Early Select Submariner...can i get out of it????

[mid1990]

Hello everyone,

I am Firstie in good standing selected for an internal scholarship that required me to early select submarines but offered grad school at NPS as an incentive.

I came to the naval academy to be a pilot, the only thing I've every really wanted in life. I was under a lot of peer and faculty pressure to put paperwork in that would lead to the scholarship even though I was under the impression that I was not really competitive for it. Murphy's law, I was selected and forced to interview with the four star in charge of Naval Nuclear Reactors...

I've done my interview and was pretty content with submarines until I was given an aviation cruise that is concluding this week. Needless to say I have found my niche in life and don't want to leave the squadron. Does anyone know how difficult it is to get out of an Nuclear contract once you have already interviewed? I've heard of kids from the academy getting out of it but for reasons that usually pertain to a lot of drinking and or partying. Although I could pursue these options I feel that this would not lead to an aviation slot which is something I know I coud have if I got out of my submarine contract...

any ideas?

 

[usnabgo08]

mid1990,

You literally are in a tough boat. I am not sure if there is a way to break your contract at this point. Likely, if you received your bonus already (I can't remember when you guys get it exactly), you won't be able to break. I'd recommend following this (and some of the below) up with a submarine officer.

Based off your scholarship selection, your minimum obligation looks to be about 5-6 years (this runs concurrently with your 5 year obligation for graduating, so essentially it doesn't add time).

Upon completion of Nuclear training, the following service obligation applies:

"Submarine Officers: Required to serve on active duty for a minimum of 24 months as a Submarine Division Officer upon completion of nuclear propulsion training or 1 year in addition to any minimum service requirement (MSR) previously incurred, whichever is longer."

After this (24 month tour), you probably could put in a lateral transfer package. I will be completely honest with you, your odds of being accepted are about 0.0000001%. My friend has put in 4 lateral transfer packages (from SWO) and every single time they aren't accepting pilots/NFOs. For a lateral transfer to work, your losing community and gaining community most both approve; normally the losing community doesn't always approve, but in aviation, it is likely they have zero to very few slots from lateral transfers, for the accepting community to gain you.

I think your best bet is to push forward...you never know if you will end up liking subs. Plenty of stories of how officers hated their service selection but realized how much they actually liked what they did and had a complete 180. Just realize that as a sub officer you will be a "leader" every single day once you step foot on your first boat. Hopefully that is partially what brought you to USNA. Sub guys do awesome stuff/missions that not everyone in the military (and for sure civilians) are privied to!

Please feel free to PM me if you have more questions.

Check out the following references:
http://www.public.navy.mil/bupers-n...clear/career/Documents/Obligation Service.pdf

http://www.public.navy.mil/bupers-n...Training/Documents/1520-050 CH-34 APR2011.pdf