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Mail Call Question of the Day

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BigWorm

BigWorm

Marine Aviator
pilot
Ok, obviously this is inspired by the show on the History Channel. There have been a few random things that have always puzzled me about the sea going traditions.

Why the freak do we call the bathroom the head?
 
Head is a much used maritime word meaning the top or forward part. Head was also the name given to that part of the older sailing ships, forward of the raised section near the bow or forward part of the boat called the forecastle.

So when someone said they were going to the head it meant they were going to the forward part of the boat. The sailors would climb down onto an area floored with a grating to relieve themselves. The grating allowed the open sea to help keep the area clean. The name has been largely retained among seamen, even in these days of modern toilets and modern flushing devices.
 
I think that was a Mail Call Question too. I need to watch that show more often, get a good dose of R Lee Ermy more often than just FMJ.
 
In addition, the smell would blow with the wind... therefore with sailing ships the smell would drift off away from the ship (off the bow).
 
Whats goin on in Corpus!

What is going on here in corpus? I live here and am awaiting OCS this summer. I go to school at Texas A&M Corpus which is right next to NAS Corpus. Yesterday I saw two f-18`s land as well as what I think was a t-38. The one that looks like an f-5 Tiger. While in class I heard like four more jets circling the patern. Man it was SICK. I was about to run out of class just to get a glimpse of one of those badboys. Does anyone know what going on here? Not to mention I saw a c-130 and some sort of observation plane. Just curious cause I have never seen these jets land here at NAS corpus.
 
Names on aircraft

At what point does a naval aviator have his or her name printed on one of the aircraft? Also since there are more aviators than planes , how is it decided whose name is chosen? The names at the bottom of the plane [not the ones just below the canopy] who do they represent, perhaps the maintance crew?
 
Future Herc Driver said:
The grating allowed the open sea to help keep the area clean. The name has been largely retained among seamen, even in these days of modern toilets and modern flushing devices.
Click to expand...

So did they just pop a squat over the grated area?

At Marine OCS, they've got a sign that says "The Head" but I guess we didn't get that lesson.
 
bruce said:
At what point does a naval aviator have his or her name printed on one of the aircraft? Also since there are more aviators than planes , how is it decided whose name is chosen? The names at the bottom of the plane [not the ones just below the canopy] who do they represent, perhaps the maintance crew?
Click to expand...

It is based simply on seniority in the squadrons I have been in. The CAG bird, with the Side Number/Modex like 100, 200, 500 etc., is painted with the Air Wing CO's name. Those are the ones you see painted up in the nice colorful paint schemes. The squadron CO's name is painted on the next (101, etc.) then the XO on down. For multi-place aircraft(F-14, EA-6), the pilots have their name painted under a pilots seat and the NFO names under NFO seats. The names on the bottom are usually the Plane Captains in the squadron and their hometown (at least here in Whidbey), though occasionally I have seen a few different. Look at them sometime, it is pretty interesting to see where a few came from, we had one from Vladivostok, Russia and a few from the Phillipines. The newest JO's are the ones that don't have their names on the aircraft and are the ones that walk off the boat or take the cargo plane home.
 
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