USN or USAF?

I found this recently on the internet and thought it would be fun to share:

Bob Norris is a former naval aviator who also did a three year exchange tour flying the F-15 Eagle. He is now an accomplished author of entertaining books about US Naval Aviation including “Check Six” and “Fly-Off”. In response to a letter from an aspiring fighter pilot on which military academy to attend, Bob replied with the following:

Young Man,

Congratulations on your selection to both the Naval and Air Force Academies. Your goal of becoming a fighter pilot is impressive and a fine way to serve your country. As you requested, I’d be happy to share some insight into which service would be the best choice. Each service has a distinctly different culture. You need to ask yourself “Which one am I more likely to thrive in?”

USAF Snapshot: The USAF is exceptionally well organized and well run. Their training programs are terrific. All pilots are groomed to meet high standards for knowledge and professionalism. Their aircraft are top-notch and extremely well maintained. Their facilities are excellent. Their enlisted personnel are the brightest and the best trained. The USAF is homogenous and macro. No matter where you go, you’ll know what to expect, what is expected of you, and you’ll be given the training & tools you need to meet those expectations. You will never be put in a situation over your head. Over a 20-year career, you will be home for most important family events. Your Mom would want you to be an Air Force pilot…so would your wife. Your Dad would want your sister to marry one.

Navy Snapshot: Aviators are part of the Navy, but so are Black shoes (surface warfare) and bubble heads (submariners). Furthermore, the Navy is split into two distinctly different Fleets (West and East Coast). The Navy is heterogeneous and micro. Your squadron is your home; it may be great, average, or awful. A squadron can go from one extreme to the other before you know it. You will spend months preparing for cruise and months on cruise. The quality of the aircraft varies directly with the availability of parts. Senior Navy enlisted are salt of the earth; you’ll be proud if you earn their respect. Junior enlisted vary from terrific to the troubled kid the judge made join the service. You will be given the opportunity to lead these people during your career; you will be humbled and get your hands dirty. The quality of your training will vary and sometimes you will be over your head. You will miss many important family events. There will be long stretches of tedious duty aboard ship. You will fly in very bad weather and/or at night and you will be scared many times. You will fly with legends in the Navy and they will kick your ass until you become a lethal force. And some days – when the scheduling Gods have smiled upon you – your jet will catapult into a glorious morning over a far-away sea and you will be drop-jawed that someone would pay you to do it. The hottest girl in the bar wants to meet the Naval Aviator. That bar is in Singapore.

Bottom line, son, if you gotta ask…pack warm & good luck in Colorado.

PS Air Force pilots wear scarves and iron their flight suits.

Well Bob, I’m going to have to disagree – my Air Force Academy graduate husband converted me.  And for the record, he NEVER ironed his flight suit.

“Annie, Annie, Are You Okay?”

I just took my CPR recertification course a few weeks ago. I am a registered nurse and have been taking CPR courses for more than twenty years. Every time I go to recertify, especially recently, there are changes to the way we are supposed to perform. The American Heart Association makes changes as new techniques are discovered which improve the percentage of individuals that recover after cardiac arrest. Makes sense. However, since I first took the course, over twenty years ago, I realize it has become harder, in a sense, because I learned CPR a certain way many years ago, and it’s hard to override that initial training.

This made me think of how my husband LeRoy would describe leaving one airplane to fly on another. For example, the Boeing and Airbus planes are completely different. You cannot take something you’ve learned on one plane and transfer it to another. The results could be catastrophic. A pilot is expected to “dump” everything he has learned on one airplane when he switches to another. It may seem fairly easy. But as I renewed my CPR license in a four hour course, I was really struggling with all the information I had been given before, that was no longer valid. Pilots go away for flight simulator training to learn how to fly newly assigned aircraft for weeks at a time. My frustrations made me think yet again how little credit pilots get.

There will always be people who think since they’ve played a Microsoft flight simulator, they could land an airplane in an emergency. Or the people that assume the co-pilot is only there in case the captain gets food poisoning. Newsflash – the movie Airplane is not entirely accurate, and whether there are two or three pilots in the cockpit, they all know and do fly the aircraft. I know only a small amount of what my husband’s job entailed. Chris Cooke, a domestic pilot who writes for Executive Travel magazine says it best “compartmentalization (the ability to focus on the task at hand) is a skill that pilots work hard to maintain. Operating in an unforgiving three-dimensional environment demands nothing else. We constantly evaluate ourselves and our fellow aviators, and we work hard to enhance your flying experience with a safe, smooth and punctual performance.” He goes on to say that a good pilot will be very critical of his own performance. When I flew as a United Airlines passenger when my husband was flying, he would ask me, “how was my landing?”

So instead of thinking about the negatives, flight delays or having to wait your turn on the runway, think about the skill and knowledge it takes for those pilots to get you from point A to point B, while you sit in a seat, eating, watching a movie or working on your laptop. Just because they make it look easy, doesn’t mean it is.