Fast Jet Test Sqn Disbandment

[Fast Jet Test Sqn.]

Fast Jet Test Squadron Disbandment Dinner

Fast Jet Test Sqn (FJTS), based at MOD Boscombe Down, formerly known as Fixed Wing Test Sqn (FWTS) or ‘A Sqn’ will unfortunately be disbanding at the end of March 2010. FJTS will then be combined with the FJ OEUs as a combined Test Team at RAF Coningsby. To that end, we are holding a disbandment Day/Dinner in March and would like to invite all those who have served on FJTS and its forebears.

If you have ever served on, or know of anyone who has served on, FJTS and its forbears, be it a Pilot/Navigator etc, then please PM me so that I can add you to the distribution list for the invitations. If you can add a little précis of when you served, what you flew in, with whom you served etc that will aid me greatly (plus I can find out the old photographs from that time too).

If you have any questions/queries about this event, then do not hesitate to contact me.

Note to moderators; if you can make this a sticky, then I would be most grateful, many thanks.

[Genghis the Engineer]

Stuck for a couple of months.

That must have been an incredibly difficult decision for somebody to have made, and I imagine that a lot of people are unimpressed with it, notwithstanding the potential benefits of combining the FJTS/SAOEU efforts. No longer having a permanent "A squadron" at Boscombe certainly doesn't feel right.

G

[Jimbo27]

"Fast Jet OEUs" does that mean 17 or 41 is giving up their number?

[CharlieJuliet]

That is really sad. The end of impartial assessment, and of tps getting a wide type experience on which to base their judgement.

[virgo]

Does your "etc" include ground crew ?

[Fast Jet Test Sqn.]

Just to inform you that the attendance list for the forthcoming disbandment dinner is now CLOSED!!!!

If were planning to come and you are unsure whether you have returned the appropriate reply slip - then please PM me ASAP!

Unfortunately space is extremely limited and we would be hard pressed to fit in anyone else.

If Flt Lt Pryor-Jones can contact me ASAP with his contact details, I would be most grateful.

[Genghis the Engineer]

Unstickied now.

But, congratulations to A-sqn/FWTS/FJTS for their 71 years of capable work (and an excellent disbandment party), and best of luck with the newly merged 17 and 41 squadrons.


And even more luck to all of the trials staff at BDN who will no longer have easy and regular opportunities to fly with or talk to their Test Pilots. I can't honestly see how they're going to make that work in the day-to-day aircraft T&E, but since they have no choice, I wish them the best of British luck.

G

[Vertico]

The very last thing upon which successful T&E should rely is "luck". Sadly, I fear that the excellent dinner at Boscombe will also prove to have been the wake for independent T&E in the UK.

When a current practitioner extols the virtues of the "single type test pilot", what hope is there? Successful T&E has always required its practitioners to have the broadest possible base of experience in order to be able to assess effectively new kit and its performance - and to plan as a team the appropriate T&E programme. Without that base, and being mindful of the extreme shortage of available flying hours always available when a brand-new type is first offered for initial T&E, how will this new breed be able to use his tp experience to extract full value from that limited flight time?

The convoluted chain of command within which the 17 and 41 Sqn tps will operate also strikes me as unsound. Where is the day-to-day supervision and mentoring by experienced tps going to come from? Without that close contact with experienced tps and boffins, the quality of T&E is bound to suffer. I make that comment with absolutely no aspersions being cast on the quality of the individual tps on 17 or 41 Sqns.

[deagles]

Agree with Vertico. I was at the dinner and the briefing and couldn't believe that tp's were to be restricted to 1 type!! I remember clocking 14 in one month at Bosconbe in the 60's. I thought that the powers had got it wrong. They should have moved the Conningsby operation to Boscombe and achieved the operating savings that way.

[Flambards]

What a shame.

This was on the cards 10 years ago driven primarily by a successful campaign from 'industry' zealots to reduce the small print scutiny of their products. It's an age old conundrum where greed is sold as 'value' and the small guys suffer. But hey ho, there would of been promotions, bonuses and much ego polishing. Smoking holes won't cut it with their consciences because the same process that removed the scrutiny will have been specially designed to remove responsibility (at least for those in the ivory towers)

Good luck guys.