NAVY Initial Flight Screening (IFS)

[Uncle Fester]

Students' spouses finding work is a perennial problem. They've been making nuggets in P'cola for a long time, and the locals usually understand very well how the Program works. Why hire Mrs Ensign when you know she could be moving at the drop of a hat? And in any case, won't be around for more than a year or two, max. And you've got a hundred other applications. Medical fields are usually good for portability - in a normal economy. Hospitals have to do a lot of prospective employee vetting and can afford to be picky.

Most of the students' spouses I knew gave up on trying to find work until they had pcs orders for a fleet squadron in hand. If she just wants to keep busy, there's always volunteering.

 

[picklesuit]

I was married and went to Vance, as it was closer to the wifes family. We chose to live on base for Primary and Advanced, and it was one of the best decisions I made in the military (besides choosing Navy!) as I saved a lot of time on the commute. When I went to VP-30, I decided to live in West Jacksonville due to the community (lesscrime) and suffered through a 45 minute commute almost every day. I hated the hours I lost each week in the truck sitting at lights and in bumper to bumper ass-pain...live close to your work, so you you have more time off...time in the commute is still time at work in my book...

 

[DocT]

I completely undertsand all the advice about being available for flights and early briefs by living in Pace or Milton. That being said I was never called in for an unscheduled flight, nor was anybody I hung out with. The determining factor in how well you do will be your work ethic and your ability to turn book learning into action in the plane. I drove from N. Pcola every day to Whiting for primary and advanced (about 43 min door to door). I actually enjoyed having 40 min to chill by myself. A wise man once told me: Live where you drink...drive to work.

 

[jtmedli]

A wise man once told me: Live where you drink...drive to work.

Solid advice. Pace is a pretty good place. I live about 3 miles from the McD's in pace and have about a 20-25 min drive to the base and downtown Pcola. Not good, but definitely not bad being 15 mins from the mall.

Getting called in for unscheduled flights is pretty rare. I haven't seen it happen. Unscheduled Sims, on the other hand, are fair game. I've had that happen once or twice. Usually you'll be scheduled for 'standby' for about 4 hours on the day you're not scheduled to come in, put your name/number on the board, and then go chill somewhere so, that if someone IMSAFEs or an IP just needs to pickup a student, you'll be ready to go. It's almost always standby for a flight/sim that you should be ready to do anyways so it's nothing to stress over.

Edit: damn you auto-correct.

 

[FLYNAVY20]

I'm leaning towards the very northeast corner of Pensacola. The area near Mugs and Jugs and the 90. I guess I won't know until I get there.

 

[croakerfish]

I'm leaning towards the very northeast corner of Pensacola. The area near Mugs and Jugs and the 90. I guess I won't know until I get there.

We looked at a few places around Davis Hwy/ 9 Mile RD. Kings Mill, Governors Gate, and The Crossings at 9 Mile all look good, I don't think you could go wrong with those. We're leaning towards the latter two since it sounds like availability will be good this spring.

 

[armada1651]

Come on people, live on the beach. That's what flight school is all about. Or at least the part of it spent in Pensacola.

 

[FLYNAVY20]

We looked at a few places around Davis Hwy/ 9 Mile RD. Kings Mill, Governors Gate, and The Crossings at 9 Mile all look good, I don't think you could go wrong with those. We're leaning towards the latter two since it sounds like availability will be good this spring.

Thanks for getting back to me on this. When do you start OCS?

 

[croakerfish]

Thanks for getting back to me on this. When do you start OCS?

November 27

 

[FLYNAVY20]

I drove from N. Pcola every day to Whiting for primary and advanced

Where about did you live in N Pcola?

 

[jtmedli]

Where about did you live in N Pcola?

I live in Pace on the other side of the bridge from Mugs and Jugs (where scenic meets 90). It's a pretty good spot to be in.

The Cordova Mall and Scenic Highway area is a good halfway point if that's what you're looking for. It's about as 'equi-distant' as you're gonna get between Downtown/Whiting/NASP. At the end of the day, however, Whiting and NASP are just far enough apart to be a pain the arse when it comes to finding a place that's right in between the two. If I were you, seeing as how you're married, I'd just plan on living closer to Whiting and suck it up for the 6-8 weeks of API and drive the longer distance to NASP.

Side note: The mall is where 9th and Bayou cross.

 

[Picaroon]

Come on people, live on the beach. That's what flight school is all about. Or at least the part of it spent in Pensacola.

Agreed. You have few chances to get paid to live in multi-million dollar condos on some of the best beaches in the world. Why not take advantage of them? Studying is easier when done on a balcony overlooking the ocean with a drink in hand anyway.

 

[KBayDog]

Agreed. You have few chances to get paid to live in multi-million dollar condos on some of the best beaches in the world. Why not take advantage of them? Studying is easier when done on a balcony overlooking the ocean with a drink in hand anyway.

You're the one who was recently asking about the leave policy at the HTs, right?

 

[Picaroon]

You're the one who was recently asking about the leave policy at the HTs, right?

Yeah...

 

[MIDNJAC]

I lived in Perdido while I was in API. Didn't attempt to game where I would be going next, and assumed that I would go somewhere else for Primary (as I did end up doing). Found an awesome pad with some of my ROTC buds who were already down there, and lived it up in a relative mansion in a nice neighborhood with a big pool and tiki bar in the backyard. 10 mins to the back gate, and within reach of most things you will want to do while in API and a-pool. Believe me, there is a lot of down time, and having to commute from Whiting every day just to hang out with people, hit the bars, or just go to class would have been really annoying. I'd rather have the hassle of boxing up things and moving up to whiting if/when the orders came, than to go through the annoyance of living there in API and then finding out I wasn't going to be there for Primary anyway. It's not like they won't give you the time to get situated in Whiting if you do have to move up there after API. Just my thoughts.