that delay is giving rise to a wave of 'beat the buzzer' authority filings. The mindset is 'start the company now. Get on the road. Worry about the rules later.' Take Texas as an example. Recently, we saw a federal crackdown on a Texas-based commercial license fraud ring that issued hundreds of CDLs to unqualified applicants. Several of those licenses were tied to carriers based in Houston (77089) and surrounding ZIPs. Many of those licenses were sold to out-of-state drivers who listed Texas addresses to avoid stricter home-state requirements. It's not theoretical. It's happening, and it's reshaping who's actually behind the wheel in parts of the country. Stakeholders from every corner of the trucking ecosystem—from safety consultants to driver schools—have sounded the alarm about a growing underground labor market. U.S. carriers are increasingly contracting foreign drivers through shady channels, especially in places like Laredo, TX and San Diego, CA. And if you think they're just running a few loads, think again. Some are running national lanes under assumed identities, rented MC numbers, or safety ratings they didn't earn. It depends who you are. If you're a broker or shipper, are you onboarding carriers from ZIPs like 78045 or 93722 without really looking deeper into your vetting processes? If you're a new MC, are you aware that simply having a DOT number isn't enough? Do you know if your driver isn't qualified, or your audit never happens, you're not only risking your business—you're risking criminal liability? If you're the FMCSA, is your system agile enough to keep up with an industry that's learning how to beat your processes faster than you can write rules? Technology may be moving faster than you can keep up. Right now, it's easier to get authority than to get audited, and it's easier to find a loophole than to find a Level 1 inspection. In May 2025, California (694) and Texas (664) topped the nation in new Motor Carrier (MC) authority grants, but accident data reveals a contrasting storyline—one that raises red flags as new entrants surge past compliance capacity. Fatal crashes involving large trucks jumped 18% from 4,821 in 2020 to 5,700 in 2021, while injury crashes increased 11% over the same period . Property damage-only crashes surged 25%, climbing from 322K to 401K in that timeframe. FMCSA's analysis shows crash rates for new entrants nearly tripled, rising from 1.3% (in the 2018 cohort) to 3.5% (by 2021). We're not just seeing more carriers being granted authority; we're seeing more crashes involving the ones with newer authorities. The acceleration of entries—especially in ZIP codes like Fresno (93722) and Laredo (78045)—is not matched by audit or enforcement capacity. The result is a growing pipeline of high-risk drivers and unvetted carriers entering service, operating before infrastructure can catch up. This isn't about fear-mongering. This is about facing facts. The numbers from the FMCSA aren't just a heatmap of new businesses—they're a warning sign. A red flag. A signal that the surge in MCs may be lapping our ability to track, audit, or even understand who's really in the cab. The people pointing this out aren't against growth, we're against blind growth. We're not questioning the dream. We're questioning the foundation it's being built on. At the end of the day, the fastest-growing ZIP codes for new carriers are the same ones named in federal indictments, major accidents, and cross-border enforcement loopholes—we owe it to the entire industry to slow down and look closer. The post New Carrier Authorities Are Surging in Surprising Places appeared first on FreightWaves.
Yahoo
07-06-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Veterans gather in recognition of 40 years of B-1B Lancer at Dyess
ABILENE, Texas () – Veterans across the nation gathered at Dyess Air Force Base (AFB) to recognizing 40 years of the B-1B Lancer. The first ever B-1B Lancer was named the Star of Abilene and was delivered to Dyess AFB on June 29, 1985. The B-1B Lancer was developed as a supersonic nuclear bomber to replace the B-52 Stratofortress following the Cold War. Dyess has been the home of the B-1. Veterans at the event spoke with KTAB/KRBC on how they felt about the event. Major Bryan Zak was in the U.S. Air Force and also served as the Defensive System Officer. He also served as the mayor of Homer Alaska. He shared with KTAB/KRBC that he also survived brain cancer. The event's anniversary held a special meaning to him. 'I feel totally connected at everything surrounding me, spiritually,' said Zak. The 7th Wing Bomb Wing Commander from Dyess AFB also Colonel Seth Spanier how exciting the event was. 'It's a really special weekend, we're lucky to do these about every 2 years… you have the first people to ever a fly a B1B back from 40 years ago. And you have some of the U.S. copilots that are learning how to fly today,' Spanier said. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
06-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
How the US could be vulnerable to the same kind of drone swarm attack Ukraine unleashed on Russia's bomber fleet
Ukraine's shock drone strike on Russia's strategic bomber fleet this week has generals and analysts taking a new look at threats to high-value United States aircraft at bases in the homeland and abroad – and the situation is worrisome. 'It's an eyebrow-raising moment,' Gen. David Allvin, the US Air Force chief of staff, said at a defense conference in Washington on Tuesday, adding that the US is vulnerable to similar attacks. 'There is no sanctuary even in the US homeland – particularly given that our bases back home are essentially completely unhardened,' Thomas Shugart, an adjunct senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS), told CNN. By 'unhardened,' Shugart means there aren't enough shelters in which US warplanes can be parked that are tough enough to protect them from airstrikes, be it from drones or missiles. Ukrainian military officials said 41 Russian aircraft were hit in last Sunday's attacks, including strategic bombers and surveillance planes, with some destroyed and others damaged. Later analysis shows at least 12 planes destroyed or damaged, and reviews of satellite imagery were continuing. The Ukrainian operation used drones smuggled into Russian territory, hidden in wooden mobile houses atop trucks and driven close to four Russian air bases, according to Ukrainian sources. Once near the bases, the roofs of the mobile houses were remotely opened, and the drones deployed to launch their strikes. The Russian planes were sitting uncovered on the tarmac at the bases, much as US warplanes are at facilities at home and abroad. 'We are pretty vulnerable,' retired US Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal told CNN's Anderson Cooper on Tuesday. 'We've got a lot of high-value assets that are extraordinarily expensive,' McChrystal said. The Ukrainians said their attacks destroyed $7 billion worth of Russian aircraft. By comparison, a single US Air Force B-2 bomber costs $2 billion. And the US has only 20 of them. Shugart co-authored a report for the Hudson Institute in January highlighting the threat to US military installations from China in the event of any conflict between the superpowers. 'People's Liberation Army (PLA) strike forces of aircraft, ground-based missile launchers, surface and subsurface vessels, and special forces can attack US aircraft and their supporting systems at airfields globally, including in the continental United States,' Shugart and fellow author Timothy Walton wrote. War game simulations and analyses show 'the overwhelming majority of US aircraft losses would likely occur on the ground at airfields (and that the losses could be ruinous),' Shugart and Walton wrote. A report from Air and Space Forces magazine last year pointed out that Anderson Air Force Base on the Pacific island of Guam – perhaps the US' most important air facility in the Pacific – which has hosted rotations of those $2 billion B-2 bombers, as well as B-1 and B-52 bombers, has no hardened shelters. Allvin, the USAF chief of staff, admitted the problem on Tuesday. 'Right now, I don't think it's where we need to be,' Allvin told a conference of the CNAS. McChrystal said the US must look at how to protect its bases and the aircraft on them but also how it monitors the areas around those facilities. 'It widens the spectrum of the threats you've got to deal with,' McChrystal said. But all that costs money, and Allvin said that presents the US with a budget dilemma. Does it spend defense dollars on hardened shelters and ways to stop drones and missiles from attacking US bases, or does it use more resources on offensive weapons that take the fight to the enemy? 'If all we are doing is playing defense and can't shoot back, then that's not a good use of our money,' Allvin told the CNAS conference. 'We've always known that hardening our bases is something we needed to do,' Allvin said, but other items have been given budget priority. Hardened aircraft shelters aren't flashy and are unlikely to generate the headlines of other defense projects, including planes like the new B-21 bombers, each of which is expected to cost around $700 million. And US President Donald Trump said recently the Air Force will build a new stealth fighter, the F-47, with an initial cost of $300 million per aircraft. 'The F-47 is an amazing aircraft, but it's going to die on the ground if we don't protect it,' Allvin said. Meanwhile, a hardened shelter costs around $30 million, according to Shugart and Walton. Last month Trump revealed another form of air defense for the US mainland, the Golden Dome missile shield, expected to cost at least $175 billion. Despite the huge price tag, it's designed to counter long-range threats, like intercontinental ballistic missiles fired from a different hemisphere. In Russia's case, the vastness of its territory was seen as a strength in its war with Ukraine. One of the air bases hit in Ukraine's Operation 'Spiderweb' was closer to Tokyo than Kyiv. But now Russia's size is a weakness, writes David Kirichenko on the Ukraine Watch blog of the Atlantic Council. Every border crossing may be an infiltration point; every cargo container on every highway or rail line must be treated with suspicion. 'This is a logistical nightmare,' Kirichenko said. And there is a direct analogy to the United States. US Air Force bomber bases are usually well inland, but accessible to vehicles large and small. For instance, all 20 B-2 bombers are stationed at Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri. It's about 600 miles from the nearest coastline, the Gulf of Mexico, but only about 25 miles south of Interstate 70, one of the main east-west traffic arteries in the US, with thousands of commercial vehicles passing by daily. Dyess Air Force Base in Texas, one of the homes of US B-1 bombers, sits just south of another major east-west commercial artery, Interstate 20. 'Think of all the containers and illegal entrants inside our borders,' said Carl Schuster, a former director of operations at the US Pacific Command's Joint Intelligence Center. 'That connection will trigger alarm in some US circles,' he said. Meanwhile, in the Pacific, even better US offensive firepower, like Gen. Allvin would like to have, might not be enough in the event of a conflict with China. That's because the PLA has made a concerted effort to protect its aircraft during its massive military buildup under leader Xi Jinping, according to the Hudson Institute report. China has more than 650 hardened aircraft shelters at airfields within 1,150 miles of the Taiwan Strait, the report says. But Shugart and Walton argue the best move Washington could make would be to make Beijing build more – by improving US strike capabilities in Asia. 'In response the… PLA would likely continue to spend funds on additional costly passive and active defense measures and in turn would have less to devote to alternative investments, including strike and other power projection capabilities,' they said.
Yahoo
05-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Former Green Beret nominated to top Pentagon position to oversee special ops
A former Army Special Forces officer who was in charge of a team involved in a friendly fire incident in Afghanistan was nominated as the Pentagon's head of special operations. Derrick Anderson was nominated Monday by President Donald Trump to serve as assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity conflict, according to a notice on His nomination was referred to the Senate Armed Services Committee for consideration. If confirmed to the largely bureaucratic position, Anderson would oversee administrative and policy issues that apply to special operations and irregular warfare units and advise the secretary of defense and other senior civilian leaders on issues like equipment, readiness and training for the force. While a captain in the Army in 2014, Anderson was the commander of a Special Forces team in Afghanistan from the 5th Special Forces Group at Fort Campbell, Kentucky. On June 9, 2014, his team and allied Afghan soldiers engaged in a firefight with the Taliban that ended in a wayward American airstrike that killed five U.S. soldiers and one Afghan. A U.S. Central Command investigation found that miscommunication and a lack of proper protocols among Anderson, his tactical air controller and the crew of the B-1B bomber that dropped the bombs led to the friendly fire. In a later interview with 60 Minutes about the incident, Anderson disputed that his leadership was at fault in the strike. A classified report on the strike obtained by 60 Minutes found that a central cause was the inability of the B-1's sensors to detect the strobe lights worn by the Green Berets on their equipment — an issue that neither the bomber's crew nor the ground team were aware of. 'I'm the commander of this team. This is my team. I miss my guys tremendously. But at the end of the day there's nothing that myself or my Team Sergeant did that day or failed to do that day that caused that incident to happen,' he told 60 Minutes. 'We made the decisions that we thought were best at the time on the ground for the guys that were getting shot at.' In 2024, Anderson also ran for a Congressional House seat in Virginia as a Republican but lost to Democratic candidate Eugene Vindman. Anderson grew up in Virginia and attended Virginia Tech on an Army ROTC scholarship, according to a Special Operations Association of America bio page. He went on to become an infantry officer, went to Ranger School and became a platoon leader in Iraq with the 3rd Infantry Division. He served on a 13-month tour during the 2007 'Iraq surge.' He also oversaw burial and memorial ceremonies with the 3rd Infantry Regiment in Arlington National Cemetery. After leaving the military, he attended law school at Georgetown University and clerked for three federal judges, according to his LinkedIn page. Navy SEAL Team 6 operator will be the military's new top enlisted leader Veterans receiving disability payments might have been underpaid, IG finds Guam barracks conditions are 'baffling,' Navy admiral says in email Navy fires admiral in charge of unmanned systems office after investigation The Pentagon wants troops to change duty stations less often
