Navy Chief
Senior Member
More from Fred today:
In our squadron, we usually went off the boat as a flight of four, called a "division". A flight of two is a "section". When we'd brief for a hop, we brief four and a spare - five pilots would brief, five would man up, five airplanes would start but only four would launch.
Our inter-squadron frequency was button 14. Primary Flight Control was button 2, I think. Anyway, we'd all man up, start, go through the checks, then switch over to button 2 and report, "Boss, Chief 305's up." If all four of the intended planes were up, the spare shut down and went below decks.
Let's say the new guy is Chief 301 today. And he's in the intended flight of four, and some wiley old guy is the spare. The wiley old guy would give the new guy a hand signal to go to button 14, then the wiley old guy would go to button two, and say "Boss, Chief 301 is down." So, the spare would get to go fly, and the new guy sat there wondering why he wasn't going anyplace.
Worked every time. Fred.
In our squadron, we usually went off the boat as a flight of four, called a "division". A flight of two is a "section". When we'd brief for a hop, we brief four and a spare - five pilots would brief, five would man up, five airplanes would start but only four would launch.
Our inter-squadron frequency was button 14. Primary Flight Control was button 2, I think. Anyway, we'd all man up, start, go through the checks, then switch over to button 2 and report, "Boss, Chief 305's up." If all four of the intended planes were up, the spare shut down and went below decks.
Let's say the new guy is Chief 301 today. And he's in the intended flight of four, and some wiley old guy is the spare. The wiley old guy would give the new guy a hand signal to go to button 14, then the wiley old guy would go to button two, and say "Boss, Chief 301 is down." So, the spare would get to go fly, and the new guy sat there wondering why he wasn't going anyplace.
Worked every time. Fred.