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Quarter of RAF trainee pilots to be sacked

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Quarter of RAF trainee pilots to be sacked

Old 14th Feb 2011, 21:21
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Well you cannot, obviously, but if you save a whole load of dosh by not having one of the later tranche Typhoons, then you could have some cash now to at least let some of the chaps finish their flight qualifications which may give them a chance in commercial aviation.

Your general point is well made however - if there are more pilots than aircraft at any given point in time, something has to give.
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Old 14th Feb 2011, 21:30
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I can assure you that if less money was spent on equipment (and the Typhoon bill has already been mostly paid, unlike other equipment out there) it would not be reinvested - it would be taken as a saving.

And as nice as it would be to help the guys and girls leaving with a leg up, the tax payer might have something to say about that one.

The bottom line here is that the Service recruit to a long term plan (especially for aircrew due to the cost of their training), when that plan changes as dramatically as it just has on SDSR there is no easy answer.
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Old 14th Feb 2011, 21:46
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So who squeeled to the telegraph !! tut tut . yes International will make up 70 % of the next IOT yes Pilits WSO and WSOps are up for the chop , the least favourable candidates will loose thier careers along with amny others and YES I qoute "recruiting willl be back to normal in 18-24 months" DIOR !!
Its a sh!t RAF its a sh!t country, me if I get the chop , I'm off abroad to spend the pay out . My thoughts are with those who are not in a happy place and ask those senior officers ( who out number those in WW2 " WTF over ?" )
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Old 14th Feb 2011, 21:51
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Capt PUG

RN Fixed Wing was quietly dismantled months ago. Over two thirds of the pilots in training were axed through no fault of their own and despite winning prizes on flying courses. Fortunately the FAA has continued to embrace them and they will trickle through shawbs over the next 14 months.

Best of luck to the RAF trainees, hopefully as one door closes another will open.
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Old 14th Feb 2011, 22:32
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Earlier RAF redundancies circa 1965

I was an Air Radio Fitter in 1965 when the RAF wanted to contract and asked for volunteers for redundancy (no payout by the way). This was to be carried out in two phases, the first phase consisted of a number of trade groups and those that asked were let go. Come the second phase which included the electronic trades, the majority who requested redundancy where refused but those who did not where in many cases compulsorily made redundant. It later transpired that the RAF had noticed the ones that went in the first phase were the best they had, and no doubt were able to secure a very good job outside the Mob. I assume the RAF used the second phase to identify their best tradesmen and decided to keep them!
I wonder what criteria the RAF will use this time, if any!
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Old 14th Feb 2011, 22:40
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Just wanted to say how sorry I’m to hear this news for you guys, I am ex green myself out 2 years now in flying in North America now.

Keep you chins up and keep looking you will find work in the world somewhere, you have already proven to yourselves that you can do it, now just got find the right place to do it, too bad for the RAF that’s all. Go out there and get them, best of British luck to you all you deserve it.
.
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Old 14th Feb 2011, 22:58
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my gut wrenched this morning when I read this sad news..

I was chopped many many years ago through my own lack of ability and I was distraught. i cannot imagine what it must be like to have the carrot of a fantastic career dangled and then snatched away at the last minute. My lad is 16 and well on track to do what he wants but he is concerned for his future now (yes he wants to fly) - it is all one massive cluster

Is it sensationalism by the media that is suggesting pilots only "hours away from finishing...will lose their jobs" ? surely it must be a case of last in first out, ie those that have had less effort and money expended on them ...I don't know (am I being naive in thinking that this will have been considered)
and finally. food for thought.....
How long before the Reds go? I was always told they were there to recruit more "Future Pilots" seems there ain't gonna be much of a call for them now is there.
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Old 14th Feb 2011, 23:10
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Do keep up dear boy, the number of new aircraft supposedly coming into service won't nearly match the number of existing aircraft being scrapped.

And even if the 12 Chinooks appear by some miracle, it hardly makes up for the total loss of two large fleets of helicopters, does it?
Wha, hang on a sec. Helicopters? I thought we were desperately short of helicopters? I thought people in Afghanistan were needlessly being blown up because there weren't enough helicopters to fly them over the IEDs?

Aargh!

P
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Old 14th Feb 2011, 23:22
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No it's definitely not going to be first in last out. They have to keep the training system going so being near the end isn't really a big advantage. And the rotary chop has nothing to do with SDSR, it's just pure total mismanagement by the brass and civil servants. That's what makes me especially sick.
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Old 14th Feb 2011, 23:40
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Just wanted to say how sorry I’m to hear this news for you guys
Can I just take an opportunity to second that. I remember my Military Flying training being hard enough as it was and that was without the added hurdles of political interference along the career path.

I'm not as optimistic as some as to the willingness of the civilian sector to pick up all those laid off ( well not immediately) but whilst sitting on a civvy flight deck airline flying lacks some of the attraction and glamour of military FJ flying there are worse places to be so it's an option worth considering should the axe fall. Good luck.

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Old 15th Feb 2011, 01:32
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Angel

Yes, its a big upset for the people involved, but its the overall reduction in the Service(s) that should really concern us. I don't mean to sound callous but people are being chopped every week and we don't have hundreds of posts of wailing and gnashing of teeth over it. They joined well aware of the chop rate. They've been chopped. That it is not their failing does not make it an iniquity unless your line is that those less than perfect (like me)"deserved" being "fairly" chopped. That would be callous. It is a harsh reality of military flying training that we all accepted as part of the deal - most won't make it and it has been so for generations. They'll get over it. We all did.

The future of a once-proud nation reduced to a token military is an entirely more fundamental matter that we should be concentrating on, and not getting aerated over a handful of broken dreams.
Of course we all feel sorry for them as I hope we do for anyone who is chopped, but a fleet with no carriers or carriers with no aircraft, a maritime nation with no maritime surveillance, squaddies with useless comms and no helicopters and less fighter pilots than MPs scares the heck out of me. Let's not lose sight of the woods for the trees here. A couple of hundred extra highly talented young people in the job market is hardly of significance in the overall scheme of things. They'll get jobs, and good ones. The state of our "defences" is an entirely different matter.

Last edited by Agaricus bisporus; 15th Feb 2011 at 01:46.
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Old 15th Feb 2011, 02:18
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A. b.

I don't mean to sound callous but people are being chopped every week
It is a harsh reality of military flying training that we all accepted as part of the deal - most won't make it and it has been so for generations. They'll get over it. We all did.
Yep, I've been made well aware of that as both a student ( even as one who was on review, lots of fun, that was ) and much later on as a BFTS QFI who saw chopped students reduced to tears ( never understood why they called me "chopper wiggy" ). Nevertheless it still seems extra tough on the current generation of trainees. Why? Well in addition to the risk of being chopped because they can't fly a circuit or they are unable to manage a 2 ship FRA at TaC weapons a significant number are now going to chopped not because of a lack of ability or a lack of effort but simply because the Treasury says so.


its the overall reduction in the Service(s) that should really concern us
You'll get no argument from me on that, the services must fast be dwindling below critical mass, but does the general population care??

Last edited by wiggy; 15th Feb 2011 at 03:29.
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Old 15th Feb 2011, 02:56
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Streaming= FJ
Superstreaming = FJ
Role Confirmation = FJ
SDSR (With 2 wings) = Join the dole queue.
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Old 15th Feb 2011, 03:07
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Agree that it's very sad news, not only for those individuals going, but for the RAF and the country, too....and this is probably just the start.

Think the comment about "does the population care" is bang on target because I don't believe the general public give two monkeys about defence - that's why it makes it easier to rip the guts out of the RAF and RN. This country for a while has become plagued with "aslong as I'm alrite Jack, then I dont really care" and "NIMBY nation". A far cry from the nation my dad and grandad grew up in.
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Old 15th Feb 2011, 04:01
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You'd think halting or easing back on pilot intakes for however long would be logical rather than wasting the 2 million a pop it takes to train these blokes. Plus when you fire them you'll be paying them the dole anyway. Dumb in so many ways.
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Old 15th Feb 2011, 05:56
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There was a post earlier (or it was in the 'training pipeline clogged' thread) that stated that were currently some holding tours of 18 months +. As rough as this decision is, has there been no previous attempt to reduce the throughput of pilot training folk?

Those figures suggest that somehow, somewhere (over the rainbow?) that there has been some mismanagement in the system already - and that includes over-recruiting as well as over-training.
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Old 15th Feb 2011, 06:03
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GrahamO
'for the first time in living memory'.........

and

'alien concept....since 1945'.......

Get your head out of your backside. The RAF (and all the services) have been feeling the pinch for decades but none more so than the last 10 years.

The service is broken beyond repair, it really is, and these individuals although unpalatable as it may seem right now have been spared from being tied to a a sinking ship.

I hope they get professional resettlement and a sensible severance package.
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Old 15th Feb 2011, 06:11
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The News Gets Worse

The news came as RAF chiefs were to announce cuts to more than half of their pilots who have been trained at a cost to the taxpayer of more than £1  billion.

The Daily Telegraph has learnt that 360 air crew will also be sacked today, in addition to a quarter of 400 trainee pilots being made redundant. They have cost the taxpayer £300 million in training.

Senior Whitehall sources have also disclosed that over the next four years, a total of 472 pilots will be made redundant, reducing the RAF to a “pitiful force”.

There is said to be growing fury in the upper ranks of the RAF, with the Chief of the Air Staff in conflict with senior commanders over the scale of cuts. RAF command was a “crucible of ill-feeling and that starts at very, very senior levels”, a senior military figure said.

Figures passed to this newspaper show the level of cuts that will be forced on the RAF across the board. An estimated 108 pilots will be taken from the fast jet fleet, 176 from helicopters, including some Navy and Army pilots, and 188 from air transport, trainers and surveillance.
MoD official is paid more than David Cameron
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Old 15th Feb 2011, 07:08
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Finnprog, one reason holds occur is because the students are too good, the instructors are too good and OASC was too good.

It happened back in the 60s too. The nav schools had a given number of slots per course. The into ITS expected some failures. The basic nav course could then take 18 per month with a proportion of chopped pilots and the rest straight through navs or siggies converting.

The next nav school was established for courses of, IIRC, 14 which included Cranwell basic navs coming for the advanced phase.

It followed that the basic nav school had to reject 5-6 students per course. After much humming and harring they back coursed increasing numbers in the basic nav school. All but one of our course was put back one month to start again and higher up the tree fewer and fewer were back coursed until the system was sorted.

As an aside, the one who was not back coursed passed out on time, went through the next 2 schools and OCU only to get killed within a month of arriving on his sqn.
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Old 15th Feb 2011, 07:20
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@Farfrompuken " The RAF (and all the services) have been feeling the pinch for decades but none more so than the last 10 years."

Very true - and were still allowed to stray well beyond their budget. The Armed Forces for whatever reason, have never stayed within budget or forecast in the last decade even if you take out the costs of operations. I make no comment on the reasons or their validity. But my experience is that the forces are actually more cost effective when at war as a lot of the bureaucracy goes away and pragmatism reigns.

My point was that for the first time ever, the budget is no longer a 'guide' to be stepped over, and has been replaced by a wall which cannot be bypassed.

I too hope anyone affected gets a good resettlement payout.
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