New Uniforms, use Boy Scouts style

[SARPilotNY]

[The real issue with this topic is to have pride in wearing the Air Force uniform in a way the Air Force members would be proud.  Wear it right or not at all.  Does the Air Force have an optional uniform to wear if you wear a beard or ponytale (for you guys)  No!  And at one point we didn't, but caved in when numerous complaints came in from AF bases about our members in AF uniforms.  

Okay, one more time.  We are not the Air Force.  We are the Air Force Auxiliary.  We do not have to meet Air Force standards (well, we do if we want to wear their uniform, but that's optional.)  The Air Force doesn't have to have optional uniforms.  If you don't meet their standards, they send you home.  We are less geared toward what the individual looks like, and more toward what he/she offers.

I can't believe that after 30 years in CAP you think a person's appearance trumps their abilities.  That makes no sense at all.

Jack

I have seen members taken by ambulance to the hospital because of their appearance.  Safety?  Over weight, under hydrated, heat, stress, fatigue.  Is one life worth allow us to be out of shape in the field?  As far as what he or she offers for many units is numbers, membership dollars, dues and recruiter ribbons.  Why do we lose so many of our members after the first year or two?  Since we are not the Air Force as you say, than screw the AF style uniform!  But that won't happen because we would lose to many members, than due, than membership money and...

Tags.  Your reply needs to be outside of the quote tags - MIKE

[SARPilotNY]

How does one discuss things with someone who firmly believes they are right and will not even listen to other points of view?

Jack

I have listened to other points of views...but without leadership, the whole uniform as in one has turned into non uniformity.

[Ned]

\I have listened to other points of views...but without leadership, the whole uniform as in one has turned into non uniformity.

And so.....?

The world has not ended.  Our membership numbers continue to run along pretty much as they have always done.

A lot of cadets get leadership training.  Some get their lives changed.

Some folks get educated about aerospace stuff.

Some folks get their lives saved.

Tell me again, what is the problem we are discussing on our nation's birthday?

[SARPilotNY]

\I have listened to other points of views...but without leadership, the whole uniform as in one has turned into non uniformity.

And so.....?

The world has not ended.  Our membership numbers continue to run along pretty much as they have always done.

A lot of cadets get leadership training.  Some get their lives changed.

Some folks get educated about aerospace stuff.

Some folks get their lives saved.

Tell me again, what is the problem we are discussing on our nation's birthday?

Ah..perfect, that the orange jumpsuit and scout uniform is ok with you? 

[Ned]

No, really.

Laying aside the humor above, what's your beef with the current system?

Obviously a series of compromises between competing factors, but it works.

The system functions.

Nobody really points and laughs at us.

The current uniform system serves the mission.

Changing the way some or all of us dress isn't gonna save any more lives or enhance a cadet's leadership training, will it?

[SARMedTech]

Its really hard to carry that orange airplane with you after you crash.  When I fly for CAP or fly for myself or another agency I carry a 406 beacon, a sat phone, the phone numbers for all the state police agencies so if I do crash and survive, I can increase the chance of making the golden hour for trauma or the golden 24 hours for aircraft accident victims.  (plus GPS w/mapping software )  I know if I crash anytime in the late morning and beyond and expect CAP to find me that day is a joke.  I know better...lets see,  I crash after taking off after sunrise at 8 am in the winter,  day time temp 40 degrees, night time 10 degrees.  I file a flight plan for a 4 .5 hour flight.  I crash at 9am.  My 121.5 old fashioned ELT goes  off, I am just a mile from a town with an airport.  First SARSAT pass goes over at 9:45, second at 11:15 and the AFRCC goes to mission.  They call around looking for our alerting officer, the message goes to voice mail since he is in a meeting.  Meeting is over at noon...but it is lunch time.  He makes a few calls (like ten) and cannot find any IC because they all are at work or won't take the mission.   More hits, positive airborne, even the FBO can hear the ELT.  Now the FAA is making phone calls to my family because I failed to close my flight plan.   It's one in the afternoon, just 3 more hours of daylight. By 2 o'clock the ALNOT is received by the AFRCC.  They have an IC but he can't get off work till 4 pm, the mission must wait.  Does he give it over to the sheriff???  NO!  4pm the IC leaves work and gets home by 4:30.  It is now dark, too late for an aircraft.  He tries to find a ground team but the closest one is over 100 miles away, about a 2 hour drive once the get grouped up.  That will take two hours also.  Now it is over 12 hours after I crash, the temp. is 10 degrees,  the plane is split in two, I am somewhat OK, my passenger is in need of medical help, fx femur, open wrist fracture, facial cuts and internal injuries.  She will never make it through the night!  My only choice is to walk for help but I am wearing my green flightsuit.  A local pilot hears the ELT and flies over me but cannot see me, only if I carried my orange airplane with me.  This may sound like fiction, but this is how CAP seems to respond.  See why I carry that stuff.  I know if I wait, I Will be dead!

NEVER does not exist in trauma. There is no difference between the golden hour for a victim of a "standard" trauma and an air crash.  Your passenger has fx femur. Is she losing blood? How fast? her wrist fx is open? How fast is she losing blood and do you have the knowledge and skills to apply pressure appropriately? Facial lacerations in and of themselves are not generally fatal. What are her internal injuries? A concussion is an internal injury and so is a lacerated spleen. They have drastically different survivability rates. You have a sat phone, phone numbers out te wazoo, etc...Do you have even basic first aide supplies? Can you keep your passenger warm and dry? Is she in shock? She has quite significant MOI (mechanism of inury) yet you do not mention your injuries.  Chances are (this is how traumas are assessed) that if she has those significant MOIs, you have similar ones. One of the things we look for in determining the severity of your injuries is how badly she is hurt. This will give us an idea of the severity of the impact, etc.  Sounds to me from her injuries that you might not be walking out unassisted. Also, what are your passengers vital signs? You cannot assess them because you do not list a first aide kit among the items you so wisely carry. Are her cardio-pulmonary functions compromised. What is her BP? Pulse? Rate and quality of respiration? You cannot say she will not live through the night with knowing these things. Given that symptoms of hypothermia can set in at temps as high as 70 degree F, the injuries may be irrelevant because you make no mention of emergency supplies to warm yourselves, take in calories, hydrate, etc. Chances are, with temps of 10 degrees and no significant survival gear like polypro underclothing, etc, you yourself will die from exposure. Also, the Golden Rule of surviving an A/C crash...DO NOT LEAVE THE PLANE.

If you are so anti-SAR and anti-CAP and so down on its abilities to be of use, why on earth have you been flying for CAP for "30+ years." According to you, we are worthless. Join the Boy Scouts. If you feel that ground teams dont have the resources we need, why are you on one? Even your contradictions contradict themselves.

[Pumbaa]

Yep I'd say this one has taken plenty of hits too!

[SARPilotNY]

OK doctor...hear are your medical board "flight doctor" test...

NEVER does not exist in trauma. There is no difference between the golden hour for a victim of a "standard" trauma and an air crash.  Your passenger has fx femur. Is she losing blood? How fast?                  Bleeding has stopped, skin ashen grey, cool, clammy. her wrist fx is open?    How fast is she losing blood and do you have the knowledge and skills to apply pressure appropriately?     I have limited supplies in my aircraft, a 2 seat Diamond.  I am too weak and ill trained to provide much of any help. There is no first aid kit, infact we left only with lightweight jackets.  No blanket.  When the plane crashed (it is white and there is snow on the ground in in the trees) we crashed into the tops of some pines at 65 knots and the aircraft went nose down until it hit the dirt.  The cockpit broke into two sections providing little shelter or protection.      Facial lacerations in and of themselves are not generally fatal.       The eyes  are swollen shut, she has numerous broken teeth and it appears her jaw is broken.  She is still wedged into her seat and when she breathes, she seems to snore.   She keeps coughing up dark red blood...like coffee grounds.         What are her internal injuries?           It hurts for her to breath, very painful and her chest hurts when she coughs.  Her abd. 4 quads are not rigid or but painful.        A concussion is an internal injury and so is a lacerated spleen. They have drastically different survivability rates. You have a sat phone, phone numbers out te wazoo, etc...  No for this flight I have no sat phone, 406 beacon, just a 121.5 ELT.  Remember the passage, this is not "me the prepared pilot".     Do you have even basic first aide supplies?  NO.      Can you keep your passenger warm and dry?  Yes, I will give her my windbreaker so it will keep her warm while I hike for help.        Is she in shock?  I don't know, what is shock?  (YES)         She has quite significant MOI (mechanism of inury) yet you do not mention your injuries.       I can't assess my injuries because I am so upset and dazed.  I think I am OK but I am more worried about my passenger, she looks so sick.  Yes I hurt when I walk and move, but don't worryabout me...help her!         Chances are (this is how traumas are assessed) that if she has those significant MOIs, you have similar ones. One of the things we look for in determining the severity of your injuries is how badly she is hurt. This will give us an idea of the severity of the impact, etc.  Sounds to me from her injuries that you might not be walking out unassisted. Also, what are your passengers vital signs?      P 120 and weak, skins cool, pale and wet.   8 and labored, you can  hear "gargling" when she breathes.  Is she going to be OK Doc??  Help her, don't let her die...      You cannot assess them because you do not list a first aide kit among the items you so wisely carry.        (the  a/c comes w/ a supplied f/a kit)  Are her cardio-pulmonary functions compromised      Yes   . What is her BP?   Can't tell     Pulse? Rate and quality of respiration? You cannot say she will not live through the night with knowing these things. Given that symptoms of hypothermia can set in at temps as high as 70 degree F, the injuries may be irrelevant because you make no mention of emergency supplies to warm yourselves, take in calories, hydrate, etc.    No water but snow melt  Burrr, no candy bars either.          Chances are, with temps of 10 degrees and no significant survival gear like polypro underclothing, etc, you yourself will die from exposure. Also, the Golden Rule of surviving an A/C crash...DO NOT LEAVE THE PLANE.      I know, but we crashed almost 8 hours ago and I can't see any more aircraft.  I am sure they have no idea where I am.  I know my ELT is going, the light is flashing...but still no help.  Where are you guys?  Its cold and she is getting worse.  I am cold and hurt too...I must walk to get help.  I can hear traffic in the distance, I will walk to get help.  Tell my wife I lover her and the gal in the plane was "just a friend".

If you are so anti-SAR and anti-CAP and so down on its abilities to be of use, why on earth have you been flying for CAP for "30+ years." According to you, we are worthless. Join the Boy Scouts. If you feel that ground teams dont have the resources we need, why are you on one? Even your contradictions contradict themselves.


I do this so I can bring help to a victim or closure to a family.  I work with some really great people, they know who they are but I also have people with standard ratings that don't know what a 211 is!  Why do I stay, I try to teach what I know to others that want to learn and help my fellow pilots, friends and neighbors...to give back.  On a CAP mission, have you or anyone else found a survivor in the middle of the night, injured, cold and scared...if so, you know why I stick around and do it.

[SARPilotNY]

Yep I'd say this one has taken plenty of hits too!


[/quot
I think you have way too much fun.  Want to go to Nevada with me to do some fundraising?

[shorning]

Can go back and fix your quote tags in the two previous posts?  It is awfully hard to read the way you have it there..  kthxbye.

[SARMedTech]

SARPilot-

I wont quote your whole post and answer it point for point but you have done a good job of quoting a trauma scenario straight out of Brady. Your not consistant enough within one post let alone the thread to make any sense of any of it. You are right though...your passenger/secretary is toast. She has classic upper airway obstruction which would have killed her about 10 hours ago since you have done nothing. She has an upper GI bleed. She is in deep, non-compensating/decompensating shock. Save yourself if you can. Also...if you make it out alive, take a survival course. You dont drink melted snow unless you can heat it since to do so in large quantities not only burns mega calories and worsens your own hypothermia, you may also send youself into shock. Good thing you can hear the cars, cause thats as close as your going to get. Given your self described condition you will be dead in about 30 minutes. Me and the other 23 people you think it takes to carry out a stokes will happily carry your body out (I always carry a body bag in my jump kit). Again, please stay away from any SAR I am on.

[SARPilotNY]

Can go back and fix your quote tags in the two previous posts?  It is awfully hard to read the way you have it there..  kthxbye.

Sorry...I am all thumbs at times...

[SARPilotNY]

SARPilot-

I wont quote your whole post and answer it point for point but you have done a good job of quoting a trauma scenario straight out of Brady. Your not consistant enough within one post let alone the thread to make any sense of any of it. You are right though...your passenger/secretary is toast. She has classic upper airway obstruction which would have killed her about 10 hours ago since you have done nothing. She has an upper GI bleed. She is in deep, non-compensating/decompensating shock. Save yourself if you can. Also...if you make it out alive, take a survival course. You dont drink melted snow unless you can heat it since to do so in large quantities not only burns mega calories and worsens your own hypothermia, you may also send youself into shock. Good thing you can hear the cars, cause thats as close as your going to get. Given your self described condition you will be dead in about 30 minutes. Me and the other 23 people you think it takes to carry out a stokes will happily carry your body out (I always carry a body bag in my jump kit). Again, please stay away from any SAR I am on.

[SARPilotNY]

Now your getting the point...little to do about uniforms  and VS, but more about an acceptable response time in order to make a save.  Point is, the average pilot we look for cannot afford to wait 12 to 24 hours for CAP to respond and help.  If that were me, I would take a boy scout, a farmer, even you!    I have seen way to many aircrash victims die waiting NEEDLESSLY for CAP to get going.  There is a reasonable response time and a ridicules response time.  The fashionshow should do little to slow us down but it seems is does.  My point is I have seen ICs go back to sleep and sit on a mission that ended up at a crash site, or eat lunch or dinner before calling for resources, I have heard some wings taking over 6 hours to find an IC...is that acceptable or should we pass on the mission?

[shorning]

Can go back and fix your quote tags in the two previous posts?  It is awfully hard to read the way you have it there..  kthxbye.

Sorry...I am all thumbs at times...

And you still have the ability to edit your own posts.  People aren't going to read what you write if you make it difficult for them.  Want to win people over to your cause?  Makes your posts/comments clear.

[SARPilotNY]

Can go back and fix your quote tags in the two previous posts?  It is awfully hard to read the way you have it there..  kthxbye.

Sorry...I am all thumbs at times...

And you still have the ability to edit your own posts.  People aren't going to read what you write if you make it difficult for them.  Want to win people over to your cause?  Makes your posts/comments clear.

gotcha...

[RiverAux]

Why are people still implying that it is CAP that is waiting excessive lengths of time to start the mission?  We have to wait for someone to request us (or convince someone through a backchannel to request us) before we can do anything.  The Air Force is the agency responsible for deciding when to start a search mission off an ELT hit.  Once they call us, we're out the door ASAP.

[SARPilotNY]

Why are people still implying that it is CAP that is waiting excessive lengths of time to start the mission?  We have to wait for someone to request us (or convince someone through a backchannel to request us) before we can do anything.  The Air Force is the agency responsible for deciding when to start a search mission off an ELT hit.  Once they call us, we're out the door ASAP.

I am talking about after the AFRCC calls CAP.  Not all wings are bad but some do take a lot longer.  Read Sar Eval where they can't find resources and suspend the mission.  I talked to the AFRCC during a mission where after 6 hours they could not find a CAP IC.  They said that's not too unusual.

[RiverAux]

My Wing probably has about as few ICs as you can have and we always manage to get a mission going within a reasonable period of time.  If there is a wing where they can't get an IC in 6 hours they need to replace the Wing Commander with someone who will ensure that the training gets done to have enough ICs on hand to answer the phone at any given time.

Plus, if I was AFRCC and couldn't find an IC in that Wing I'd be calling adjacent Wings and getting them involved.  If the first Wing complains I'd tell them T.S. -- pick up your phone and you'll get the mission.   

[capchiro]

Well, it sounds like our NY Pilot is confused.  By his own admission, he has been in a paid profession that enables him to do search/rescue work on the job and pays him for it.  Now, If he is paid by the state/county/federal, etc., then they sure have the expectation that he will be there when needed.  CAP is a volunteer group that goes above and beyond the roles of your average joe citizen.  We are not paid to get our butts out of bed and run out in the woods whenever Ima Lost or Mr. Outta Gas falls out of the sky.  We are so much more than that to so many more people.  ES is but one of the jobs we have been asked to do.  And I say asked and not tasked because again,we are not "professionals" and I don't want any of my brother heroes to get their rear out of shape because I am using the word professionals to separate us as the truly beautiful thing we are, which is volunteers.  Now, we do a very "professional" job of what we do.  We are one of the largest "air forces" in the world.  We don't tear up airplanes, we don't lose cadets in the woods and we don't leave our wounded behind..oops, different scenario, but you do get the drift.  If your whole focus in CAP is ES. I feel sorry for you, because with your background, I think you may be an adrenaline junkie, and you know what I am talking about.   Try working with the cadet program and see the cadets grow and mature through the program.  See these same cadets go to one of the Military Academies.  There is more than one way to serve the country and more than one way to make a contribution.  I hope that with your opinionated attitude that you have not been in a command position because those under you would suffer unbearably.  Most of the responders on this thread have many years of great experience and have tried to respond to you in a collegiate manner, hoping to enlighten you.   You asked at one point about the maroon epaulets.  If you don't know about them, I am  suspect of your tenure and involvement with CAP, as someone with your credentials should know the story by now.  A word to the wise, try to use this board to learn something and remember that CAP is not as narrow as you may believe and you can be sure that if you post something on here that is incorrect, someone will catch it.. As usual, JMHO..