JSUNT Begins.

Well sort of anyway. Yesterday 20 April was the official report/start date of Joint Specialized Undergraduate Navigator Training class 05-05, but in reality the entire first week is spent indocing, and the first day of actual class isn't until next Tuesday. So this blog will finally be relevant to those Navigator types looking to see what it's like. I'm going to try to post on an everyday basis now, even if they're short and sweet, just to keep everyone reading the blog interested in a navigator journal or navigator blog will be updated on what it's like.

The first two days were pretty horribly boring, so I figured I'd spare you and talk about them both at once. We reported at 0730 over in the 563rd building where many of the classrooms are for both the 562d and the 563rd (Navigator and Electonic Warfare Officer Training Squadrons, respectively) and hung out in blues for a while. Well when I say 0730, I really mean 0715, because the rule at nav school is you're either 15 minutes early to an event, or you're late. Basically if anyone was still missing at like 0720 then whoever was in charge or led their section or whatnot would have to get on the horn and getting their asses into their chair. So basically that means I'll be wasting a truckload of time sitting around waiting for things to start. Theoretically I guess you should be studying or whatnot, but given we haven't really started anything yet, basically it's been a get to know the guy next to you kind of deal.

The majority of us know each other already from OTS or from the last six months of sitting around and doing NIFT, so there weren't too many new faces. The girlfriend will have nothing to worry about as I only have one female in my class of 35 or so, and she's not my type. We also have about seven Navy guys, none of whom we'll be competing against as they obviously go to Navy planes in the end. They actually already completed the first phase, so they'll be sitting around for the first three to six weeks or something while we do that, then rejoin us for the majority, then leave about three months before us as they don't require the last phase either. They've been sort of cliqueish over the first few days, but I guess that's to be expected, we're sort of headed in different directions.

The first day opened with a long briefing on how to take tests without failing, and what to do if you do fail. Quite boring. Then came many more briefings on safety and various things I don't even remember, just stuff you have to do so they get it out of the way. The Vice Wing Commander for the 12th Training Wing spoke to us, as well as the 12th Operations Group Commander or Vice today, and last up was the 562d Squadron Commander. Lots of welcome to Randolph, you're embarking on a wonderful journey, yadda yadda yadda.

We've gotten a couple hours for lunch the last couple days, and today we had our flight pictures taken, the little indivudal ones they put up on the board in the lobby and in the base paper eventually when you graduate along with your name and where you're going and what you're flying. They had little temporary wings we put on for one of the pics then took one without, that was sort of a trippy thing I wasn't expecting. I've never worn wings before, even though I certainly haven't earned them yet. Should be a different feeling when someone pins me on in nine months.

Speaking of which, glancing at a schedule they had up in my instructor's flight room the "drop" date, meaning the date when we find out what planes are available I believe, and thus can figure out by class ranking who is taking what and who is going where, is December 3rd of this year, with my actual graduation date being Friday February 4th, 2005. Talk about a long time away. It'll probably be nice to have holiday leave in there towards the end, the last phase of training I've heard is the easiest, and given you already know where you're going all the stress is off. Until then though, I expect it to be one of the more stressful times of my life.

My flight commander seems pretty lax, which can be good and bad I suppose. Tomorrow morning he's slated for a two hour block to start the day and I think that'll be more of what we're really going to be doing over the next nine months, what will be expected of us, and the way things are going to go. Something tells me he might get a bit more serious, who knows. He's Navy, so at first us AF folk were confused because he was listed as a Lt on our board in NIFT, but in the Navy the rank structure goes Ensign, Lieutenant Junior Grade, then Lieutenant, rather than the AF's 2d Lt, 1st Lt, Captain. So in reality he's an O-3, comparable to AF captains, which puts him way above any of us. Towards the end of the day today we went around the room saying our names, hometowns, commissioning source, and what we wanted to fly, and a surprising number of people just seemed interested in getting their wings, regardless of the plane. I'm guessing some people just didn't want to say. There were also a surprising number of people who wanted the C130 (Slick) which typically about half of each class ends up on anyway, some not by choice. Given our large class size we may get a greater variety of planes than most, which would be nice. I'm pretty clueless as to what I want at this point, or even whether I want the EWO or Nav track, so we'll see how it goes.

I'm really looking forward to 30 Apr of this month, as we're having a Command Day which they do about once a year where they're bringing in folks from all the different airframes to show us videos and talk to us about what they actually do for a living, which for most of the airframes will be my first contact with someone who actual does the job and lives the life. Then the best part is they're actually bringing in all 13 or so airframes to Randolph, and we'll actually get to go out there and see the planes on static display for a couple hours, most of which I've never even seen in person, from the AC130 Spectre (Gunship) to the E3 Sentry (AWACS) to even the F16CJ which I guess is an option on the EWO side of the house, which I didn't even know was possible. Interesting concept there, I thought to go fighters you had to come out of Pensacola, but based on what was said today that isn't necessarily true. It might be a one slot a year type thing though rather than at least one per class like most planes, so who knows.

More indocing tomorrow, we've got the Flight Commander for a couple hours up front followed my medical pre-screening getting ready for our full on flight physicals that'll take up all of Friday. Monday we just have one on one interviews with our FC (get used to that acronym and a million others) and then most of us will get out of the all day newcomers orientation briefing that was extensively boring and took up most of the day when we first got here, which the people who just arrived in the last couple days like the Navy folk will be forced to attend. Then come Tuesday we actually have our first classes, I'm sure I'll find out more about the layout of the classes tomorrow. All I know is I got about a one foot high stack of paper yesterday consisting of only some of the reading material for the next nine months. Fun stuff.

So will try to update daily with the happenings on the path to flapping my wings.