pulse1
A possible answer to your recollection may be due to the airman in question having re-enlisted after a period in civvie street. When back in uniform he would still be entitled to display previously earned aircrew brevets.
When I was at Colerne in 1972 there was a Cpl who wore an Air Gunners Brevet. I asked him about it and he said he had been demobbed at the end of WWII and re-enlisted in the early 1950s. As an aside, the UTP and the SWO at Colerne at that time both wore the Pathfinder eagle. The UTP was a Sqn Ldr Walsh but the SWOs name is lost in the mist of time. Both good eggs though.