"What's the Class Drop?"
 

Where does this term come from? It's asked probably 10 times a day on here and it's pretty obvious what it means.... But I've never heard it on the civilian side of hiring/training. Is this a military remnant?

Yep. As in what choices "dropped" down from higher up for each class to choose from.

UPT students rank their choices and find out at the "drop party" which plane they get.

Just to clarify....it's an Air Force thing. USN/USMC don't call it that.

Since we've combined training, they do now.

Training has been "Combined" in some form since at least the VN era.

Never heard it called "The drop" aside from the Zoomies in VT 31. And it was a zoomie only thing.

I thought it was what you do after a night of drinking cheap beer and eating wings.

Concur...in my time as a FTS/TAR IP in Corpus (10 years) I have never heard anyone from an all Navy squadron (27/28) call it a drop...and only the USAF studs/IPs in the "combined" squadrons (31/35). OBTW, they're not joint anymore either.

I can't speak for the bizarro chuckleheads at TW-5.

IMO, we never had any sort of "event" when assigning a pipeline out of Primary because 60% of the studs went helos and half those guys were ****ed. I don't know if Master got drafted but seeing someone's face after an E-2/C-2 draft could be very traumatic:)

****ed= mad, upset, etc

ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG to US.

Thirty years ago it was also called the assignment drop.
Assignment night was a huge party afterwards. Typically the last time the class (2 sections) had a blow out party. Two sets of drunks "OMG I got it!" and "OMG what happened?!" Some of the best stories in UPT came from that night.

LOL, 2 sections is right.

I haven't been to a drop lately but I imagine now the big party is get your assignment and leave ASAP before you get accused of DUI, conduct unbecoming, unprofessional relationships, cheating, or sexual assault.

My version of assignment drop...get called into the skipper's office, he spends 5 seconds telling me I got legacy hornets in Lemoore, and then get kicked out.

Slightly less exciting than the USAF version...

That's why they call it a PARTY! :eek::D

When the list was announced, our Squadron Commander warned: "Don't y'all go FIGMO on us just yet. Assignments can be changed.":rolleyes:

Even thought I was a Guard Puke and knew exactly what I was getting, and where, I still had a Great time at the drop party, watching some of my buddies jumping for joy, while others were crying in their beer and throwing their new T37 (FAIP) Squadron Scarves at their IP's!

Ahh...three more years in Del Rio!

What could be more fun?!

There's always at least one! We had a guy that got T-38 FAIP. He dropped a large F bomb and shattered his class beer mug on the table. Needless to say his new squadron commander, flight commander and future squadron mates weren't very impressed.:eek:

Combined?

I just thought the Air Force took over because they love briefings and the rest would rather fly airplanes.

That's funny! :D Admission requirement for Air Force UPT is "extensive knowledge & minimum hour requirement of .PPT presentations."

I was actually going to ask this same question.
Personally I find it an incredibly annoying phrase. Should stay with the mil... Not all things transfer well.

Wow, you're a little thin skinned.:eek:

Some of us are capable of doing both.;)

Well, I was a T-6 instructor at Moody AFB in 2002-2003 with Navy and Air Force students. The assignments came on "Drop" night for both services.

"Incredibly annoying phrase"? I'm a Navy guy and I find what you wrote incredibly annoying.

That's cool... Everyone has a right to an opinion.

Spot on. One of the best nights of my life. I was in Del Hell, and I think they ended assignment nights one or two classes after mine. Like Sliceback said, 2 section blow out party that started 2 hours before the drop, then the tequila shots before going up on the stage and spinning the wheel of torture (especially the guys getting BUFFs to Minot). Party continued to the pool. It's fuzzy after that. :eek: Later classes got to go into a classroom and be told what they got.

Yeah, pretty much the PC etc police have made what use to be good times a reason to count down the days to getting out. It's a shame.

Yeah, as a 4,500hr. ATP rated civilian going through AF UPT, I always thought it was funny they would spend more time briefing than flying! 90 minute brief for a one hour flight! :eek:

One day my T37 IP asked me, "So...when you were flying freight...what did you guys brief?"

I said, "Nothing, we got in the plane, we started it up, and we went flying..."

He said, "Well, what about the weather? Didn't you brief the weather, and the approaches?"

I said, "Nope, we didn't give a sh!t what the weather was, we just went. We had to go anyway or we'd get fired. If the weather at the destination was bad...well...we found it anyway."

He said, "So you busted Mins?"

I said, "No, we just found the runway and landed." ;)

Tower would sometimes ask us, "What's the ceiling out there?" and we'd answer, "It's right AT mins..." :D

(Freight dog code for...it's bleak)

Another Guard Guy with 3,500hrs. and a DC 8 copilot prior (Rich Air, out of MIA, flying 'stuff' to South America), who was in my UPT class said of AF Pilot Training,

"The SOF keeps a piece of blue plastic behind his desk. Every morning he holds it up to the sky, and if the colors don't match it's 'no solo's to the areas'! I just hope that when the Russians come, the weather is good!"

FUNNY, but soooo true.

As you can be at times ;)

It's for the guys that;

STILL wanna be called by their callsign
Refer to the active runway(s) as the "duty runway(s)"
Refer to FO's as "copilots"
Reference EVERYTHING in 24 hour time....."meet for dinner at six?" "yeah, see ya at eighteen hundred hours"

http://www.funnyordie/com/videos/8af...ears-from-nino

I must have flown for similar freight place.

That story is 100% the way we rolled!

(The things we did for multi time.)

You know what's funny? When I went through UPT 30 years ago, there was a class called, "Officership Development".

Every week some old heads would come in and talk to us about what it meant to be an Officer in the USAF. So one week a guy shows up who flew AC130s in Viet Nam. he's wearing a fight suit, his sleeves were rolled up, his zippers unzipped, hair a mess, boots unlaced, cigar hanging out of is mouth.

He opens with, "What this country needs is a GOOD WAR!" then goes on to talk about the pussification of the USAF since Viet Nam! He said (since there was no war at the moment in 1983) the idiots in charge had nothing better to do than worry about haircuts, shoe shines and painting the trash cans for an upcoming inspection! At one point he said, "During Viet Nam, if some Azzhole Major had told us we had to wear our hats or zip up our zippers, we would have bombed his hutch!" :eek: :D

Sad that they are still out there, pussifying the AF experience. Some douche looking for a promotion killed the drop night party, no doubt.

If you want to read a really good book about those glory days (Viet Nam) pick up, "Robin Olds, Fighter Pilot".

One of our T37 FAIPs smashed his champagne bottle on the floor as he left the stage and stormed out of the O Club. Another one's wife threw her wedding ring at him and left. Another T37 FAIP was at the bar afterwards, head down on the bar, crying uncontrollably. I came up on his left side to try to console him (and to order another beer).

He tells me to go to hell, you get to leave here, you phucking Guard Guy!

As I'm about to leave with my beer, the BASE COMMANDER comes up on his right side, puts his arm around him and says, "Don't worry son, it'll be alright..." and before I can stop him, he lifts his head, turns towards the new voice (unknown to him, it's his new boss) and screams through his tears, "PHUCK YOU!" :eek::eek:

I quickly left the scene!

Great book

I had two roommates, great guys, and we all got our first choice. We had an "after party" at our place after the O Club party. Eventually, one of my roommates drove his motorcycle up the stairs in our rental home. The other, punched out the window in our living room and we had to take him to the ER.

Thats a frikkin drop night!

Speaking for civilians, we aren't sure we get the significance of the drunken Air Force rituals, or swearing at superior officers; WGAF? We had frat brothers who were out of control, but that is because they weren't getting laid and had nothing better to do.

We installed bunks to prevent drunk driving. These bunks were on a hall to the women's restroom. One night I escorted a date and observed every bunk getting put to good use ... simultaneously ... which was impressive given that Tech had like three girls who attended when I did. We had to brown bag it.

I think the song went "I'm an anxious twat from Agnes Scott and I want to marry an engineer ...."

My other recall was she and I were going at it and a rather fat brother popped his head up and stated, "she's beautiful, the most beautiful girl I've ever seen." She ended up marrying a SWA pilot. Hope I turned her on to the whole aviation thing.

Guys have been busting their asses, under high stress, for a year plus. It all comes down to assignment drop. One night, a couple of seconds on stage, and your future career could be decided right then and there. That's why it's a big deal.

Pre drop - a couple of mugs of Bloody Mary's and a couple of beers. Double shot of Tequila on stage. About face and full knee lock trying not to fall over.

New Wing CC. Drop party in the o'club. He's a non drinker. He drops by in civvies and steps into the men's room. It's trashed (doesn't happen...). Asks a 2Lt friend, who's also in civvies - "how about cleaning up in here?"(Wing CC looks like a civilian contractor with his down vest). Friend - "and who are YOU?!?" Wing CC - I'm Colonel Ellis (Jeffery T.??). Buddy - "I'm cleaning it up"

Talking the next day with senior student. Said Col. Ellis say down with me and Xxx Xxxx to talk. Class leader says "hopefully you did the talking." Me? I was too drunk to talk. Class leader - "Oh no! Xxxx was in worse shape. He was putting his head through the drywall". They kept expecting him to hit a stud and knock himself out. He got the base and jet he wanted.

Col Ellis kept turning the keg off. He'd leave the room and guys would turn it back on. Supposedly happened a couple of times. It didn't go over well. IP's told me the following drops were a lot quieter.

Pre PC
 

Our celebration was actually a Toga Party (circa 1980 so Animal House was still an influence). Pre-party prior to going to the club. Toga parade while wheeling a keg into the O club and parked it right in the middle of the class. Assignments were taped to the bottom of a full "Class Mug" of beer. Chug the beer while everyone else could read the assignment until you got to the bottom of the mug and turned it over on your head. At the same time a large slide of your aircraft was projected on a large screen behind you. Then you read what you got. The expressions were priceless as were the comments from the peanut gallery while they saw the drop before you finished the mug. Post party/parties went well onto the next day. Commanders were all on board and right in the middle of the fray. Too drunk to drive...sky cops would give you a ride vice busting your balls. Good times before the PC police infested the ranks.

The quieter nights were in vogue for a while.......including mine:mad:

I wasn't at Ellis' wing, but I did know his son at Randolph back in the day........a good guy.

When I got my T-37 to Willie, I actually turned the card over to check the name and see if they had given me the wrong card. NO ONE had talked to me about it (the usual thing):D After I got off the stage, still looking shell shocked I'm sure, all the tweet guys came running over saying "we didn't thing you'd mind since your from the local area". But, what was really bad is when I called my parents and told them what I got, and my mom said "praise the lord, we were praying for that" (parents were still in the PHX area). I said thanks mom, I guess this is your fault:o

Ferd

Guys can be in UPT, and gone, in about a week. There's no option of just paying more money, either you learn on their timeline, that has a couple of minor ways to get additional help, or you'rer gone.

Guys would go into the 'pass or be gone' flight '89' flight) with somewhere between 0-4 hrs of sleep. They knew EVERYTHING depended upon their performance that day. Hard to sleep with that pressure.

Watching them step to the jet was sometimes like a death march, no one knew if they'd be back. Often times they'd didn't.

Shoot, guys would barely sleep before checkrides sometimes. Failing one was also stepping on the treadmill that could wash you out of UPT in a matter of days.

Haha! This thread is making my week.