Phlying hours during Cold War

[tartare]

Slow day at work yesterday, so was reading excerpts from Courtney's blog online - and a question occurred to me which former drivers of the big MiG parts distributor may be able to answer.
Averaged out how many hours do you all reckon you were flying each day on 43 Squadron during the 80's?
In general was it a sortie a day?
Did you ever fly 2-3 sorties in a day - or more?
What was the longest time you actually spent continuously airborne in an F4 - including tanking?
The reason I ask is that reading through what Courtney had written about checklists, start procedures etc - it struck me just how complex the Phantom's systems were - so reactions to faults or failures as well as just the processes to actually fly the thing must have needed to be almost instinctive.
As a mere civilian - I find these fast jet human factor issues very interesting - and the fact that western air forces aren't just superior because of technology, but time spent in the air by their pilots as well.
I'd always assumed there was at least one of you up there in the cold and the dark over Dogger, Fisher or German Bight keeping us safe while we all slept soundly in our beds...;)

[Mach Two]

If we exceded the Squadron number in our monthly flying ours we were required to buy a barrel. Tremblers didn't have much of a problem with that, but we sometimes had to honour the tradition on 43.

[tartare]

In all seriousness - barrels aside - was there an allocated/budgeted amount of total flying hours to each squadron?
I guess in the end it all comes down to $$$.

[Mach Two]

Cm looks like he's AWOL just now. I can answer one or two of your questions.

The SD98 rate? Allocated hours per crew, but it wasn't really possible to distribute the hours exactly. Things like leave, courses, detachments would reduce some guys' hours while the bloke that picked up a couple of Q scrambles at the end of the month would do very nicely. If memory serves, the average was probably something like 30 hours a month. Didn't take much to to occassionaly tip over 43.

Two sorties a day was quite common, especially if the Squadron was in a phase of training requiring shorter sorties with the tanks off, for example (combat or gunery, maybe). As for long sorties with tanking, 2, 2.5 hours. Long transits or QRA supported by a tanker could be 6 hours or so.

[Ali Qadoo]

On the odd occasion the sqn would have a "max fly day" when up to 4, sometimes even 5, short trips would be flown.

Longest trip: 8.5 hours from the UK to Ascension. Actually, it could've been MPA-Ascension, haven't got my log books to hand, but either way it was a bloody long time to sit on a bang seat - ooh, me farmers!

[charliegolf]

Helicopter crewmen at the warmer end of the CW were about 360 a year too. JPs would be similar, I guess, but maybe more for QHIs?

CG

(Missed the OPs ref to FJ human factors.)

[Exmil]

Averaged out how many hours do you all reckon you were flying each day on 43 Squadron during the 80's?
I was on "the other squadron"; abbos flew about 30 hours a month, more experienced people flew less with a minimum of 180 hours per year to retain CR status.

In general was it a sortie a day?
No. As others have said, sometimes daily, sometimes more, sometimes less but aiming for the right number of hours per month.

Did you ever fly 2-3 sorties in a day - or more?
3 sorties was the usual max, for flight safety reasons. This was normally only achieved in air combat or gunnery flying. As AliQ has said, sometimes you could have more, but would need to be specially authorised.

What was the longest time you actually spent continuously airborne in an F4 - including tanking?
9.5 hours following a couple of Bears around the North Atlantic.


The reason I ask is that reading through what Courtney had written about checklists, start procedures etc - it struck me just how complex the Phantom's systems were - so reactions to faults or failures as well as just the processes to actually fly the thing must have needed to be almost instinctive.
From the OCU onwards, the bold face drills (response to emergencies) was a 100% pass mark in exams (usually done as part of the standardisation and evaluation - STANEVAL - of the squadron).

As a mere civilian - I find these fast jet human factor issues very interesting - and the fact that western air forces aren't just superior because of technology, but time spent in the air by their pilots as well.
I wouldn't say "mere"; I'm a civvy now. It's time spent selecting the right people, time spent training on systems and in the sim as well as in the air.

I'd always assumed there was at least one of you up there in the cold and the dark over Dogger, Fisher or German Bight keeping us safe while we all slept soundly in our beds.
It would have taken an enormous number of a/c to have one in the air all the time. We held a number of armed a/c at 10 minutes readiness 365 days a year to respond.

[Pontius Navigator]

I recall on one Exercise Priory that a few aircraft at Coningsby missed the initial scramble and launched just as the raid broke. While the initial aircraft recovered in around one hour, shot out, the late comers were just left on cap for the rest of the day with sorties of around 7.5 hours. Now that was numb bumming as they only had the tanker to keep their interest up.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

Not forgetting the hours already spent in the cockpit on readiness, pre-dawn, freezing one's nuts off and bored out of our tiny minds

o-dark-30, barring the telebrief beep, not a sound for nearly an hour.

"157"
"157 what?"
"157 crosshead screws in the rear cockpit"

........

"I'm going to count the slotheads next!"

[tartare]

Really interesting guys... thank you for the contributions.
Hell - UK to Ascension... that would have been very painful!

[fergineer]

was comfortable in the Herc tanker that was for sure, hot drinks hot meals etc......

[Geehovah]

I found it varied as my role changed.

As a first tourist on a squadron I flew up to 30 hours a month. Once I became an authoriser it dropped off to about 20 hours. As a nav instructor on the OCU it was as little as 8 hours a month. That was barely enough to keep current never mind instruct.

My longest Q sortie was 7 hours. I once flew 6 sorties in a day on a max fly exercise in Malta which was more than GASOs allowed. The Boss wanted to fly 56 sorties that day so he sought dispensation. One sortie was normal and 3 or 4 in a day very unusual unless you landed away.

The routine tasks did become instinctive but there were never two sorties the same. Always something to catch you out if you stopped paying attention.

My record in an F4 was bringing a jet back from the South Atlantic. 5 hours day plus 2.20 night into ASI followed 48 hours later by 9 hours to UK.

[Fox3WheresMyBanana]

By the end of the '80s, as an ab-initio F3 squadron pilot, I got 20 hours a month in my first year and less than 16 in the second year. I was no worse off than my contemporaries.

I once did 3 sorties a day for 3 straight days getting LCR recurrent for an unexpected tasking. 12 hours total and involving every task - day, night, tanking, every kind of intercept, affil, and air combat on every sortie. Not a moment just 'in the cruise', and it was completely exhausting, especially having done only about 3 sorties a month previously (one of which, co-incidentally, was with Geehovah).

Interesting human factors. I could barely finish my dinner each evening before collapsing into bed, yet was alert first thing in the morning (which wasn't usual for me!). I remember on the last trip setting up for another split and the nav complaining " do we have to turn so hard?". I was unnecessarily pulling 5 'g' because I wasn't even noticing it anymore. It was immensely satisfying though - aircrew just want to fly!

.

[Shackman]

I recall on one Exercise Priory that a few aircraft at Coningsby missed the initial scramble and launched just as the raid broke. While the initial aircraft recovered in around one hour, shot out, the late comers were just left on cap for the rest of the day with sorties of around 7.5 hours. Now that was numb bumming as they only had the tanker to keep their interest up.

At least they got back to Coningsby. I had the misfortune of landing there one Friday afternoon at the end of an exercise to drop off a couple of Phantom guys we had taken up in the morning only to remove most of the tailwheel (AEW Shack) and thus close the runway for about 12 hours. Unfortunately all the rest of the wing was airborne after the survival scramble, and it was the night of a VIP dining in night. Also unfortunately, by now the only airfield still open for F4s was Leeming. A very long bus ride later (in Goon Suits and suitable 'on-bus' liquid refreshment) the crews arrived back looking for a Shack crew. Luckily we had taken refuge in the local hostelry, and by the following morning our excellent gc's, who had driven down overnight, had changed said tailwheel and we made a 'swift' getaway!