A Trickle Approved for TERA

According to Stars & Stripes, the recent and very limited Temporary Early Retirement Authority (TERA) offer led to more than 350 airmen retiring early.  They must be retired one month from today.

According to the article, the 311 enlisted and 47 officers who were approved for the program, broke down as such:

The military rank of the majority of applicants approved — 201 — were technical sergeants, according to Dickerson. There were also 110 master sergeants, 31 majors, eight captains and eight lieutenant colonels.

Seventy-nine of the approved applicants had 15 years’ active-duty service; 66 had served 16 years, 81 were at 17 years, 95 completed 18 years, and 37 had 19 years in the books.

Those are some pretty interesting statistics, particularly the number of folks with 18 and 19 years who took the retirement penalty to retire just a little early.

The article also states that the Air Force expects to announce involuntary separation programs soon.  As a person who applied for the TERA program and was told I was not eligible, I'm particularly interested to see what happens next.

I predict those who were not eligible for this voluntary separation program, will find themselves more than eligible for coming involuntary separation programs in FY 2014.

Interesting times we live in.