Nation

Hello everyone,

Little background on myself: 30 year old male, selected for AD UPT with the Air Force in 2018, failed FC1 for childhood asthma and anemia after a very long, drawn out process (disclaimer, I'm not anemic; was checked out by my personal doc and endurance training was the culprit).

Busy saving money for flight training when I heard the Navy increased the age of pilot accessions to 32 back in June. Started working with the Navy the last few weeks; got cleared through MEPS again, set to take the ASTB-E in a week, applying to the October board for SNA.

I've been having a lot of internal conflicts regarding going through with the process. In the Air Force I had my FC1 before heading to OTS, which doesn't happen in the Navy. I also wonder if my experience dealing with the headache that was the AF for my limited time was a valuable insight into the ~12 year commitment I'd be signing up for, and maybe flying as a civilian would be the smart move. Get that seniority number sooner.

Don't get me wrong, I want to serve. Being a fighter pilot was my entire focus during the process with the Air Force, and while I don't want to put the cart in front of the horse, it's the same here.

Any advice from present/previous Navy or other MIL pilots? .

Thanks for reading.

FlewNavy

You will start the aviation process after finishing OCS and incurring an obligation. Google the following for source documentation. NAMI Navy asthma. You will be disqualified and have to go through the waiver process which will be uphill and a coin toss. Navy prefers no waivers because it’s not hard to recruit people to fly...only hard part is keeping them for a career which would seem an unlikely prospect considering your age. The following is from the Navy aeromedical guide:

AEROMEDICAL CONCERNS: Asthma symptoms can rapidly progress from minimal to totally disabling. Exposure to dust, smoke or fumes can provoke attacks in susceptible individuals. Positive pressure breathing, breathing cold or dry air, and +Gz exposure can stimulate bronchospasm in individuals with hyperreactive airways.

WAIVER: Any history of asthma, to include childhood asthma and exercise-induced asthma, is considered disqualifying (CD) for aviation duties and training, even if the disease is very mild.

APPLICANTS: Waivers for applicants with a history of asthma may be considered if all of the following criteria are met, with complete documentation submitted to Code 42:
1. The individual is currently asymptomatic and has been asymptomatic for a minimum of five years without medication use or prescriptions filled.
a. Depending on the needs of the Navy, asthma that is symptomatic/requires
medication use into adulthood (≥18 yo) is generally not considered for waiver in
untrained personnel.
2. Baseline pulmonary function testing (PFT) within 1 year of waiver application is normal.
3. Methacholine challenge test within 1 year of waiver application is within normal limits
and not suggestive of bronchial hyperresponsiveness.
4. Completed Navy ARWG Asthma worksheet reviewed with patient and signed by
submitting FS/AME. (form follows this section)

AAfng

Try the navy or you will regret it. Airlines arent going anywhere, they will be here later

OneCircle

So, I will throw in some random thoughts....for your FYSA my background is F/A-18s (about 3000 hours or so), just finishing up, former VFA CO.

Some good recommendations here already. There are a few more things to think about.
- Are you married? I ask because flight school and beyond is a large time commitment with lots of moves (likely) the first few years. I moved from Pensacola (API) to Corpus to Kingsville to Lemoore in a roughly 2 year timespan. Your spouse would need to know what may be coming.
- You will be significantly older than most all the other SNA's in your class. Not a huge deal but you may not fit in as well at first. But being more mature may also help in some ways.
-Are your prepared mentally to fly helos, maritime patrol or E-6s? Fighters are an achievable goal but far from guaranteed. Even if you pull jet grades there may be not be jet spots during your time of selection.

If you are ok with all that then I highly recommend giving it a shot. I did so many cool things and met so many cool people that I wouldn't trade it for anything. Not to mention flying F/A-18s was pretty damn awesome, except for a few dark nights at the boat.

Nation

Thanks for the feedback. I'm fortunate (I guess?) that I'm unmarried with no real responsibilities; I had spent so much time in the recruiting pipeline for the AF, I kept that as my goal.

One of the plus sides for the Navy seems to be the non-fighter duty stations are all pretty awesome. I would have no issues flying a different airframe. My biggest apprehension is holding off on getting my aviation career started for another "coin toss" (as FlewNavy put it) with my medical history. The Navy seems to operate a bit more quickly than the Air Force though, when it comes to accessions. I was told I should hear back in November regarding this upcoming board.