Active 1 May 1960 - present Type Training Garrison/HQ NAS Corpus Christi | Branch United States Navy Part of Training Wing Four | |
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Country United States of America | ||
The VT-28 "Rangers" is a U.S. Navy primary flight training squadron based at Naval Air Station Corpus Christi, Texas.
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History
VT-28 was initially established as Advanced Training Unit 611 (ATU-611). The Rangers began as an advanced multi-engine training squadron flying the S2F-1T, a training variant of the Grumman S-2 Tracker. On May 1, 1960 ATU-611 was redesignated VT-28 and in September 1962 its aircraft was redesignated the TS-2A in accordance with the 1962 United States Tri-Service aircraft designation system.
After decades of use and the designation of thousands of Naval Aviators, the TS-2A was replaced with the T-44A Pegasus twin-engine turboprop trainer in 1979. VT-28 continued training advanced multi-engine aviators until 1990 when the Chief of Naval Air Training (CNATRA) reassigned the squadron to be responsible for training instructors and updating training syllabi for the T-44A and T-34C Turbo Mentor. Three years later, CNATRA again reassigned VT-28, this time to be the Navy's fifth primary training squadron flying the T-34C Turbo Mentor. In 2013 the squadron began its transition from the T-34C to the Navy's newest primary flight trainer, the Beechcraft T-6B Texan II