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How Did You know You wanted to fly in the military/join the military?

davidc1220

Well-Known Member
Why did you pick the branch you did? How did you know you wanted to do this? All are welcome to reply! Just figured it would give others who are wondering what to do, an idea of why military aviation made a difference in y'alls life and how it can make a difference in theirs.

Thanks for replying
 

FLGUY

“Technique only”
pilot
Contributor
Why did you pick the branch you did? How did you know you wanted to do this? All are welcome to reply! Just figured it would give others who are wondering what to do, an idea of why military aviation made a difference in y'alls life and how it can make a difference in theirs.

Thanks for replying
For me it was a few different things. Naval Aviation seemed to have this prestige about it that the Air Force didn’t have. Carrier aviation and learning to land on the boat (even though I never got to do it personally) carried a reputation of being the hardest thing any pilot could ever do, and the culture surrounding it was much more enticing. Little things like the Navy having a general sentiment of “If it doesn’t violate NATOPS, then you can do it” vs. the Air Force mentality of “If the manual doesn’t explicitly state that you can, then you can’t” (generalizations of course, but there is some truth to them). Better uniforms, cooler deployments, more history in the service.

All that being said, quality of life is probably the single most important thing you could want in any career, and the Air Force in many ways beats out the Navy in that department. Shorter deployments, always being land based, more options to fly in your later career come to mind. I also hear promotions are easier on the Officer side in the Air Force, but that may be anecdotal to one individual I know.

Personally, I would keep applying to both and go with the first one that picked me up.
 

BigLuvin

Active Member
pilot
None
I'll keep it simple. I wanted to get the fuck out of Tennessee and was too poor for college so I enlisted as an Aircrewman and the Navy seemed dope. It's been one hell of a ride.
 

sevenhelmet

Low calorie attack from the Heartland
pilot
I knew I wanted to be a pilot, but I couldn't afford an aviation degree, so the military academy route made sense. The Navy officers I encountered were cool and approachable, while the USAF guys didn't seem to think much of their own service (this ended up mattering quite a lot; officer recruiters, take note). Carrier aviation looked pretty cool. Even though I'm out now, and I've had my differences with the USN, I stand by my choice.
 

Flash

SEVAL/ECMO
None
Super Moderator
Contributor
I grew up hearing stories about flying and fighting the 'Meatballs' in WWII when he was a B-24 pilot in the China-Burma-India theater and got to visit my uncle (married into the family, shortly after divorced) at Andrews when he flew there in an F-14. Why Navy over USAF? I like the water and the culture appealed to me even from a young age, just seemed to be less 'rigid' than the USAF when it came to many things.

Chocker whites are cool too, the 4 times you get to actually wear them.
 

DanMa1156

Is it baseball season yet?
pilot
Contributor
1. I always liked ships as a kid for some reason, and when I saw TOP GUN and the planes land on the ship, I thought that was incredible. I was in 4th grade and I couldn't read or watch enough about it. (Still feel this way, and I absolutely love landing on ships even though I am a helo pilot. Small boy landings, I love that challenge even to this day.)

2. As I got older, I seriously considered two major factors between the Navy and the Air Force commissioning programs: (1) Where would I likely live in a career as a pilot for either one? Most USAF duty stations did not appeal to me whereas the locations for Navy locations did appeal to me; and (2), if, for some reason I didn't end up qualifying as a pilot, what was the worst imaginable job each service could throw me at in my 18 year old brain - for the Navy, it was subs, and for the Air Force it was Missileers (spelling?). I figured Subs would be way cooler and had a more interesting mission set than sitting in an underground bunker in the middle of nowhere waiting to end the world. (I made the right choice for me; my perception matched reality here as far as I can tell.)

3. I genuinely wanted to serve on ships. I have my bad days like anyone else, but in general, I don't entirely hate the boat like a lot of people do. I think I'd be more frustrated deploying to a town where I couldn't take liberty, or some remote part of the world where even if I could take liberty, it would be pointless. At least the Navy gets port calls and the expectations for work while in port are very low.

4. Navy uniforms seemed way cooler. (Still feel this way.)

5. The Navy culture both in and out of aviation is something I thought I'd fit in more with. (To a large extent, I think that was and remains true.)
 
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Griz882

Frightening children with the Griz-O-Copter!
pilot
Contributor
I would say when I was about 13. I saw a Blue Angels air show in Deer Valley, AZ. Was hooked..the A-4s were awesome.

Also, both of my uncles served in the Navy during the Vietnam time period.

View attachment 34461
This is what they flew when I first saw them (age 10). From the F-11 they went F-4’s (amazing show!) then A-4’s.
87F906CA-F878-CF32-F186-4A3FB07C0B87.jpg
 

ciceronroma

Ciceron
I grew up an Air Force brat and always looked up to my father as he served our country. I tried multiple times to enlist or become an officer during my life, but each time, the same problems came up. I was overweight and just couldn't lose enough to join. Then about 2 years ago I started going ham on getting in shape (lost over 80 lbs.) and focused everything on that, and then realized I could finally pursue my dream.
After looking and going through multiple branches I noticed several things. 1, my age (33 now) was barring me from serving in many MOS or Billets, and 2nd, I had a Master's Degree, so being an Officer would be a priority for me. After doing the runs, the Navy was the only branch that, instead of giving me extra problems with my application from the get go, sat me down to take some practice tests, which I proceeded to knock out of the park with perfect scores. That piqued their interest, so now, after a year of applications and processes, I'm hopefully going to serve in the US Navy as an Intel Officer after OCS next month!
 

Meyerkord

Well-Known Member
pilot
I went to school to be a computer nerd, and, while I was decent at my job, I found it boring and soul-sucking to sit in a cubicle under fluorescent lights all day, so I decided to pull the trigger and try something cool and different. Military was always something in the back of my mind. I was a volunteer firefighter and liked giving back to my community, so military was the next step in my mind. I was single with no kids (still am) so it made the transition pretty easy. Chose the Navy because they have the coolest duty stations and I just liked the Navy culture.

4 years later and absolutely no regrets.
 

Hopeful Hoya

Well-Known Member
pilot
Contributor
I had always grown up living aviation, and I knew if I was going to fly I wanted to fly in the Navy. But it was never more than a thought in the back of my head until I spent a summer in college working on Wall Street. Sure, living in NYC was a lot of fun, but I figured that there were better ways to spend my 20s than working 16 hour+ days staring at spreadsheets, and so I was sold on the Navy after that.

5 years in (and 1 year into my Fleet tour) I have absolutely no regrets. Sure, I spend more time looking at spreadsheets than I would have thought, and some days have me fantasizing about building one of those Rage Rooms in my house, but then there are days that you launch off the boat on the first-go BFM 1.0 cycle or get a good-deal JOPA flight in the 2508 and get to drop down into the Sidewinder and it makes it all worth it.
 
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