Air Force CSO

Soku39 said:
No you just put it on your high risk activities form that they'll have you fill out, other "high risk" activities to include skiing, scuba diving etc etc. The sq/cc can either approve you to do them or not. Oh ya did anyone mention that being in the Air Force is a lot like being in kindergarten?
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Funny story about that.
 
My background is Medical Lab Science, an AFSC I picked up enlisted in the USAF. While in the Med Group, my OICs and NCOICs encouraged very openly to pursue college and any flying activities I was after, so much so to the point that they "tailored" my work week to meet class schedule and have time for homework etc. Given of course I'm all caught up with CDCs...Annual...etc. That is what I loved about being in the Air Force, the standard of excellence and challenge towards continuing improvement. If such a culture is indeed pervasive throughout the Air Force and the Ops community I shouldn't have too much trouble doing a little instructing on the side, given I still want to after work.
 
So ILL said:
If such a culture is indeed pervasive throughout the Air Force and the Ops community I shouldn't have too much trouble doing a little instructing on the side, given I still want to after work.
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lol

my day today consisted of showing up at 0800 for 3+ hrs of mission planning (mind you I was flying last night so I didn't get to attend the other 3 hrs of mission planning that night), 3 hrs of briefing, first as an entire air wing, then as individual flights, then as individual elements, then loading mission cards while I am trying to eat my only food of the day. Fly for an hour and a half, land late afternoon, get into the debrief an hour later after I finished spinning my tapes and filling out paperwork in maintenance. Debrief is again 2+ hrs long, as you watch the entire event again on the big screen of tacts, then listen to all the comm real time, then have your flight debrief, and then your element debrief. Walked out of it at almost 9 tonight, then went back into work to write evals for my Sailors for the next 3 hours. That is kind of the lifestyle you are looking at. More power to you if you can find time to instruct on the side, or even have the interest in flying remaining to also fly outside of work.
 
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MikeD said:
Every pure EWO I've ever met, like a BUFF EWO or EF-111 guy....all of them seemed kind of socially odd; as if they spent too many days locked up in the booths at Corry Station.
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I've spent a lot of time at Corry Station, what are you trying to say?
 
///AMG said:
lol

my day today consisted of showing up at 0800 for 3+ hrs of mission planning (mind you I was flying last night so I didn't get to attend the other 3 hrs of mission planning that night), 3 hrs of briefing, first as an entire air wing, then as individual flights, then as individual elements, then loading mission cards while I am trying to eat my only food of the day. Fly for an hour and a half, land late afternoon, get into the debrief an hour later after I finished spinning my tapes and filling out paperwork in maintenance. Debrief is again 2+ hrs long, as you watch the entire event again on the big screen of tacts, then listen to all the comm real time, then have your flight debrief, and then your element debrief. Walked out of it at almost 9 tonight, then went back into work to write evals for my Sailors for the next 3 hours. That is kind of the lifestyle you are looking at. More power to you if you can find time to instruct on the side, or even have the interest in flying remaining to also fly outside of work.
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How are you going to find time for grad school?
 
///AMG said:
lol

my day today consisted of showing up at 0800 for 3+ hrs of mission planning (mind you I was flying last night so I didn't get to attend the other 3 hrs of mission planning that night), 3 hrs of briefing, first as an entire air wing, then as individual flights, then as individual elements, then loading mission cards while I am trying to eat my only food of the day. Fly for an hour and a half, land late afternoon, get into the debrief an hour later after I finished spinning my tapes and filling out paperwork in maintenance. Debrief is again 2+ hrs long, as you watch the entire event again on the big screen of tacts, then listen to all the comm real time, then have your flight debrief, and then your element debrief. Walked out of it at almost 9 tonight, then went back into work to write evals for my Sailors for the next 3 hours. That is kind of the lifestyle you are looking at. More power to you if you can find time to instruct on the side, or even have the interest in flying remaining to also fly outside of work.
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Now you're understanding why I got so sick and tired of it after years of this BS grind, for 2 hours of flight? And that wasn't even attending to my normal additional duties.

Figured out quick that I wanted to work to live, not live to work. You figure that out quick when you start losing things because of it.
 
///AMG said:
lol

my day today consisted of showing up at 0800 for 3+ hrs of mission planning (mind you I was flying last night so I didn't get to attend the other 3 hrs of mission planning that night), 3 hrs of briefing, first as an entire air wing, then as individual flights, then as individual elements, then loading mission cards while I am trying to eat my only food of the day. Fly for an hour and a half, land late afternoon, get into the debrief an hour later after I finished spinning my tapes and filling out paperwork in maintenance. Debrief is again 2+ hrs long, as you watch the entire event again on the big screen of tacts, then listen to all the comm real time, then have your flight debrief, and then your element debrief. Walked out of it at almost 9 tonight, then went back into work to write evals for my Sailors for the next 3 hours. That is kind of the lifestyle you are looking at. More power to you if you can find time to instruct on the side, or even have the interest in flying remaining to also fly outside of work.
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And I thought 3 hours of mission planning the day before, and showing 4+00 prior to take off for a 3.5 was ridiculous. You make it sound like I hit the jackpot.
 
So ILL said:
Thanks guys, yeah I have my commercial and instrument and was hoping CSO time would count towards some kind of time building. I would think the Air Force/FAA would allow some crossover since the revamped CSO training down in Pcola has a lot more hands on flying. Well If I do take it I can flight instruct on the side and hopefully make enough money to time build on my own. I'm not itching to start a commercial flying career right now just some time down the road.
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There is actually little "hands on" flying that goes on at UCT. Back in the previous strike pipeline (VT-86, etc) there was a lot more hands on stuff. You will probably have a decent amount of time casual (between classing up) to get some civilian flying going, but it's just enough time to stay current really. I wouldn't try to instruct during UCT unless you were just doing BFRs for people on the weekends.
 
ryan1234 said:
There is actually little "hands on" flying that goes on at UCT. Back in the previous strike pipeline (VT-86, etc) there was a lot more hands on stuff. You will probably have a decent amount of time casual (between classing up) to get some civilian flying going, but it's just enough time to stay current really. I wouldn't try to instruct during UCT unless you were just doing BFRs for people on the weekends.
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Did you do any instructing before the air force?
 
Being a WSO, I think, has made me a pretty good civilian CFI. Training and the ops tempo forced me to set down GA flying in between college and about mid-captain. I didn't become a CFI untill about 9 years time in service. Even now, my max is about 2-3 students, and that's as a staffer with a pretty easy work schedule.
 
So ILL said:
If such a culture is indeed pervasive throughout the Air Force and the Ops community I shouldn't have too much trouble doing a little instructing on the side, given I still want to after work.
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I think you'll find there is a lot more "work" that will occupy your day as a rated officer in an operational assignment than in your time in the medical career field.

I'll put it this way: when I got an assignment as an AETC instructor, I was overjoyed that rules there mandated a 12-hour "maximum flight duty day".
 
I'm a Herk nav (technically a CSO, but you will never heard that uttered), and right now waivers aren't happening. You can try, but it's highly unlikely to get an age waiver for UPT.

I'd apply to Guard Herk or Spec Ops units- they're likely to keep their navs longer than anyone else. The Guard probably only has ~10 years left at most flying with navs.

0 of your time will count towards any civilian flying, BUT, in my opinion, being a navigator can make you a damn good pilot.
 
hook_dupin said:
Being a WSO, I think, has made me a pretty good civilian CFI. Training and the ops tempo forced me to set down GA flying in between college and about mid-captain. I didn't become a CFI untill about 9 years time in service. Even now, my max is about 2-3 students, and that's as a staffer with a pretty easy work schedule.
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How is life as a F-15 wso?
 
NewYorkophile said:
I'm a Herk nav (technically a CSO, but you will never heard that uttered), and right now waivers aren't happening. You can try, but it's highly unlikely to get an age waiver for UPT.

I'd apply to Guard Herk or Spec Ops units- they're likely to keep their navs longer than anyone else. The Guard probably only has ~10 years left at most flying with navs.

0 of your time will count towards any civilian flying, BUT, in my opinion, being a navigator can make you a damn good pilot.
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I don't want to go to J school, they can't make me!
 
scoobs said:
How is life as a F-15 wso?
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Probably better than life as not an F-15 WSO :)

Seriously, for all the bitching I did above and that others in this business probably do at times, it's still kind of first world problems. You get paid to fly thousands of hours in airplanes that few ever get a chance to even sit in, you get to (hopefully) succeed in one of the most demanding and dynamic jobs anywhere in the world, and you get to experience things that your friends can't even comprehend. How about sitting in the ready room of USS Ship, in all of your flight gear, when the 1MC calls "launch the alert 15 fighters".......which is pretty much what you have been waiting to hear your entire life since you were about 4 years old since you saw Top Gun.....except now it is actually happening, and you are one of those dudes. You go sprinting down the pway as fast as you possibly can, with people literally jumping out of your way. Get up to the flight deck, and in the time it takes a guy to preflight a cessna, your jet is already in tension on cat 1. You are shot off the front, and without ever bringing the motors out of full afterburner, you get to completely disregard every procedural rule in the book short of flying into the water, and you just point the nose towards the bad guy and climb like a scalded cat as you blow through the number. For a few minutes, you are the guy who would be in a picture next to the definition of "hard dick fighter pilot", if such a term were in the dictionary. Every E-2 controller or helo pilot hottie in the airwing is watching you too, and they know you are infinitely handsome, debonair, and pretty much just dead sexy. Your boner fest is slightly diminished by the time you get to the "merge" and realize the bad guy is just a G-1 or something weird and the whole thing is a training exercise, but you know that had it been a Bear, you would have absolutely shot it, because that is what you were put on the earth to do. You might even close your eyes, and imagine sweeping the wings of the big fighter, while turning the ICS knob down to drown out the troll in the backseat saying things like "dude that is the 7:15 out of Tampa". But then you are suddenly thrown back into reality when you realize you are simply talking to yourself because there is no backseat, and you are way below ladder, and you pretty much need to just chill out and hold overhead the ship at 250 knots because you have been in max AB for the last 10 minutes trying to be the first dude to get to the bad guy.........I mean how else were you going to tell everyone else in the airwing that they love the weiner, at 0200 on friday night when you are all sipping things like juice and milk and real party foods like cereal and jello, without a hot selfie of you next to some bizarre prop job that looks like Hef's personal ride from 1963. But you just seal the deal, when all those hotties get to watch you rip it off a mile behind the stern at like 10000 knots, and you go from a high start, to a settle, to a underline fly through down at the ramp to a taxi 1........boom.........they wouldn't put it there if it wasn't for stopping. As you play out in the wire, your canopy opens up and while the boss and everyone else is screaming for you to close your damned canopy and get out of the LA, you calmly say "not now chief, I'm in the zone", shut that hog down right then and there, get out and toss your helmet into the ocean, and walk straight across the flight deck like a rockstar and giving bro hugs to all the weirded out yellow shirts you can cross paths with.

Seriously, thats what we do on the reg
 
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