Navy Flight School Q and A

Capt MJ said:
Oh well done, your head looks just like I imagined it! Big brain in there somewhere.

Do they still do the mini-wings to give to mom or G/B/Friend/Spouse? My departed mother-in-law gave me the wings she had kept for decades. Hers had a tiny diamond chip.

So proud of you and appreciate you sharing this; wings of gold are so special. DH has the tiniest wings of gold sticker you can find on the center back window of the Corvette, no big honking USNA crests or N* or go Navy bumper stickers or Navy class year vanity plate. Just the tiny wings of gold. If people know what they are, great. If you know, you know.

Your notes here are excellent. Deckplate gouge.
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They do a spouse's award (certificate of appreciation) for each spouse, but no other family members. The mini wings would have been cool to get though! It is very cool seeing the fraternity of winged aviators. Texting a lot of my flight school mentors, more than one said "welcome to the club" and it actually feels like one haha. I hope there are similar feelings in other designators too. Every community has its heroes and great achievements.

Happy to help! I feel the inner workings of flight school are valuable for everyone interested in Naval Aviation (and their families) to learn.
 
Happy2BaNavyMom said:
Thank you so much! This is really helpful. My '21 did FAM1 yesterday (first ACTUAL flight in the T6, I think). I haven't heard from him but I think his days are getting longer.
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Congrats to them! I still remember parts of my C4101 (first flight in Primary). It's a roller coaster ride for sure. The plane flies you more than you fly it the first few flights. Days can be long. Usually, you get the squadron ~45 minutes before brief time, you brief from anywhere between 10 minutes to sometimes over an hour (a lot of factors), spend 20 or so minutes on the ground getting geared up and pre-flighting, spend 20-30 minutes starting up, doing ground checks and taxiing, 1.5-2.0 hours in the air, a 5 ish minute taxi back, 10-15 minutes walking back and taking gear off, and usually around 20-30 minutes in the debrief. Rinse and repeat over and over.
 
This is great information. My DD is in Primary and I just don't get this kind of news. As a parent we're on a need to know basis. Congratulations on your wings!
 
Hi, I was wondering, how often did you get to fly your aircraft in flight school and if you know, how often will you get to fly it as a JO? Does the frequency depend on what type of aircraft someone is flying?
 
Not as much as you think. In flight school expect to get scheduled for something everyday, either flight, sim, or class. So probably flying 4-8 hours a week in flight school.
In your first actual squadron in the fleet it depends on where your squadron is in their workup cycle. On deployment you'll expect to fly 40-60 hours a month. Off deployment it can vary between 15-40 a month, or usually 2-3 times a week.
Flight instructors in primary or advanced will fly way more than anyone else. I averaged flying 5-6 days a week, 60 hours a month, and had some months into the mid 70s.
 
gonavy14 said:
Not as much as you think. In flight school expect to get scheduled for something everyday, either flight, sim, or class. So probably flying 4-8 hours a week in flight school.
In your first actual squadron in the fleet it depends on where your squadron is in their workup cycle. On deployment you'll expect to fly 40-60 hours a month. Off deployment it can vary between 15-40 a month, or usually 2-3 times a week.
Flight instructors in primary or advanced will fly way more than anyone else. I averaged flying 5-6 days a week, 60 hours a month, and had some months into the mid 70s.
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What determines how often you fly? Is it part of the schedule? Can you decide on some downtime to fly your aircraft if you'd like?
 
There's a daily flight schedule. If you're on deployment, you'll have operational flights and missions supporting the strike group. Throw in some training flights every once in awhile too, but no you can't just decide to go out for a flight if you have free time. Flight hours, gas, and maintenance are expensive. Not to mention that about half of a squadrons aircraft are down for maintenance at any one time. They may have something broken, or they may just be undergoing regularly scheduled inspections. Either way, the aircraft that are up are usually supporting the flight schedule and they don't usually have extras lying around.
 
Dragomir said:
What determines how often you fly? Is it part of the schedule? Can you decide on some downtime to fly your aircraft if you'd like?
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In addition to what @gonavy14 said, there are different internal priorities going on. Someone who needs to get an upgrade might get the priority for flight time over someone else. Learning does not stop once you get your wings. You gain additional mission/tactical quals and flight quals during your tour. Those take flight hours to get. Also, there are pilots in different tours. For example, pilots doing their junior officer tours will fly the most. Pilots who are department heads (LCDRs) run the different departments in the squadron. So they have more intensive ground jobs (read less time to fly) and those ground jobs make sure the squadron runs every day.

Stuff like flyovers and other good deal flights aren't officially joyrides or anything like that. Sometimes the mission to be accomplished allows you to do really cool stuff. So the flyover for the Super Bowl is a good deal flight for sure, but the official mission for that flight was public affairs.
 
Most folks outside of Naval Aviation are unaware that the Navy Flight Hour program is highly managed by the staff Commander Naval Air Forces.

During flight training all the way up to getting to your first fleet squadron - your flying hours will vary slightly but never more than enough to get you qualified. No "extra" flying. If you are getting "extra" flying it is probably because you failed an event and the Navy will only give you so much "extra" until they cut you loose.

Fleet squadrons will be given an allotment of flight hours to meet their Training and Readiness requirement. Each pilot will get their share of hours needed to either meet their individual training requirements as well as the readiness metrics for the squadron.

The flight hour allotment will vary depending on where the squadron is within the deployment cycle. During the down time periods, you could go as low as 10hrs per pilot per month - that is the minimal sustainment level. During peak periods and on deployment that could be as high as 50-60 hours per month and I have several pages during the gulf war where I surpassed 120hrs in a month (requires a waiver). Additional flight hour funding could be authorized by specific funding for combat operations that are not part of the DoD annual budget.

Commanding Officers should set policy on flight hours. Several COs I've had made it clear they would be #1 on the flight hour list. The best CO prioritized the JOs getting the majority of the flight hours as they are in the tour where they are learning their trade craft and do not have experience to fall back on yet. Every squadron is different...

We used to talk about good deal flying - the daytime - just go out and fly etc. That mindset and there era of getting 1000hrs of jet time in a 3year tour are gone. The Fleet Response Plan circa 2003 changed the Navy readiness model to a heavily metric based approach. No longer would we train to our utmost potential - but we would train to our maximum potential within an allotted budget. We discovered that our operational resources (jets/airspace) were far more limited than we believed.

The job was still amazing...but being in an era where all your leadership had 5000-6000 hours and 500-1000 arrested landings in a career where a JO today could expect to get maybe 2000 hours in 2 decades seems sometimes like a let down.
 
Usnavy2019 said:
In addition to what @gonavy14 said, there are different internal priorities going on. Someone who needs to get an upgrade might get the priority for flight time over someone else. Learning does not stop once you get your wings. You gain additional mission/tactical quals and flight quals during your tour. Those take flight hours to get. Also, there are pilots in different tours. For example, pilots doing their junior officer tours will fly the most. Pilots who are department heads (LCDRs) run the different departments in the squadron. So they have more intensive ground jobs (read less time to fly) and those ground jobs make sure the squadron runs every day.

Stuff like flyovers and other good deal flights aren't officially joyrides or anything like that. Sometimes the mission to be accomplished allows you to do really cool stuff. So the flyover for the Super Bowl is a good deal flight for sure, but the official mission for that flight was public affairs.
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NeverSayNever said:
Most folks outside of Naval Aviation are unaware that the Navy Flight Hour program is highly managed by the staff Commander Naval Air Forces.

During flight training all the way up to getting to your first fleet squadron - your flying hours will vary slightly but never more than enough to get you qualified. No "extra" flying. If you are getting "extra" flying it is probably because you failed an event and the Navy will only give you so much "extra" until they cut you loose.

Fleet squadrons will be given an allotment of flight hours to meet their Training and Readiness requirement. Each pilot will get their share of hours needed to either meet their individual training requirements as well as the readiness metrics for the squadron.

The flight hour allotment will vary depending on where the squadron is within the deployment cycle. During the down time periods, you could go as low as 10hrs per pilot per month - that is the minimal sustainment level. During peak periods and on deployment that could be as high as 50-60 hours per month and I have several pages during the gulf war where I surpassed 120hrs in a month (requires a waiver). Additional flight hour funding could be authorized by specific funding for combat operations that are not part of the DoD annual budget.

Commanding Officers should set policy on flight hours. Several COs I've had made it clear they would be #1 on the flight hour list. The best CO prioritized the JOs getting the majority of the flight hours as they are in the tour where they are learning their trade craft and do not have experience to fall back on yet. Every squadron is different...

We used to talk about good deal flying - the daytime - just go out and fly etc. That mindset and there era of getting 1000hrs of jet time in a 3year tour are gone. The Fleet Response Plan circa 2003 changed the Navy readiness model to a heavily metric based approach. No longer would we train to our utmost potential - but we would train to our maximum potential within an allotted budget. We discovered that our operational resources (jets/airspace) were far more limited than we believed.

The job was still amazing...but being in an era where all your leadership had 5000-6000 hours and 500-1000 arrested landings in a career where a JO today could expect to get maybe 2000 hours in 2 decades seems sometimes like a let down.
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Very informative. Thank you.
 
NeverSayNever said:
The job was still amazing...but being in an era where all your leadership had 5000-6000 hours and 500-1000 arrested landings in a career where a JO today could expect to get maybe 2000 hours in 2 decades seems sometimes like a let down.
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This is one of the reasons a lot of JOs are getting out after their MSR. Not specifically the contrast between leadership's flight hours, but the decline in flight time and increase in ground jobs post initial shore tour and dissociated sea tour.
 
Usnavy2019 said:
This is one of the reasons a lot of JOs are getting out after their MSR. Not specifically the contrast between leadership's flight hours, but the decline in flight time and increase in ground jobs post initial shore tour and dissociated sea tour.
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Current leadership at the O5/O6 level has grown up in the FRP era. There won't be huge differences in flight hours going forward. Current retiring O5s will be lucky to have 1500-2000hrs in 2023. The last 10 years of a career is where the pension was truly earned. Now that the BRS is in place there is even less incentive to stay beyond MSR.
 
Well, things change rapidly in the world. Servicemen and women may end up getting a lot more training AND real world ops in this lifetime. In the 80's it was relatively "safe" and boring to be a regular person in the service. That changed after Desert Storm and especially 9/11.

Instability in Europe and Asia are making our current crop of servicepeople's lives potentially very interesting, and busy.
 
Since this forum is slightly more "anonymous" than the Facebook pages...I have a question for the OP or anyone who has had experience with debilitating airsickness. My DS is in flight school (Primary - about 5 flights short of solo) and continues to have very serious issues with airsickness. They tried the patches, which eased it, but didn't cure it, at all. (From what I understand, the patches are "new" and some people go straight to the spinner.) Now he is destined for the "spinner" chair. He can't fly again until he gets through this. 1) What exactly is the spinner chair? Is it more of a gyro gizmo? 2) What percentage of people have to go this route? 3) What percentage of people does this work for? 4) GOD FORBID he can't get over this, where will he go?
 
Happy2BaNavyMom said:
Since this forum is slightly more "anonymous" than the Facebook pages...I have a question for the OP or anyone who has had experience with debilitating airsickness. My DS is in flight school (Primary - about 5 flights short of solo) and continues to have very serious issues with airsickness. They tried the patches, which eased it, but didn't cure it, at all. (From what I understand, the patches are "new" and some people go straight to the spinner.) Now he is destined for the "spinner" chair. He can't fly again until he gets through this. 1) What exactly is the spinner chair? Is it more of a gyro gizmo? 2) What percentage of people have to go this route? 3) What percentage of people does this work for? 4) GOD FORBID he can't get over this, where will he go?
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Let me cut to #4. If he is DQ’ed for Navy air, discussions will occur, and space will be looked for in other communities, a match will be made, and off he will go to complete his ADSO elsewhere. They will do their best to get him through this, because of what they have already invested, but at some point, a needs of the Navy decision will be made. Either he can or cannot move forward with training.

So sorry this is happening - but it does.
 
Happy2BaNavyMom said:
Since this forum is slightly more "anonymous" than the Facebook pages...I have a question for the OP or anyone who has had experience with debilitating airsickness. My DS is in flight school (Primary - about 5 flights short of solo) and continues to have very serious issues with airsickness. They tried the patches, which eased it, but didn't cure it, at all. (From what I understand, the patches are "new" and some people go straight to the spinner.) Now he is destined for the "spinner" chair. He can't fly again until he gets through this. 1) What exactly is the spinner chair? Is it more of a gyro gizmo? 2) What percentage of people have to go this route? 3) What percentage of people does this work for? 4) GOD FORBID he can't get over this, where will he go?
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What exactly is the spinner chair? Is it more of a gyro gizmo?
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in the situation you describe, you are very likely referring to a barany chair - watch that video (source youtube) and decide it's accuracy/ veracity yourself, or search the internet for an article called "The chair that stops you from vomiting in flight".
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less likely it could be discussing an aerotrim (also known as Multi-Axis Trainer (source: youtube) or MAT) is a 3-axis gimbal which has been used for equilibrioception (balance) training in pilots or astronauts - shown below.
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Good luck to your son and here's hoping this works to get him squared away to move forward with his flight training if that is what he wants. He is already I'm sure looking into every remedy (not sure which of these are allowed by the military) including the scopolamine patch, other medications, hydration, sleep management, vented air, oxygen supplementation, relaxation meditation, cardio fitness, etc.
 
Weed. I am totally sure the Navy would be cool about a relaxing bowl just before takeoff, to, you know, mellow the stomach and whatnot. He might have to smoke it outside though, as some of those air quality rules can be harsh.

(Do I need to say I'm joking? I'm joking. Seriously, best of luck to him.)
 
The ART program has a success rate in the mid to high nineties percentage wise. They will work with him if he keeps showing up. You have to have some grit to show up, get to the urge of vomitting every day for a while, and go back back the next day. People have nothing but respect for people who come back from the chair. The same goes for someone who DORs or attrites for airsickness. People will work to find that SNA a good home. A lot of communities like Supply and Intel factor Flight and Nuke attrites into their community numbers.

The ART program will also not just force him to ride the chair. They will change his fitness and nutritional habits if they are deemed to be contributing to his airsickness. The Navy knows this is a common issue, the AMSOs are all trained to treat this, and the Navy will do its best if your DS wants to keep showing up!
 
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