a great deal of skill is about to walk out the door at Kinloss
Apparently someone made the comment in the Transition Wing coffee bar after the letters were handed out on Thursday, that 1000+ man-years of MPA expertise would be exiting the Service.
Given that a lot of the younger generation only mainly have experience of transitting up and down the boulevard and flying circles while they did ISR, and also that getting an MPA again in the future is still only an unfunded aspiration, in the fullness of time I think it will be clear that the MOD have f***ed up in spades. To be honest in some circles I understand it is very clear that they appreciate that fact now, but we are stuck with the Political decision which was made by the man at the top after all.
In letting various mates know that I got a letter, I found an e-mail from quite a few months ago:
At the moment as I describe it, I don't want to be part of the tin-pot outfit the RAF will be once all the cuts have happened. Even though I'm PA, I don't think there is much chance of me getting to fly anything else, and at the end of the day it's always been the flying I've loved, not the desk jobs. If I stay I'd probably get some dull job down South that would mean doing the weekly commute, hence I am seriously considering applying for redundancy on the 2nd Tranche. That would be an exit date of 31st Aug 12, and would be same date if I was made compulsorily redundant on the 1st Tranche.
I'd started hearing rumours that there might not be many aircrew in Tranche 2, so I was actually starting to worry that as an experienced Tac Nav I'd got my tactics wrong (a very rare event if I say so myself!). Hence I was relieved to get my letter and it has now bought some certainty back into our life.
Looking back it's been a great ride, and as others have said, I've met and worked with some great people. My personal merry-go-round will be stopping in a years time though and I'm ready to get off.
betty-s,
Of all the names on the list I saw I have to say that your better halfs was one of only a couple to activate my WTF caption.