Sorry you're a pax now
 

Recently had the pleasure of travelling down to Lyneham to transit off on detachment in a herc. Going through the security gate six of us were asked to remove our aircrew knifes as we weren't entitled to wear them when travelling as passengers! Now I know the dangerous air cargo posters talk about knifes etc, but this was an aircrew knife not a machette or dagger!! Twenty odd years of flying and seems I'm not to be trusted with a piece of my flying clothing, talk about jobs worth. What do I see on the news a few weeks ago, the parachute regt arriving in Macedonia climbing down the steps of a VC 10 with SA80s to hand. Gobsmacked.

Ahhh.... nothing changes.

Remember many years ago being told that I couldn't wear an issue Mae West in a herc as a pax because the CO2 bottle and miniflares were DAC.

Load ole bollox init.

Came back from Op Agricola and the RAFPs at Lyneham made me put my rifle thorugh the XRay machine; now what's all that about then?

I paxxed up to Fairford a couple of years ago in a herc as I was going to spend the day on the static herc we'd parked there the day before.
Flight time: 7mins. Check in: 2hrs before. Knives removed from us......muppets... :rolleyes:

Arkroyal - why did you want to wear you LSJ while paxing? A little more faith required methinks. ;)

Stopstart,

Sorry, should have been more specific. If I'd worn it that would be OK. Only DAC as carry on baggage!!!! :confused:

To make matters worst, not only was my knife removed, but I found myself plus 60 odd colleagues travelling in the back of a herc again. Only a week before the (CASWO) 'Chief of Air Staff Warrant Officer' had told us the prime mover for OP Resinate was now the VC10! Where's those nice new shiny C17s when you need them! Busy doing airshows I guess :confused:

> Came back from Op Agricola and the RAFPs
> at Lyneham made me put my rifle thorugh
> the XRay machine; now what's all that
> about then?

When coming back thro' Split airport in mid 90s they used to do that to all the weapons bundles! What sort of mind does it take to insist on something like that?

As a Herc mate,I can only sympathise greatly with everyone's sentiments so far.
Recently I was at Aldergrove to bring some troops home. They arrived from the province in a Chinook, deplaned (with baggage) and were promptly taken by the movements staff to complete a full check-in procedure!! I was incensed, as I feel that treating our troops in this way is not only pointless in the extreme, but it only serves to further degrade any positive opinions the standard grunt may have of the Herc ,or more generally RAF AT. They had just come off one RAF ac and could not be taken from the helicopter into another ac.
I know it sounds bitter, but I think it is just another indicator of how effective other trades (in this case the Movers and the RAFP) are at justifying, sustaining and even expanding their respective empires.
If we cannot get rid of these pointless procedures then I think we are all worse off. Would any mover or RAFP out there care to justify it?
I sit back to await a party line from someone.....

Well if any of them had any brains they wouldn't be Movers or Police in the first place would they??

Can't disagree with anything so far, apart from the bit about brains. Those that make those sort of comments aren't really worth smelling coffee for. To be honest, if some of you had 'brains', you wouldn't waste time starting new threads on stuff that's been done b4, and better. The arguments bemoaning the poor teamwork from 'support staffs' show a certain maturity - clearly, the 'firm' would run much better without them.

Back to the original topic, yep, let's bin it all, and the next time a mil pax hides something danagerous in their cabin luggage and it costs, them you can really have something worthwhile to beeaatch about.

Go on.

Go on, go on.

Go on, go on, go on.

Go on, go on, go on, go on.

Go on, go on, go on, go on, go on.

Go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, go on.

:p

ps - yes, I did get out of the wrong side of bed today!! So yah boo sux!!! :p

[ 09 September 2001: Message edited by: Didntdoit ]

So what happens to a stick of paras. Does the loadie hand them their bayonets back as they jump out of the door?

Just wondering.

I once mistakenly checked in my flying suit as hand baggage on civ-air. When they inevitably found the knife I naturally aplogised and suggested that I could remove it and hand it to the senior member of the cabin crew to ensure I didn't go barmy and open a few beer bottles when on board. Gatwick staff said, "No, don't worry, you're military aircrew, we can let that pass!" We,ve got a lot to learn from civvies.

Once upon a time I flew RAF AT without being delayed by movers, without being delayed by RAFPs, without suffering ATC delays (my own forte), without ac unserviceability and actually arrived at my destination on time.

Didntdoit, does that make good reading?

TTFN, going back to my book of hideous slot times....... :p :p :p

Hengist Pod,
It is big bonus though when the civilian security staff at certain London airports understand the need for confidentiality and common sense, with regard to certain clothing in baggage of any sort! It is a pity that I have never seen it happen! Maybe one year they might get it right!

Exact same thing happened to us going to and coming from Op Grapple from 92 to 95 ( and every other Op there till 845 left, come to think of it :p ) - aircrew knife on trop dpm and they made us take them off and stow them. Total waste of time (that could have better been used in the bar or at home) before we came back again via the same means and....you guessed it.....we took the knives off and had to stow them.
Right royal pain in the hoop! :(
They weren't bothered about the leathermans or gerber knives on our belts though! :D

[ 12 September 2001: Message edited by: jockspice ]

Tuesday's events put a slightly different light on this conversation don't you think???

Nuff said.

Respect. :(

Not wanting to slight the problems with a few people willing to die in the name of terrorism, I don't see how it can be applied to military personnel, en masse. For example, if I really wanted to cause disruption, I'd either fly my own jet wherever I wanted to, or drop bombs from said jet. If I wanted to do over a Tristar, I'd do it when tanking (some say I do it often enough...) The same goes for our engineers, who have ample opportunity to sabotage jets on a daily basis.

On another topic....
Having recently returned from a GOOD det, the RAFP who checked our baggage was in a flying suit; Why? (all flying squad/flying pigs jokes already covered).

Talking of which, thanks to all 2 Gp personnel who managed to drag the 10 hour flight from Brize to Vegas out to 41 hours. Hope Calgary was worth it...

Dearest Radhaz.

I really think you missed Larfyar's point. As it's Friday, I'll be nice.

May I refer you to my post of 9 Sep (ie, written before the events of 11 Sep). As it's now 14 Sep, (ie, after the events of 11 Sep), may I remind you of the lowest common denominator, of which, there are some that are clearly lower than others.

Yours,

In respect to others

DDI xx :confused:

Pathetic!
 

*********** *** ** I *** *** mainly ***** *** **** ******* witter on ***** ***** like a pathetic ***** girl* bitching **** **** ***** and ** **** ***** *** idiot* are ******** ** ** *** ******** ** *** *** your * ****** ****grace!:*

Couldn't have put it better myself, pal. You are banned as a waste of bandwidth...