phrogpilot73
Well-Known Member
We schedule our briefs two hours before launch time. I guess that time I spend in the head after the brief reading is considered "pre-flighting" by the VP world.
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VP and their misunderstanding of the word "preflight"
- Thread starter Fezz CB
- Start date
When you're on an 11 hour mission after a night of Singha and street vendor food in Pattaya, pre-flighting your intestines is vital.
We had a lot more equipment and more than twice the crew in VQ and we still got by on 2-hour preflights. Part of the reason we often laughed at the VP guys......
Is that when you are flying operational too? We always had the maintenance crew on standby for any gripes that might crop up (literally standing out next to the plane in Prowlers). Of course we had to be on-station by a certain time or we would have some 'splainin to do to some to those much higher up the food chain so there was a lot more extra incentive for us and the squadron to get off deck on time, which happened a lot more often than not.
Why not? Is that typical for your squadron or the community? As a bonus, you get to use your DEMOT hand signals (or HEFOE if you're a CVW guy)!
Agree. If I spin the a/c and find a gripe, that's not preflight, that's just flying helos.
Nope, no HEFOE signals. Not sure why we don't do it. I stopped asking why we do dumb things, and don't do smart things long ago. It saves my head from all the bruising smashing it against a wall tends to produce.
Planes tend to work better on deployment, so operationally it's less of an issue. You're a priority on deployment, and there's nothing else for maintenance to do but fix planes when you call a gripe in. No one is doing their DADT training, completing a DOD survey, or doing information awareness and trafficking in person's training while the hydraulic pumps are spewing fluid all over the flight line. They just come out and fix it.
Planes tend to work better on deployment, so operationally it's less of an issue. You're a priority on deployment, and there's nothing else for maintenance to do but fix planes when you call a gripe in. No one is doing their DADT training, completing a DOD survey, or doing information awareness and trafficking in person's training while the hydraulic pumps are spewing fluid all over the flight line. They just come out and fix it.
Counterpoint:
Consider a B-747 going from JFK to NRT (@ 14 hours block-to-block) ... double crewed (old school = 5 drivers) and 18 F/A's ...
We show ... walk to OPS ... flight-plan & WX brief ... brief the F/A's ... walk to the gate/bird ... stow our gear & make our 'nest' in the cockpit ... preflight ... interface w/ gate agents, F/A's, and ground personnel ... release brakes to push-back (that's when the flight clock starts) ... start engines ... make 'appropriate' announcement(s)/contact w/ the paying, flying public ... and release brakes to taxi.
Total time?? 1.0 to 1.5 hours, unless we encounter an unexpected mechanical.
Just sayin' ...
Consider a B-747 going from JFK to NRT (@ 14 hours block-to-block) ... double crewed (old school = 5 drivers) and 18 F/A's ...
We show ... walk to OPS ... flight-plan & WX brief ... brief the F/A's ... walk to the gate/bird ... stow our gear & make our 'nest' in the cockpit ... preflight ... interface w/ gate agents, F/A's, and ground personnel ... release brakes to push-back (that's when the flight clock starts) ... start engines ... make 'appropriate' announcement(s)/contact w/ the paying, flying public ... and release brakes to taxi.
Total time?? 1.0 to 1.5 hours, unless we encounter an unexpected mechanical.
Just sayin' ...
I don't think there is any misunderstanding by the VP types We ALL know that sometimes preflighting the warpig can take a long long time, especially doing the bag drag from plane to plane as we preflight multiple birds.
VP preflight times as mentioned can range from 1 hour to 5 hours. Preflight can include TSC brief, ADB review, survival equipment checkout, uncovering aircraft, weather brief, filing, Crypto check out, fueling, continuity checks as required, buoy/ordnance loading, individual crew position AIRCRAFT preflight, preflight #1/#2 (unless you like doppler well ice cream!), and finally the crew planeside brief. Many of the same things other platforms do.
Positional crew preflights take differing amounts of time based on duties. Pilots are positionally responsible for different areas, (3P flight station, 2P tube, PPC outside walk around... of course varies by squadron and number of pilots on board, etc). For me, takes about 20 minutes to comprehensively preflight the entire aircraft. Flight Engineers can take awhile longer, uncovering the aircraft, fuel dips, weight and balance paperwork, etc. They typically do not attend TSC Mission briefs, they and the IFTs prepare our aircraft prior to the rest of the crew showing up. In many cases they find out issues on the aircraft, get our aircraft switched, get fueling initiated, etc. IFTs start preflighting/troubleshooting and getting the tactical computers up and online, and start the process for getting buoys loaded witht he AOs.
It is up to the MC/TC/PPC of course to "herd cats" and make sure the whole group is ready on time, making the decision to accept an aircraft without all the operable equipment, both aircraft and mission (gee, can I fly today without the radar? What working equipment does my mission require? etc) Or working with maintenance control to determine timeline to fix (is the part on station, can it from another aircraft, impact of replacing/removing equipment, does it require turns/cure/FCF etc). Same as all the other platforms, whether single piloted or with multiple aircrew. Usually, we call plane side, all work complete, tools accounted for 40 minutes prior to takeoff, allows time for 5-10 minute plane side brief, time to start engines, and get off deck on time. Many times we get delayed due to other aircraft with less fuel capacity (tacair/helos/etc), and unfortunately on time takeoff is now being tracked by entities outside squadrons (sigh)... hence the importance to list any maintenance delays.
For DFWs we typically only have 2 hours of preflight, and usually only need half of that. I can get off deck on an FCF within an hour (including FCF maintenance control brief).
Who am I kidding!?! You all are just jealous that we are shore based, and you are stuck haze grey and underway... suck it!
VP preflight times as mentioned can range from 1 hour to 5 hours. Preflight can include TSC brief, ADB review, survival equipment checkout, uncovering aircraft, weather brief, filing, Crypto check out, fueling, continuity checks as required, buoy/ordnance loading, individual crew position AIRCRAFT preflight, preflight #1/#2 (unless you like doppler well ice cream!), and finally the crew planeside brief. Many of the same things other platforms do.
Positional crew preflights take differing amounts of time based on duties. Pilots are positionally responsible for different areas, (3P flight station, 2P tube, PPC outside walk around... of course varies by squadron and number of pilots on board, etc). For me, takes about 20 minutes to comprehensively preflight the entire aircraft. Flight Engineers can take awhile longer, uncovering the aircraft, fuel dips, weight and balance paperwork, etc. They typically do not attend TSC Mission briefs, they and the IFTs prepare our aircraft prior to the rest of the crew showing up. In many cases they find out issues on the aircraft, get our aircraft switched, get fueling initiated, etc. IFTs start preflighting/troubleshooting and getting the tactical computers up and online, and start the process for getting buoys loaded witht he AOs.
It is up to the MC/TC/PPC of course to "herd cats" and make sure the whole group is ready on time, making the decision to accept an aircraft without all the operable equipment, both aircraft and mission (gee, can I fly today without the radar? What working equipment does my mission require? etc) Or working with maintenance control to determine timeline to fix (is the part on station, can it from another aircraft, impact of replacing/removing equipment, does it require turns/cure/FCF etc). Same as all the other platforms, whether single piloted or with multiple aircrew. Usually, we call plane side, all work complete, tools accounted for 40 minutes prior to takeoff, allows time for 5-10 minute plane side brief, time to start engines, and get off deck on time. Many times we get delayed due to other aircraft with less fuel capacity (tacair/helos/etc), and unfortunately on time takeoff is now being tracked by entities outside squadrons (sigh)... hence the importance to list any maintenance delays.
For DFWs we typically only have 2 hours of preflight, and usually only need half of that. I can get off deck on an FCF within an hour (including FCF maintenance control brief).
Who am I kidding!?! You all are just jealous that we are shore based, and you are stuck haze grey and underway... suck it!
phrogpilot73
Well-Known Member
Websan, everything you mentioned other communities don't view as preflight. We view aircraft preflight as preflight. I have a brief scheduled for 0730, and a take off for 0930. I PREFLIGHT for about 15 minutes, everything else is just shit I have to do.
Whatever floats your boat. Not going to keep me up at night. We list our times BRIEF/PREFLIGHT/TAKEOFF/ONSAT/OFFSTA/LAND/POST on flight schedules that get turned into Greens or ATOs.
An IFTs "PREFLIGHT" is one component of my overall preflight as a Mission Commander, many moving parts. Positionally my individual preflight may only take 20 minutes, but the whole crew has varying timelines, comprising a preflight for the entire aircraft. Times may vary.
You can probably geek out and find a 3710 definition of preflight to confuse me with or something, but I am pretty comfortable with our communities definition of individual preflight and aircraft preflight requirements.
MasterBates
Well-Known Member
VP =
It is quite sad, that I, as a Hummer Clown (tm) can say this.
It is quite sad, that I, as a Hummer Clown (tm) can say this.
Yawn... get back to me when you find a community or job you can stick with and that will have you.VP =
It is quite sad, that I, as a Hummer Clown (tm) can say this.
I think I've discovered your fundamental problem. If it takes you 5 hours to get a working bird in order and airborne, maybe you should take more than an hour to FCF brief, "preflight" and go. Can't speak for the pointy nose guys, but the FCF is the single most time-sucking evolution when it comes to helos. Then again, we don't report on station, followed by a "RTB due to engine fire" 15 minutes later.
Smiles, but only half-way.
Dev, not sure what you are getting at with smiles "only half way". FCFs for the vast majority are not for mission systems (tube gear), only for airframe (prop/eng/hydraulics/control surfaces/etc). As a MO, you know shit is going to break, some birds stroke better than others, some you just get crap parts and takes awhile to work through. Saw a CNAF brief awhile ago about the health of the fleet, and our maintenance numbers were better than F18 and helos.
Getting the mission equipment in the tube ready to go is the time consuming part. The pilots are usually waiting around for NFOs doing crypto loads, acoustic guys bringing SASP up, etc. Depending on what you need for the mission and what kind of aircraft configuration you have that can take as little as 20-30 min or these ridiculously long times others have mentioned, especially if critical gear goes down/