Titles and Acronyms old and new
 

Hi all,

Once again I've come across another interminable service Acronym. STO, the example is an RAF Wing Commander accompanying the Geilenkirchen CO, greeting 92 Sqn pilots on arrival, December 1965.

FB

Senior Technical Officer ?

Seems rather short to be interminable :bored:

In this day and age the STO would probably translate to "Assistant Deputy Chief of Staff Logistics" ie ADCSL or somesuch!
Old Duffer

When one was in Whitehall some years ago, one had many dealings with PSO to ACAS (sorry! Personal Staff Officer to the Assistant Chief of Air Staff).

Borrowing a phrase from Flanders and Swann (Eating People is Wrong) I always called him "Chief Assistant to the Assistant Chief". Don't think he was amused........

I have a friend who was an MSO. Medical Services Officer, aka Pox Doctor's Clerk.

Ninthace
Presumably an Australian?

When I was in the navy I met someone who arranged (made it up?) his job title to be

electrical installation engineering information officer.

so he could say in meetings I’m eieio 😎

Well in a quasi-military context (the Maquis) ,in the books I am reading, it stands for Service de Travail Obligatoire (Forced Labour). Which I am guessing is not appropriate here!

Mogwi senior used to do his RNR annual training interpreting aerial photos at JHQ Rheindahlen many decades ago; he called himself SNOG (Senior Naval Officer (Germany)).

Very rare beasts at JHQ ............... the sight of a RN officer made the more uncouth people stop and stare. I personally never had dealings with one in a total of about 13 years in RAFG, all but three at JHQ,

STO was Survival to Operate … at least it was in the 90s when I was Wg Cdr STO in the Deputy Directorate of War Plans and Policy (WPP) in the Air Force Department (AFD) at the Ministry of Defence (MOD).

Then the Warsaw Pact (WP) and Soviet Union collapsed, and we were disestablished with on-going work passed to Strike Command (STC) where I suspect it largely withered on the vine.

Falklands 1983 had the SS Rangatira moored in Stanley harbour for accommodation purposes, with a Naval Lt as the military “OC”. We sailed down on the SS Uganda together, and as the Senior Naval Officer on the Rangatira we RAF types awarded him the informal title of SNOTRAG.

No, on more formal occasions I referred to him as the Pox Doctor's Quill Bearer. Someone had to keep the medics paperwork straight and for some reason there was not only an RAF trade for it but they even had their own officer corps. I used to wind him up further by using my academic title. We are still mates to this day, so he took it well.

I recall many years ago at RAF Leconfield the Senior Medical Officer (SMO)phoning into the station and asking to be put through to sick quarters only to be told by the operator (no direct dial in those days) that it was now the Regional Medical Centre. She then enquired who she should say was calling and the SMO responded said that he supposed they better say it was the Senior Regional Medical Officer

When I had dealings with the R.N. I was told of an officer who was given the task of trying to persuade ratings to sign on again when thir time was up.
He declared his job title to be"re-employment of manpower for further term" ROMFT for short.
To every matelot ROMFT stood for " Roll on my F-ing Time"

I think the navy had Supply and Transport Officers, but they put (N) at the end.

Interminable Sir because I couldn't put together an answer which I recognised, and I spent a long time trying to find the answer. Therefore, to me it was a conundrum!:)

FB

That's what I thought.

FB

Mogwi
In days of yore in Berlin at 26SU we had 2 RN CSOs (something to do with comms), one at Gatow and the other on Teufelsburg, who were known, as the only RN staff in Berlin, as SNOG and SNOT......

Re EIEIO

At LATCC the above acronym stood for the External Interference Engineering Investigations Officer.

TLAs are SOP in the RAF TFN. STN CDRs are to see FLTs and SQNs RTN FOBs to SHQs ASAP. SSO and SRO to be updated WIE, APs UDATE TBD.

I don't know if this has leaked into the RAF from the civil side yet but a term for a 'less than popular or useless' colleague is Leatherman.
(Complete tool). :E

WW2 ….there was a RCN officer at Goose Bay Airport, Labrador, Newfoundland ( Still a British Colony at the time ) on the ferry route to Europe who co-ordinated shipping and convoys delivering vital supplies to build and supply the base.
SNOGOOSE.

as lowly airman was appointed
 

CATTAC................chief assistant to the assistant chief

I served somewhere where a trainee pilot officer in the tower was TEAPOT. His wife, rather uncharitably ,was TEABAG.

There used to be a medal awarded called the Veterans Decoration. It was said that some who had earned it had the VD and Scar.

And SPOT was Senior Pilot Officer Tower, of which we had a few including the one who made 1*

I've been SLOPS and FLOPS but unfortunately never POOPS. I had a female colleague who was SO2 Mission Analysis, she very quickly had her email short-title changed after arriving in post!

Remember it well, I was on Radar Squadron 1987-88.

FB

Eureka! Well almost, I've been browsing WW2 acronyms and abbreviations, STO was either Sea transport Officer or Station Transport Officer. The latter may well be appropriate, as plans for evacuation at RAF Stations in Germany, back in the day, were quite an imperative. Especially with US owned nukes on board. In other words, to oversee the organization of "Transport" to get various people away west smartish before the Russians arrived.

FB

Back in the 1970’s there was a British naval liaison officer in Bermuda with the title Senior Naval Officer West Indies, or SNOWI for short.

On 230 Sqn in the early 1980s we had a Royal Marines exchange pilot. He was universally known as SMOG (Senior Marine Officer, Gutersloh). I think he might have coined the expression himself!

We also had a SPOT, as per MPN11 stated above.

Happy days.

Do we still have SLJOs?

Years ago in the DIS, the amalgamation of Geographic and Imagery into one division - Geographic and Imagery Management (GIM) - gave the once in a lifetime opportunity to create new job titles. We nearly managed to sneak two past the AVM in a presentation of the branch wiring diagram, but sadly he spotted them and banned both. (a) GIM Sqn Ldr Int Plans (GIMSLIP) and (b) GIM Joint Analysis Mapping Section (GIMJAMS).

In the 1970s the Senior Officer Hong Kong Squadron was always known as Socks. The appointment (RN) then was held by Cdr Tim Sloane - a nice bloke.

GDT at RAF LBH in the v early 90's managed to get the following into SRO's once before someone cottoned on and I (we) were spoken to:

First Aid Trained, Station Live Armed Guards - followed by the list of nominees for the upcoming duty

SNAFU (an FLA, not a TLA): For many years the Torpedo Control Sub System Mk 9 (TCSS9), fitted to all early RN nuclear submarines, had a key element known, officially, as the Supplies Null And Flood Unit, which did what it said on the box: monitored a Mk8 torpedo in the tube to ensure that, electrical supply were correct, the gyro was nulled, and that the plugs and link cable connecting to the torpedo were not flooded. The clever project officer who got this name through the official system earned my undying admiration. It was replaced in the late 70s by a system that had the more boring TLA of DCB, but who knows, it may still have been in CONQUEROR in 1982, and could have been the last bit in the chain of events that did for the BELGRANO.

apologies if related previously .......................Met Office College had a board displaying important visitors' title and surnames. The letters were velcro or magnetic.

Too much temptation one day:

Director General Met Office short form DGMETO became METGOD
Directot Met Office Services short form DSMETO became METSOD, and
Directot Met Office Research short form DRMETO became METROD

Only noticed by the dignitaries as they arrived.. College Principal not amused. Your correspondent nowhere to be seen.

On a Shackleton detachment to Keflavic in the early 80s, the aircraft captain/detachment commander was a quite junior flight lieutenant. He was introduced to a USAF Colonel in the officers' club by one of the (fairly inebriated) rear crew as "Det Comm Shack Lant", Detachmant Commander, Shackleton Atlantic: said flight lieutenant was treated like royalty for the rest of the night.