HILL AIR FORCE BASE — For the third time in the past month, fighter pilots from Hill Air Force Base will be working on their dark sky flying skills.

Micah Garbarino, spokesman with Hill’s 388th Fighter Wing, said pilots from the active duty 388th and reserve 419th fighter wings will conduct local night-flying operations through Thursday, May 14. Pilots from the two wings previously wrapped up a night-flying training in mid-April and did another night mission last week to make up for a canceled Temporary Duty Assignment. During this round of training, pilots are scheduled to fly about an hour later into the night than they did in April, set to finish up each night this week by 11 p.m.

Garbarino said residents should expect increased noise during the night operations. Hill pilots regularly fly a limited number of night hours to meet Air Force proficiency requirements. Garbarino said the 11 p.m. cutoff schedule could change, based on a number of factors, including weather, airspace availability and other elements.

Col. Michael Ebner, 388th vice commander, said pilots were scheduled to fly at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada last week, but the mission was canceled due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Approximately 45,000 flight operations take place at Hill’s airfield every year, according to an Air Force fact sheet, making it one of the busiest flight lines in the military. Aircraft from all over the United States and internationally fly into Hill’s Ogden Air Logistics Complex, which performs maintenance on dozens of aircraft. Hill’s Utah Test and Training Range in Utah’s west desert also draws aircraft from all over the world.

But the fighter wings perform the bulk of flight operations on base, training to remain combat ready with the F-35. The 34th Fighter Squadron, one of the wing’s three squadrons, recently returned from a combat deployment in the Middle East.

In 2015, the Air Force tabbed the base as the first combat-ready F-35 unit in the military. Hill owns and operates 78 F-35As.