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Warfare Transitions
- Thread starter goplay234
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Be a bit more specific- I assume you mean a lateral transfer from one warfare community to another. i.e. SWO to Pilot, NFO to Pilot? In general you need to be warfare qualified in your original community, submit the paperwork, and hope the Navy has a spot for you in your new choice. Right now, the Navy seems to have too many JOs everywhere, so not likely.
If any FO goes through the entire 'no-fun-at-all' phase known as Strike-Fighter... not to mention the RAG, and THEN decides to go back to fly P-3s...
What are you, a massochist?
Answer to your question: That would be a very long shot.
What are you, a massochist?
Answer to your question: That would be a very long shot.
Okay, let me do you a favor, before the entire board gets home from work and jumps down your throat. Please, use the search function and try words like "transition", "helo to jet", etc etc. This subject come sup pretty much once every two months.
That said, platform transitions are not unheard of. For example, the S-3s are going away, you have a bunch trained aviators, you need to put them into new platforms. OK, what about guys in platforms not going away? Transitions for the sake of "I want to go fly this" or "I selected XXX and am qualified in it, now I want to go fly XXX" are not what I would call common. Look at it from the Navy (or Marine) perspective. The gov. pays however much money to train you up in your selected platform. You decide to try to transition, what does the Navy get? Instead of someone with 3-4 years of operational experience under their belt, ready to do a shore tour, and then possibly select for Department Head and go back and use all that operational knowledge to train nuggets, they have a guy in his 6th or so year in the Navy who basically wants to start over (Sundown guys I AM NOT TALKING ABOUT YOU).
Then you have to ask, who should we let transition? Your community is not gonna send some dirtball, but then again, why should they pawn off a rock-star quality guy who will make them look good by staying in the career path and going on to the FRS or some other high-profile job within the community (notice how I keep using that word).
Bottom line, transitions happen. Rarely.
Now, use the search function and wade through the other posts out there, they have a ton of great info. Everyone else, lets play nice and not jump all over goplay234.
[and if you just have a desire to fly a few different airplanes, you can do so on your shore tour. Station pilot, Test Pilot School, Personnel Exchange Program (flying with foreign nations), SAR station pilot, range control aircraft...)
That said, platform transitions are not unheard of. For example, the S-3s are going away, you have a bunch trained aviators, you need to put them into new platforms. OK, what about guys in platforms not going away? Transitions for the sake of "I want to go fly this" or "I selected XXX and am qualified in it, now I want to go fly XXX" are not what I would call common. Look at it from the Navy (or Marine) perspective. The gov. pays however much money to train you up in your selected platform. You decide to try to transition, what does the Navy get? Instead of someone with 3-4 years of operational experience under their belt, ready to do a shore tour, and then possibly select for Department Head and go back and use all that operational knowledge to train nuggets, they have a guy in his 6th or so year in the Navy who basically wants to start over (Sundown guys I AM NOT TALKING ABOUT YOU).
Then you have to ask, who should we let transition? Your community is not gonna send some dirtball, but then again, why should they pawn off a rock-star quality guy who will make them look good by staying in the career path and going on to the FRS or some other high-profile job within the community (notice how I keep using that word).
Bottom line, transitions happen. Rarely.
Now, use the search function and wade through the other posts out there, they have a ton of great info. Everyone else, lets play nice and not jump all over goplay234.
[and if you just have a desire to fly a few different airplanes, you can do so on your shore tour. Station pilot, Test Pilot School, Personnel Exchange Program (flying with foreign nations), SAR station pilot, range control aircraft...)
I'm the exception to the rule right as ZAB said. I was an S-3 Guy, but with the jet being retired, we are all moving on to new communities. With this large group of people being promised transitions by the Navy (the Navy doesn't want to repeat the A-6 fiasco), the avail seats for people from other communities to transition is even tighter than usual. So, it is possible, but on a scale below the usual. I think there were 3 slots last year for nonS-3 guys to transition. A quick search of old message traffic will reveal the actual numbers. I'll post it if I find it.
The Navy is offering an NFO to Helo pilot program (sub program of NFO to Pilot Program) that will allow more transition opportunities than previously existed. The S-3 guys have been offered transitions to Helo's too, but there have been no takers so far.
As for the S-3 transition, EVERY community in the Navy has been very accomodating and are ALL taking the S-3 guys in. They even have come up with the alternate career tracks that will continue to offer career opportunities to the S-3 guys as if they hadn't changed communities. S-3 guys are transitioning as XO/CO's, DH's and as super JO's. We definetly cannot complain about the opportunities that have been offered to us.
The Navy is offering an NFO to Helo pilot program (sub program of NFO to Pilot Program) that will allow more transition opportunities than previously existed. The S-3 guys have been offered transitions to Helo's too, but there have been no takers so far.
As for the S-3 transition, EVERY community in the Navy has been very accomodating and are ALL taking the S-3 guys in. They even have come up with the alternate career tracks that will continue to offer career opportunities to the S-3 guys as if they hadn't changed communities. S-3 guys are transitioning as XO/CO's, DH's and as super JO's. We definetly cannot complain about the opportunities that have been offered to us.
Pretty much like this... The '90's were much like today. The Navy was downsizing and some airplanes were being retired. For the most part, the A-6 guys were thanked for their service and sent on their way; their services were no longer required. The difference with then and now is the Navy is trying to not do that and is offering the guys in the S-3 to have career opportunities. Really the idea is that they have tried to think ahead about manning and future requirements and plan for it in the Sundown plan instead of just sending a lot of talent/experience home with a thank-you. This does has an effect downstream, I think some of the over capacity of the training command was triggered by more S-3 guys taking the transitions offered to them than the Navy expected.
Note: Not ALL A-6 guys were sent away. I had a great DH in my last tour who was a former A-6 guy and I knew several others in other communities.
Note: Not ALL A-6 guys were sent away. I had a great DH in my last tour who was a former A-6 guy and I knew several others in other communities.
Like Zab said, do a search and you will find a lot of the detailed threads on this in the past. He was right in saying that it is rare, even rarer now. I transitioned from the EP-3E to the EA-6B and when I did it there were roughly 10 people selected for every board, two boards a year. After the S-3 guys started their sundown, they stopped having the boards for a while. They did have one sometime last year but I don't know if it has continued.
The best thing to do is to get to whatever community you select out of flight school, work hard and have fun, prove yourself and get qualified, then you can seriously start thinking about transitioning. I found that by that time though, most guys are either pretty happy where they are or do not want to go through the hassle of flight school again. I, on the other hand, am a masochist who thought that flying a jet would make me cool, then I met guys like Meat who flies jets too and found out how wrong I was....
The best thing to do is to get to whatever community you select out of flight school, work hard and have fun, prove yourself and get qualified, then you can seriously start thinking about transitioning. I found that by that time though, most guys are either pretty happy where they are or do not want to go through the hassle of flight school again. I, on the other hand, am a masochist who thought that flying a jet would make me cool, then I met guys like Meat who flies jets too and found out how wrong I was....
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