08Dawg

Playing devil's advocate... Tell me a Buff radar nav with a Litening Pod isn't as much of a weapons systems employer as a Bone OSO. Which is also why you get the occasional PCola grads getting sent to the Buff FTU.

Him, him!

Without going too deep into this can of worms, I really think it varies platform to platform. A U-28? Yes, very much a CSO, at least from what I've been told. A Buff or a Herc? Unless you're sitting upstairs and backwards, very much a nav, although interestingly, I've seen some forms that way B-52 WSO, like WIC class rosters and stuff like that.

I got mine after IFS, but I went through the pilot syllabus. You'll need the XC, night, and a little hood time. You'll also have to work on stuff like short/soft field TOs/landings, but it's not that hard. Hopefully you can find some place close that rents a DA-20, but if not, moving into a Cessna or a Piper isn't that hard.

Godspeed, brother.

Or maybe they do this...

Well, being one of those bastard dual-seat qual navs...it's been my practice that I will be a nav first, and a radar later, when I've paid my dues in the right seat and the squadron trusts me enough to sit in the left seat full time. We do get some left seat time, because those skills are perishable, but it's usually shorter duration flights, and never a live weapons drop or anything like that. The old-school RNs also usually don't mind if you snag a little left seat time in the sim. Everybody's doing their best to make the DSN thing work, in one form or another, and I haven't really seen any young guys get uppity and think they're just as much of a radar as the traditional guys. But, similiar to the CSO stud's question, it's a little frustrating because, while they did a great job of creating the FTU syllabus, there wasn't much thought beyond that, such as when we'll technically start being radars and stop being navs, how many hours will it take to become experienced, and upgrade to instructor. As for how the Buff's going to deal with the PCola CSOs...no freakin' clue. There's this idea out there that perhaps we can be triple seat qualified, which would IMHO be even more of a nightmare than the DSN thing. I've also heard you'd be qualed as an EW and a nav, and "upgrade" to radar later. Simplest thing in my mind would almost be to "drop" a Buff nav or a Buff EW, or have some kind of selection once you get to Barksdale. Either way, it's going to be very interesting.

If I were an officer on that ship, I think I would be mighty pissed if some hotshot civilian lawyer tried to shift the blame to me by calling me incompetent. That's slander.

Even though mine's a six or seven year as a nav...yeah, I'm probably staying in. I've got way too many friends on the outside working shit jobs even with a college degree because there's not much out there.

All the H models are 60-xxx or 61-xxx. There were no G's "converted" to H models.

Just another b!tch that is against everything, for the sake of being against everything. "We want to repaint the stripes on the road orange instead of white". "NO YOU CAN'T DO THAT, ITS A TERRIFYING COLOR!!!"

I have never chewed anybody out for it, hardly even said anything because I feel like that would just add fuel to the fire. It's just common courtesy to say SOMETHING to somebody as you pass them. I dunno, maybe I was raised different.

You must have seen a shitty nav class, because mine was not that way at all. I never once felt that way about my class, or the classes within two or three of mine. There was one dude in a class behind me that was very much out for himself, but everybody knew who he was, and once they figured it out, gave him a wide berth. Slammed his ass (sts) on drop night for it, too. What you might have seen was the navs in EWO phase being lost/bored/frustrated, because integration was about 96% what the EWOs had learned for the last month and a half, and about 4% what the navs knew.

What kinda hacks me off even more is people who render salutes and don't say a damn word. Whether it's me returning an airman's salute, or me saluting a more senior officer, I always, always say at least "How ya doin" or "Good afternoon, sir" or something. But sometimes you get these dudes that throw you a salute, but say nothing at all, almost in a "I'm doing this cause I have to" kind of way. And it's not just once. Almost seems to be prevalent. Anybody else had this?

I realize this is a minor issue in the grand scheme of the queep and shoeclerkery, but a bro who just went told me no bags even if you've earned your wings already. What's the story there?

Barnstormers is more or less, GA pilot porn.

Always thought Gary Sinise was a class act. Here's just another example.

No posts in ten days??? What the hell is this thread coming to (sts)?

2!!! It continually amazes me how much we, as the branch of the armed forces that deals primarily with air combat, continue to downplay the air part, and just focus on the combat...if we even really do that.

Not sure how you'd export this to international aviation, but with ADS-B coming online, I wonder if there'd be any way to tie that in with this idea?

Ya know, for as much noise as we make about valuing heritage and history, there always seems to be some serious soul crushing whenever some dude tries to display a little respect for it. I'm sure if you asked the dude with the patch, he would tell you he's not trying to compare himself to the Thud drivers of old, just trying to honor their heritage a bit. That's real heritage, not the made-up crap that leadership spews out every year. Lighten up, Francis.

Going slightly along with this...why the hell do we insist on wearing eight-point covers in desert locations? That's a Navy-Marine thing.

I just finished the FTU about four months ago, so PM me too, if you want.

Pics?

A toast. Godspeed, brothers.