Back Seat Driver

[bigfig]

A (probably dumb) question about Marine NFOs. I heard that WSOs and ECMOs do not have co-pilot controls, but a friend of mine insits that they have some sort of ability to take control of the aircraft in an emergency so he can put it on the ground. Any validity to this statement?

Also, do NFOs get any PIC time in their platform at FRS? Do they get actual time behind the stick of a jet during intermediate/advanced? What type of piloting time/experience do they get during training?

Thanks for your time,
bigfig

PS> Any Marine SNFOs joining me at OCC182?

 

[Frumby]

Nope,
There is no way possible an NFO can land a Prowler or a Hornet. He can insist all he wants but he is wrong.
NFO's do not get any stick time in the FRS. Flight school was doing the Super FO program for awhile but I'm unsure if they are still doing the program. Super FO provided a FO with a certain amount of Front Seat time before starting FO training. Good luck, Frumby

Attack Pilot
Major USMCR

 

[bigfig]

Sir,
Thank you for your reply. However, if there ever is a problem, and I am in the back seat, I'll try to insist REALLY hard to land the plane. That should do the trick.
bigfig

 

[radio_freq]

You can insist all you want and the plane will land...just not at the attitude you wanted.

 

[MVS26]

Bigfig,
As Frumby said, you won't land a hornet or a prowler. A hornet, you don't have a stick back there, and, it's impossible for you to climb up to the front seat. As for a prowler, well, I guess you could reach over if you were navigating and grab the stick, but you'll probably be the only one in the plane (if that's even possible, I'm not sure what the ejection sequence is for a prowler) 'cause everyone else would have ejected instead of letting you drive. But Frumby's right, there is a Super FO program (got a cool patch for it, too, think T-34 with a superman cape and SuperFO written like Superman), you'll get 6 WHOLE FLIGHTS up front. Then they kick your butt back to the backseat and ask you politely to keep your hands off the controls. But I'll agree with everyone else: Insist all you want!
-Matt

 

[Frumby]

Big Fig,
I appreciate your motivation but your assured chance of survival is ejection. Give it back to the tax payers so that you can get a shiny new one.

For all interested:

The ejection sequence for the EA-6B is:
Remember the EA-6B Martin Baker seat is not a Zero/Zero seat. You need at least 80knots to guarantee proper separation among the seats.(Zero/Zero refers to zero airspeed at zero altitude. In other words, if you were to initiate ejection while sitting in the chocks, you would be able to get one swing in the chute and survive)

Upon ejection initiation the firing sequence is:

ECMO-3(Behind Pilot) 0.0 secs
ECMO-2(Behind ECMO-1 and to the right of ECMO-3) 0.4 secs
ECMO-1(Front right seat) 0.8 secs
Pilot 1.2 secs

As many will notice, 1.2 secs for the pilot is a hell of a long time during an ejection situation.
The front seat has the ability to select command eject authority to either pilot only(only person who punch out all occupants) or both pilot and ECMO-1(both front seats can punch out all occupants). ECMO-2 and 3 do not have command authority. ECMO-2 and 3 can punch out but the front seats will remain in the aircraft.
Just thought I would throw that out, Frumby

Attack Pilot
Major USMCR