Is there something wrong w/ Army avation?

[bobbybrock]

jreb892,
maybe I can shed a lot of light on your situation. I'm an active army CWO3 H-60 I.P.
I can clarify many of your questions. First, you can get a flight contract as a civilian. The Army does like to get promotew from within. WOCS class from 93 was primarly college grads. Myself included. But there are people without their degree who get picked up. Your recruiter might try and persuaded you to enlist. Then apply from within. Not a bad idea but it is a crap shoot.
Most of my Navy and marine bretheran have been pretty much right on track with the assumption of Army branch officers( regualr commision).

 

[bobbybrock]

sorry but I got cut off on my last thread. Like I was saying, most regular officers fly very little past the 6 year mark. And in their first six years, about 36 months is spent in staff positions.Staff aviators in the army fly very little if not at all. At the battalion level (sqaudron) 95% of the line pilots are warrants. All tracked aviators(Instructors, Test pilots, safety officers are warrants) To give you an example, my commissioned peers from flight school are propably sitting around 700-800 hours. I'm just over 2400 hrs.
If you did go warrant you would be given the chance to take a regular commission. OCS would be open to you as soon as you reached your first operational unit. There is also a direct commission program to the medical service corp. They are the bubbas who fly our dustoff helos. The later option is very competitive and most who get picked up are CWO2/CWO3 IP types. For OCS you must have 90 college credit hours to apply. Another option is to get your wings via the Army and jump ship. Go to any Coast Guard or Air farce helo unit and you'll find many prior army warrants. The coasties are very big on direct commisioning army bubbas.
The down falls of this program are many. Time to complete your degree will be limited. Especially with todays op tempo. I've tried many a time to finish my masters and have yet to complete it. Leadership tends not to focus on flying. Remeber most of the 0-4's and 0-5's lack the experience that their line pilots have. Pay is okay, my pay equals what a ground 0-4 would make. The difference is made up with 650 flight pay and ACP bonus which is 12 grand a year. Commisioned aviators are eligable for the 650 but not the 12 grand. Causes tension between the 0-3's and warrants. The upside is your entire career is spent flying.
If I had to do it again I would proably go Navy or Marine air. My advice, get your degree, experience college and look into NROTC or PLC.
If you do go army you will fly TH-67 (Navy TH-57) through most of your training. The army game plan is to have move you into an advanced air frame (H-60, H-58, H-47) for combat skills training.This is what they are calling flight school 21. I think AH-64 pilots still have to go through AQC(advanced aircraft qual). Probably close to what you guys call FRS or RAG.

 

[Fatboy]

hey bobby, whats the difference beetween the flight 21 program and the other route after you select your airframe?

 

[Coner]

hey guys, since we're on the topic of army aviation, i have a few stupid questions. i'm a little ignorant...so bear with me please.

1)are warant's treated the same way as commisioned guys. for example do you salute a warrant?

2) are warrant's ever given a ground tour like in the marines, navy, and air farce.

3) i was told that most guys wanna fly the blackhawk as a preferred airframe, and that the apache's are usually the least desired airframe. is this true?

4) and lastly, don't think i'm just after the image or anything, i'm simply curious. do army aviators get the leather jacket's and all the bell's and whistle's that you would see a naval aviator get.

thank you

cheers

 

[NeoCortex]

Ryoukai
On an unrelated note, does the Navy limit cockpit time after a certain rank?

On a side note, I knew a 2 star admiral that still flew when he was incharge of a battle fleet. Yes, you are not going to be doing combat missions, but you still can fly.

On the unrelated note, You won't see an Admiral in the sky's over Baghdad! You would see a CW5, though.

Is it really fair to compare an Admiral to a CW5?

 

[bobbybrock]

Fatboy,
The difference b/t regular flight school and fs 21 is this. Training is the same all the way up to instruments. All training is done in the TH-67. The same air frame as the TH-57. At that point based on order merit you chose an airframe. If you go flight school 21 you train in what we call the BCS (basic combat skills) phase in the aircraft you will fly in the fleet. So if you are a flight school 21 guy you fly about 80 hours of comabt skills training your fleet airframe. The army thinking is the fleet will get a more skilled and comaby ready pilot. Prior to this concept, you would fly one of two airframes in combat skills. Either the UH-1 (utility) or OH-58 (scout/attack) phase. After that training you'd go to a unit flying that airframe or get an advanced aircraft qual ( AQC ) . Our AQC was made to train seasoned aviators to fly a new airframe. They basically came in to learn to fly a new system. So a WO-1 or 0-1 in AQC was usually behind the power curve. So if you took a flight school 21 pilot and put him in a new unit he arrived with more flight time in his fleet aircraft. A non-flight school 21 guy arrives with less time. Regardless, both will be flying with an IP for a while when they arrive at the their unit. The fs 21 might take a little less time to progress to what we call a RL1 aviator. That means he's basically a qualified co-pilot.
As an IP I've seen very little difference. From what I've been told, is that most FS 21 slots will be for Warrants. The reason behind that. Branch officers can show up at the unit and not even fly. Per each company there are usually 3 slots for commsissioned officers. The othe 15 to 20 are for warrants.
As far as wrrants and there place in the rank structure. Army aviation warrants tend to be pretty young compared to their ground counter parts. We are saluted by all enlisted and salute even the most junior 0-1. In the cockpit it is a totally different deal. Like the other services we have no rank. As a IP I will never log PI (second in command) time with any commissioned officer. Even the brigade ( Wing) commnader who is an 0-6. Most of these guys aren't PICS ( HACS) anyway.
In the aviation branch almost all warrants go by first name and we don't salute each other. Our enviormant is probably pretty close to the relationship between the 0-1 thru 0-4 in a
navy and marine unit.
Grounds tours are served.But not very often. In my 11 years I've been in operational flying slots the entire time.Ground tours are usually in what we call ACRC. This is a tour spent evaluating army guard and reserve units. Sometimes we serve as LNO but that job usually goes to an 0-3. We don't have the equivlent of the Marine aviator ALO tour.
As far as what type of airframe, well it all depends on your personallity. My first choice was H-60, then H-47. Most utility guys have a very laid back attitude. In these unit you tend to see longer hair and more flight suits.Gun guys tend to be the aggresive type who you might find in your fighter community. My personal opinion is that H-60 and H-47 are more well rounded as pilots. We fly more instruments then the 64 and 58 guys.
The army does not issue the leather flight jacket. Depending on when you went through flight school, you are issued a 3 flight suits and two air force flight jackets. The new guys aren't issue the standard CWU 27P (flight suit). They are issued the Aviation Battle Dress Uniform. This is a two piece flight suit that looks very much like your standard BDU's(utilities) The army hierarchy doesn't like it's pilot looking different from the rest of the ground guys. Most units let ther pilots wear both. What you'll most likely see is warrants in the traditional flight suit and the commssioned guys in the two piece army (ABDU) comformist
uniform.
Well hopefully this answered most of your questions. Or maybe I just confused you more about the army aviation branch.

 

[TechGuru]

hello

 

[Fatboy]

Sweet bobby, thanks for the good info.

 

[46Driver]

Bobby,
Very informative post. The only exception to that is the first name basis part. You had better believe a Marine 1st Lt is going to be calling a captain sir and the same thing goes for a captain speaking to a major.

 

[bobbybrock]

46driver,
Sorry about that. I'm thinking more of the Air farce culture. But then again I might be wrong there. I worked with the HMX-1 guys recently and they are extremley professional. It was very refreshing to be around 0-3, 0-4's and above who took flying seriously. When it comes to being a total combined arms offifers, Marines aviaotrs walk the walk. A lot of army bubbas wish we'd model our aviation branch more in line with the way you guys do business.
Just curious 46 driver, are you out of the east or west coast? I see 46's do approaches into our airfiled (SVN) every now and then. I also have a question for you. How do you guys progress a pilot to HAC status? And at about what hour level does it happen. Take care and keep the dirty side down.
Bobby

 

[46Driver]

I did some Space-A traveling with the Air Force to Australia and Germany and did notice the Air Force used first names, not only between officers but also between officers and enlisted aircrew. You might say I was shocked.

Got a lot of good friends up at HMX. Good duty but they are always on the road. Don't know if I ever could have stomached being up in the DC area but they all seem to like it. The Marine Corps helo community is so small everyone does seem to know everybody else - if not personally, at least by reputation. You can credit The Basic School for the total arms mentality - that is one thing the Corps does really well.
As for me, it was 7 years at Camp Lejuene/MCAS New River. Occasionally we would fly down to Savannah from there, the 46's could also be from MCAS Beaufort (there are 2 Phrogs at the jet base to perform Search and Rescue).
Making HAC usually happens around the 500 to 700 around mark depending on the CO. Most bubbas show up at the fleet squadron with about 300 hours coming out of the the FRS and it takes about 1 to 2 years spooling them up. The CO then makes the call of when to let them upgrade. In our squadrons case, the CO would not anyone upgrade until they had at least 2 months on the boat - shipboard flying being particularly dangerous. We were impatient - as all lieutenants are - but in this case, the CO was correct. Besides, the extra hours made the check ride easier. In my case, I did my 2 pre-HAC checks and my 2 HAC checks in Mogadisha, Somalia (2 day flights and 2 night NVG flights).
How does the Army do it?

 

[bobbybrock]

Well the army has no set standard for making PIC (HAC). What usually happens is a nugget will spend at least a year as a PI. The the unit has a PIC board. it consist of the CO and the IP's and the unit PIC's. Since the unit PIC's are the guys who fly with the new guys the most. Almost like my days back in the fraternity. You'd vote and any thumbs down ment no ride. For seasoned guys coming to a new unit it is usually a records review then a ride. What you have to understand is in the Hawk community there are serveral mission we fly. You could fly for three or four years in a Medavac unit then go to a assault unit and fly special mssions. So it also depends on mission training with a guy showing up to his secod or third unit. Bottom line is the unit Standards pilot usually has the last say. The skipper is usually to green to really know when is the right time for a guy to make the jump to the right seat.

 

[bobbybrock]

46 driver,
I have a few question concerning the physical make of the squadron. As a marine officer you are familiar with the way a Infantry company is made up. That is basically how a aviation company is composed. How do you guys do it. Is there like a HQ unit where all the officers/pilots are assinged? Also are line pilots given charge of like say a life support shop? Plus what type of collateral duties is a regular line pilot given?
As you mentioned TBS. What a great concept. Tell your guys they are Marines first and for most then back it up with the training. You see, the army tries that.They just don't give you the training. My unit has six pilots who are either ex rangers or Special Forces, so we get a little OJT from them. I think the aviation branch is thinking about sending new 0-1's to the Infantry OBC. Not TBS, but a start.

 

[MrTorso]

I didn't see this answer to a previous question so I'll toss it out. With NROTC you get full tuition and book $ each year. 1/C get a bigger stipend than the 4/C but it all evens out. I'm a Marine Option (future 2nd LT) and we do summer training with the Navy for ~4wks per summer except for 6 weeks of Bulldogg (OCS) summer after Jr. year. They cram a lot more into our 6 weeks than in OCC/PLC (we always saw them taking their time at OCS) because we didn't slow down at all until day before graduation. We get to apply for Aviation contracts just like everyone else going PLC/OCC. Commission and 6 months of TBS is the way to go. It's a rough and tumble route but if life was easy would it be any fun. Plus we get to get our hands dirty unlike the Navy!
Semper Fi!!

 

[46Driver]

I think having your O-1's go to an infantry unit and getting a first hand look at the ground side first is an excellent idea - hope the Army implements it.

As for our squadrons, they are self-contained units. CO (and quite often the XO) are LtCol's. Under that your structure is S-1 (Admin), S-2 (Intel), S-3 (Operations), S-4 (Logistics), S-5 (MWR), and DSS (Safety/Natops). These are often referred to as "Upstairs". Officer heavy with minimal enlisted troops. Often the Ops guys have the most advanced quals (WTI, etc). Generally, the Operations Officer is a senior major. Meanwhile, the "Downstairs" guys are maintenance - lots of troops and far fewer officers. The Aviation Maintenance Officer (generally a mid level major) is in charge of all this (say about 100 Marines) and is usually junior to the OpsO (although depending on personality, the CO may shuffle these people to get a better fit.) Under the AMO, you will have several divisions including phase crew (lieutenant), flight equipment (lieutenant), quality assurance (captain), avionics (non-flying warrant officer), maintenance admin (non-flying warrant officer), and the 2 biggest divisions (which are always at war with each other!) are airframes (captain in charge of hydraulics and metalsmiths) and flightline (captain in charge of crewchiefs and enlisted aircrew). The maintenance officers are all Functional Check Pilot Qualified and spend more time testing aircraft than running missions. Much more of our time is spent with our "collateral duty" than with our flying job. Paperwork out the wazoo most of the time.

Generally, when you start executing missions for your workups, it is the Ops guys who are the tacticians and lead the flights while the maintenance pilots are usually HAC's for dash-2, 3, etc. Also, note that the higher in rank generally signifies more flight time.

This is what I saw in my years at New River - Q-Ball and PhrogDriver might want to amplify or correct some stuff here.