And the Rock that said "If you come a month early you will never be out of date, and over a full career you will only do an extra couple of CCS days". :yuk: My reply "But if I come late by a month every year it will mean at least 2 less CCS days over the same period".:ok:

Obviously before the time of digging holes and carrying heavy weights to show what heroes we would be.

IRT Honington, Pre Bosnia Det, Late 90's...
Landrover anti-ambush drill...
Female Sgt Nurse, 1 year in, giving covering fire to said ambushers, gets stoppage with SA80, stops firing.
Cpl rockape, "why have you stopped firing?"
Nurse, "cause I have a stoppage!"
Rockape, "so what do you do when you have a stoppage?"
Nurse, "Put your hand up!"

Us...roll about laughing, unable to continue anti-ambush :D, told Nurse is now casualty and have to carry her a mile up the bloody hill.:{

I hope she didn't have the typical Issue WRAF body shape....

:E

16B

CCS First Aid/Guns
 

"Right gents.." (briskly rubs hands), "..first aid."

"As you all know, St Johns have now issued Edition.." (insert random number) "..of their First Aid book so...." (as it is every bl**dy year:hmm: ) "... it is at odds with what's in your CCS book, which as far as I'm aware is still edition.." (insert further random number). "I'll show you the latest St Johns methods but your test will still be from the book".

"Ok gents, anyone know the number of compressions per minute for a casualty? Sir....? No, ok, I'll give you all a clue............." (sung very fast with accompanying vigorous arm movements equating to approx 180bpm) "NELLIETHEELEPHANTPACKEDHERTRUNKANDSAIDGOODBYETOTHECIRCU S (pause) OFFSHEWENTWITHATRUMPETYTRUMPTRUMPTRUMPTRUMP..." etc.

I see that some are giving the Rocks a hard time, even saying they got the wrong application form at the tri-service careers office. Shame on you all. Over the years, 23 now, i have found the vast majority of them to be good instructors. Some think they are all stupid for being a soldier in blue, well i've kown lots of them over the years who have far more qualifications than i have but they are doing what they want to do. I used to be a ground electronics technician serving on Regiment Sqn's, i have many fond memories of my 7 years on different Regiment Sqn's. Some get hacked off these days at the frequent trips to the desert, back in the 80's and early 90's before i changed over to the aircrew world these rocks and associated engineers etc were down in the Falklands for 4 and a bit months then back for 12 months (4 Germany Sqns taking it in turn). They didn't whinge, they got on with it and throughout my time with them i became aware of how professional they actually were. So what am i getting at, firstly dont judge the Regiment guys by what you see on GDT/CCS, the guys im sure are only teaching what they have been directed to. Secondly, until youve served with these guys on a Sqn dont judge them as being second class soldiers, in many ways i believe them to be better than your average infantry man. Having seen the aptitude tests for the Army and RAF, even for Rocks, i know who has the higher standard and it aint the Army. (no offence meant to any Army guys)

So if you dont like the content of CCS blame the policy makers.

In fairness, boys & girls, it's not the Rocks who are to blame for the CCS / IDT / IRT / blah blah fiasco that we are forced to go through every year / 28/56 days prior to deployment / whenever they decide its necessary (insert current policy as appropriate). It is all an ass-covering exercise by those in positions of command, now that 'common sense' no longer officially exists.

I once defended the RAF Regt to a member of our esteemed British Army whislt serving in a 'Joint' post - said British Army chap was intent on making the 'auld' Toast / Soldiers joke with the RAF Regt as the recipients. I reminded him that they are NOT soldiers, they are specialists in Airfield Defence, and proceeded to quiz him on exactly HOW he would attempt to shoot down an aircraft that was threatening his troop out in 'the field' with nothing but small arms....his response was amusing, at least. YOU try explaining the concept of lead/lag to a Squaddie, who's fastest-moving target ever would be a Tank doing 50 Km/h.

IMHO the esteemed British Army would do well to seek advice from the RAF Regt when they eventually take over the role that the RAF Regt currently fulfill.

This chimp even asked me "WTF is 'Force protection'?" (in between picking horse hairs out of his spurs).

16B

I have heard that, in some of the RAFs more northern outposts, the annual CCS is now 9 Monthly so that is always 3 months in date!!:uhoh:

Pensinsular or St John Moore?

St John Moore here.:ok:

Takes me back - used to go to Peninsular Barracks with CCF - look at them now.

Agreed, but there is a very wide-spread default setting amongst gunners that we're all stupid because we don't know the ins and outs and stuff they do every day. Any time a rock wants to ask to come and do some of that tricky flying stuff using a postcard-size guide book and an afternoon's tick-testing, I'm all ears. :hmm:

HS

Peninsular (1982/3) - In my, day Sir John Moore hadn't been granted a sainthood;)

I'm told the Rocks are actually quite rated by the Army, as is the RAF as a whole in terms of NBC capability. We're not that highly regarded in terms of airlift capability, so clearly 'warfighter first' is having the right effect :*

How Many Courses?
 

Apparently IDT is being replaced by OFT. What's the difference?

As for job creation schemes, how many courses a year do I need to do to practice stripping down an SA80/SLP, putting on an S10 and discovering that I don't really like CS gas?

I know it's a radical idea, but why don't we have one course that does everything and call it something like GDT, for ground defence training?

I know it's not the Rocks fault, they're just carrying out their orders from on high. But how many times have the people from on high been OOA in the last few years to get a reality check:mad:

RR

....and just how useful is an annual range shoot anyway apart from proving the armoury have been fcuking around with the sights again?
:hmm:

What's that they say about bad workmen and tools Talking Rad ;)

I just accept I'm crap at shooting :p

I quite enjoyed CCS during my time in, except for the pointless tick tests. (yes, I know, sad git...:yuk: )

My point about a range shoot being some kind of "qualification" for current ops is this:
It shows no real ability to use the weapon, merely to operate it.
It's akin to giving someone a basic driving test then packing them off on the Paris Dakar.

Great stuff chaps... a fine reminder of the worst day of each year! Was I the only one who, having re-assembled his SLR / SMG / SA80 / pistol or whatever this year's weapon was, often ended up with a 'surplus' spring or arbitrary metallic lump on the floor?!

Having re-reassembled the weapon, I was then taken to the walled comedy store - the 25m range. Missing the target was never the issue (it was a given!), but the Rock's audible frustration that I'd managed to eject as many rounds sideways out of the middle bit of the gun and onto the gravel next to me as I'd managed to fire... cue Rock running to re-insert said rounds into gun for me to pop off in general direction of target, thus getting us all home in time for tea with all relevant boxes ticked!

Would have made sense if we had the time to do it 4 times a year and hence retain at least some of the information, or maybe I'm just thick and proud to be so.

The one piece of human warmth I ever detected from the Regt types was the last question on the tick test:

"Scratch and sniff - which one's nerve gas?!"