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Navy F-16s -- Picture link

WSO's and old RIO's that go / went to Top Gun get back seat rides in the vipers. Our training O (RIO to WSO) road in them a couple times.
 
Flash said:
As far as I know, VFC-12 had a RIO billet for years.........was suppose to be an expert in radar-guided AAM's........
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The Adversary squadrons (at Oceana, Key West and Miramar) in the day all had RIO billets who were the duty TACTS Range gurus as well and got plenty of stick time.
 
heyjoe said:
The Adversary squadrons (at Oceana, Key West and Miramar) in the day all had RIO billets who were the duty TACTS Range gurus as well and got plenty of stick time.
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Window dressing ... pure and simple. And that's an observation based on a lot of Adversary time .... offered without prejudice or agenda, as you know I love my B/N's .... :)
 
A4sForever said:
Window dressing ... pure and simple. And that's an observation based on a lot of Adversary time .... offered without prejudice or agenda, as you know I love my B/N's .... :)
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One adversary pilot came back alive because his RIO landed the TA-4J after pilot became incapacitated. He was more than window dressing and got an air medal for it (never had to pay for a drink as long as the pilot was around).

I beg to defer on window dressing as FFARP was a huge part of turnaround training and RIOs at VF-43 and VF-126 taught the appropriate lectures to squadrons (some pilot oriented "stuff" is better taught by pilots and same for RIOs). RIOs were also the GCI controllers at TACTS range that was fundamental to FFARP missions. Of course, I guess a pilot could do it, but I sure never saw one in the trailers (before they had nice building) except for debriefs. Another thing was RIOs were likely the ones to roll back to fleet as many pilots were using Adversary tour to springboard into the airlines (had the gouge book in the Ready Room).
 
heyjoe said:
One adversary pilot came back alive because his RIO landed ......
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HEY!!! I'm a believer --- believe it. I knew Brian Westin, you know .... :D

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BUT: Whether or not NFO's HAVE served in the Adversary environment is not my point. Times change and everybody's gotta be somewhere .... I started flyin' Adversary in early 1978 and the NFO's were few and far between .... and they didn't run the nacent TACTs range as it was then "too new" and ONLY the techs ran it. They didn't brief nor debrief ACM hops either, outside of the FITRON RIO's contributions as part of the crew.

Bottom line: The NFO's didn't do anything in a single seat Adversary squadron that was irreplaceable .... in fact; I can say again they weren't there as a general rule --- again, no agenda nor prejudice, just the way it was .... :)
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