Originally Posted by
Tankertrashnav
I was reading the obituary of Ward Thomas, founder of Yorkshire Television, and it said that he trained as a pilot and navigator in South Africa, before being posted to 100 Squadron as a Lancaster pilot and then as a navigator on 550 Squadron. There is a photograph of Thomas with his crew on 550 where he is clearly wearing a nav brevet. The obituary goes on to say that he subsequently flew as a pilot with Swissair until 1953.
My question is - was there any system of "dual training" where you could come out with both qualifications? It seems unlikely to me, I am more inclined to think that the obit writer has got it wrong and that he was "remustered" as a nav after his time on 100, or perhaps he was always a nav. Indeed he may well have flown as a navigator with Swissair, not as a pilot as the writer assumed.
Anybody have any info on this?
I can only answer for the dark blue but, having greatly enjoyed all the interesting responses to date, I hope that I may be allowed to highlight the question TTN actually posed, namely “... was there any system of "dual training" where you could come out with both qualifications?”. I take this to mean where aircrew were specifically trained for the dual role, rather than the myriad of responses relating to people going from one sub specialisation or branch to another for whatever reason, either consecutively, on transfer, or subsequently in the big outside world - even a flying "fang farrier"!
Bengo’s response is therefore really the only one that’s completely on track, whereby a limited number of seaman specialist officers sub specialised as aircrew did indeed qualify as (F) rather than (P) or (O), and I decided to have a look to see what I could find. I therefore started by selecting the 1980 Navy List and the 1981 List of Retired Officers, which seemed good places to look for an indication of those shown as (F) whom some PPRuNers might have met or known. Unfortunately, however, there is no indication of sub specialisation shown either for officers on the Flag List or the Captains’ List in either volume, or the List of Retired Officers, or indeed on the latter on the Commanders’ List, although I am confident that there must have been some still around, as evidenced by dipping into a 1945 Navy List which showed quite a few (F)s, coupled with the explanation at the end of my sixth paragraph.
Moving quickly on, I was therefore quite surprised not to find a single solitary (F) in the Commanders’ and Lieutenant Commanders’ List for General List (Full Career) officers and only one Commander (F) and one Lieutenant Commander (F) on the Supplementary List (Extended Medium Career Commissions), M J Holmes and R Warren respectively.
That’s enough about the general, now to the particular, and I’m glad to say that I recalled one very interesting (F), namely Commander David “Shorty” Hamilton, whose death at the age of 91 was in fact recorded by Lordflasheart in 2017 at
https://www.pprune.org/where-they-no...on-rn-rip.html and whose flying career ranged from Tiger Moths to command of of 892 and 899 Naval Air Squadrons flying Sea Vixens, after service in 700Y Naval Air Squadron, the first Sea Vixen Trials Unit.
I would like to think that the three links shown below, which contain several references to his (F) qualification, will prove worth reading by those interested. The first is his own account of his naval career, including war service in HMS WHELP with the Duke of Edinburgh, then participating in the post war sinking and destruction of the 221 surrendered U-boats whilst serving in HMS OFFA and "lording" it over the Kriegsmarine immediately post war, before going on to solo after six hours dual in Tiger Moths at RAF Yatesbury, followed by Harvard time at RAF Ouston (a thread on which coincidentally was resuscitated in this forum as recently as 3 February). His views on the bombing of Germany, including Dresden, are also stated.
The first link is also notable for containing the entry, "1948 - After Aerodrome Dummy Deck Landings [ADDLS] at Milltown carried out first deck landings on board HMS Implacable in the English Channel on 22 June. After leaving OFS became member of the first pilot cross qualification [F] course and graduated as Observer [Navigator]. The Admiralty had decided that future COs should have dual qualifications."
Commander Shorty Hamilton RN, Fleet Air Arm -
https://www.seavixen.org/aircrew-car...horty-hamilton
https://navalairhistory.com/2017/11/...d-hamilton-rn/
As a personal footnote, and a nice surprise when I saw it, I had the pleasure of sailing off Sydney many times in the yacht NIRIMBA whose picture is shown at the end of the first link.
Jack