• Please take a moment and update your account profile. If you have an updated account profile with basic information on why you are on Air Warriors it will help other people respond to your posts. How do you update your profile you ask?

    Go here:

    Edit Account Details and Profile

Should I stay or should I go? Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying And Love HSC.

Gatordev

Well-Known Member
pilot
Site Admin
Contributor
With smaller SAGs stationed farther apart in a Sea Control or Maritime Basing scenario, read “grunts on the ground” as “sailors at sea” away from LHDs or CVNs. Fortunately, progress is being made:

This is just bizarre. AWs complain about being Plane Captains because it takes away from their tactical training time, so the PC requirement goes away. Now they want to become Paramedics? It's a two-year training curriculum, has constant CEC requirements, AND it's not something you can do without constantly practicing the skill, which takes more time. That isn't even covering how not all paramedics are equal and can do the same things (or are capable of it).

Too bad the helo community doesn’t take SAR seriously, though

No body has said that. You keep coming back to this. What was asked was why that mission, the one that's executed some large percentage of time, isn't appreciated for what it is: saving lives. The answer is easy, it's not sexy and the saving lives part rarely happens.

Just going to let the irony sink in here... But you can go back to telling HSC they’re being dumb to train to mission sets it rarely does (CSAR, CAS, HVBSS, SOF Support).

Let's stop conflating "HSC," missions that are and aren't even trained to, and missions that are trained to but not executed normally. Sometimes it's tough to figure out if your posts are truly defending "HSC" or if they're defending what your squadron does. I'm sure you'd agree that the two are not the same.
 

Hair Warrior

Well-Known Member
Contributor
This is just bizarre. AWs complain about being Plane Captains because it takes away from their tactical training time, so the PC requirement goes away. Now they want to become Paramedics? It's a two-year training curriculum, has constant CEC requirements, AND it's not something you can do without constantly practicing the skill, which takes more time. That isn't even covering how not all paramedics are equal and can do the same things (or are capable of it).
Reading that letter/memo, it almost sounds like they want to become USAF PJs.

I get that USAF PJs have an elite training pipeline and are considered SOF, but the Navy doesn’t have enough time, money, or people to recreate the USAF PJ curriculum (or tolerate its washout rate).
 

RobLyman

- hawk Pilot
pilot
None
To the SAR issue specifically...


With smaller SAGs stationed farther apart in a Sea Control or Maritime Basing scenario, read “grunts on the ground” as “sailors at sea” away from LHDs or CVNs. Fortunately, progress is being made:


Too bad the helo community doesn’t take SAR seriously, though
Welcome aboard. The Army did this about five years ago for medevac. Studies showed the Army National Guard medevac units had higher survivability rates than active duty, mostly due to their civilian training and experience. Most of the medics in our unit greatly exceed the medical training requirements of the Army. ALL are nurses or paramedics in their civilian job.
 

robav8r

Well-Known Member
None
Contributor
Reading that letter/memo, it almost sounds like they want to become USAF PJs.

I get that USAF PJs have an elite training pipeline and are considered SOF, but the Navy doesn’t have enough time, money, or people to recreate the USAF PJ curriculum (or tolerate its washout rate).
Thank you MOTO . . .
 

Pags

N/A
pilot
SAR Medical Technicians are not the same thing as AW’s. They are HMs by rate.
Not sure how they're being used in the community these days but when they first showed up it seemed like they spent pretty much all their time over at the clinic and didn't fly very much. I can see using them more on a det like NAAD or during SAR.
 

Brett327

Well-Known Member
None
Super Moderator
Contributor



Just going to let the irony sink in here... But you can go back to telling HSC they’re being dumb to train to mission sets it rarely does (CSAR, CAS, HVBSS, SOF Support).
There’s zero irony. Ask me what my primary mission is, and I’ll tell you that it’s SEAD - 100% of the time. If you find any VAQ JO saying otherwise, I’ll will correct that individual on the spot. Our O6 leadership is 100% in alignment on that.

Can’t say the same for HSC.
 

croakerfish

Well-Known Member
pilot
Not sure how they're being used in the community these days but when they first showed up it seemed like they spent pretty much all their time over at the clinic and didn't fly very much. I can see using them more on a det like NAAD or during SAR.

Their day to day is HM type stuff but they’re pretty involved in the SAR program at most squadrons. They deploy on SAR dets now too.
 

Gatordev

Well-Known Member
pilot
Site Admin
Contributor
Welcome aboard. The Army did this about five years ago for medevac. Studies showed the Army National Guard medevac units had higher survivability rates than active duty, mostly due to their civilian training and experience. Most of the medics in our unit greatly exceed the medical training requirements of the Army. ALL are nurses or paramedics in their civilian job.

Right, but that's because your PRIMARY mission is MEDEVAC. Of course that makes sense. That said, since I misunderstood...

SAR Medical Technicians are not the same thing as AW’s. They are HMs by rate.

Gotcha. Since this was posted by "saraircrewman" I mistakenly thought it was for all aircrewman since technically there aren't any 7815 (or whatever the old Rescue Swimmer NEC is that I can't remember) anymore.

Thanks for the correction. That makes more sense now.
 

red_stang65

Well-Known Member
pilot
You keep coming back to this. What was asked was why that mission, the one that's executed some large percentage of time, isn't appreciated for what it is: saving lives. The answer is easy, it's not sexy and the saving lives part rarely happens.

Who doesn’t appreciate the mission for what it is? Many on here would have you believe that it’s HSC who don’t appreciate it, and that we should just be happy with our lot. My argument is that even a mission as foundational as SAR is severely unsupported by the leadership (read: above CDREs).

There are plenty of lives to be saved and have been saved outside of US territorial waters. They just very rarely go to the Navy and more often go to land-based RQS or others. Why? It’s not because HSC isn’t standing SAR duty while at home or on the boat, but we lack the basic support for a critical mission: fuel for long transits, sufficient radios for coordinating with multiple agencies, paramedics for continued care during said transit, a SAR radio for the swimmer that’s actually reliable, etc. If those basic things were supported to allow HSC to actually perform that job to the level which it deserves, I’m sure perspectives on both sides of the community would be very different.
 
Last edited:

croakerfish

Well-Known Member
pilot
Who doesn’t appreciate the mission for what it is? Many on here would have you believe that it’s HSC who don’t appreciate it, and that we should just be happy with our lot. My argument is that even a mission as foundational as SAR is severely unsupported by the leadership (read: above CDREs).

There are plenty of lives to be saved and have been saved outside of US territorial waters. They just very rarely go to the Navy and more often go to land-based RQS or others. Why? It’s not because HSC isn’t standing SAR duty while at home or on the boat, but we lack the basic support for a critical mission: fuel for long transits, sufficient radios for coordinating with multiple agencies, paramedics for continued care during said transit, etc. If those basic things were supported to allow HSC to actually perform that job to the level which it deserves, I’m sure perspectives on both sides of the community would be very different.

The other services will spend money to be better. The Navy prefers to ghetto rig everything it can get away with and spend the rest on Fat Leonard parties.
Air Force guys have fucking M-4’s in their seat kits now.
 

Pags

N/A
pilot
Who doesn’t appreciate the mission for what it is? Many on here would have you believe that it’s HSC who don’t appreciate it, and that we should just be happy with our lot. My argument is that even a mission as foundational as SAR is severely unsupported by the leadership (read: above CDREs).

There are plenty of lives to be saved and have been saved outside of US territorial waters. They just very rarely go to the Navy and more often go to land-based RQS or others. Why? It’s not because HSC isn’t standing SAR duty while at home or on the boat, but we lack the basic support for a critical mission: fuel for long transits, sufficient radios for coordinating with multiple agencies, paramedics for continued care during said transit, a SAR radio for the swimmer that’s actually reliable, etc. If those basic things were supported to allow HSC to actually perform that job to the level which it deserves, I’m sure perspectives on both sides of the community would be very different.
I think you have to define what level of SAR support USN is willing to fund. USN obviously sees a need a need for organic SAR underway, especially when jets or troops are in the air. But this is a pretty limited capability that is primarily focused on immediate SAR around Mom. Besides Guam I'm not sure there's a NEED for USN to fund HSC to do the type of SAR missions you mention above. Sure, participating in those missions make for good optics and are professionally fulfilling for those involved but it would seem to be way outside what USN wants its helicopters to do.
 

red_stang65

Well-Known Member
pilot
Welcome aboard. The Army did this about five years ago for medevac. Studies showed the Army National Guard medevac units had higher survivability rates than active duty, mostly due to their civilian training and experience. Most of the medics in our unit greatly exceed the medical training requirements of the Army. ALL are nurses or paramedics in their civilian job.

Do the medics also fill roles as crewmen, or are the roles separated?
 
Top