Originally Posted by
5 Forward 6 Back
So if you hail from north of Lincolnshire, where is there the RAF can now offer you for a chance to work?
A handful of QFIs at Linton, plus ops and ATC... all due to move to Valley in a few years. A tiny number of pilots on 100 Sqn and JFACTSU at Leeming, plus some FTRS UAS/AEF types... a few SAR guys at Boulmer about to be civilianised, leaving just the ABMs... more reservist pilots at Leuchars and Glasgow on UASs, and then a decent-sized base at Lossiemouth.
So with Linton for the chop in or around 2017/18, and the Hawk T1 dying at the same time (and quite possibly 100 Sqn with it), that means aircraft jobs will stop as far north as Scampton and not restart until Lossiemouth.
Linton's a base close to my heart, and it strikes me that all the basing review stuff I've ever read pays a lot of attention to circuit congestion, operating areas, access to the right training, ac parking and storage etc. But not a single but asks where people might want to work.
Does that really matter?
If I want to work for BA, I'd better like living near Heathrow or Gatwick.
If I want to work for BAE, I'd better like living near Warton, Salmesbury etc.
If I want to be a fishhead, I'd better like the South Coast or Rosyth. If I want to be an FAA type, I've got the grand choice of VL or CU.
I highly doubt that the issue of where RAF airfields are located (not that Kinloss IS an RAF airfield anyway) is an issue of great concern from the perspective of where recruits come from.
And in any case, deletion of RAF positions from Kinloss makes no difference to your concern of a gap between Scampton and Lossiemouth, given the relative latitudes of Kinloss and Lossiemouth. Leuchars, possibly so, but even that is hardly likely to be a consideration when say a geordie is considering joining up. I doubt the 18 yr olds of Newcastle think "Well I was going to join the RAF, since Leuchars is only 200 miles away, but now they've closed it, I think I'll be a motor mechanic". And what happens when on completion of tour, you get posted to Akrotiri? Other than no rations, of course.