What inspired you to join the Royal Air Force?

[Talk Wrench]

What inspired you to join the Royal Air Force?

I remember looking up into the sky as a kid and seeing aeroplanes, wondering what they were made of and how they got there. They fascinated me yet everyone spoke about pilots, but I wanted to know how the aircraft worked

The RAF seemed like a good choice and the decision to join, based on my wonderment of aircraft, was the best I ever made!

So what inspired you to join?

 

[GOV1]

Inspired no.

I knew of St Athan and watched "Get some in"

My decision to join the RAF was at the careers office, as I walked in I saw the Navy bloke and thought "I was sea sick crossing the Channel" and then glanced at the Army bloke and thought "**** that" after the Falklands conflict and then smiled at the RAF lad drinking tea and smoking.

Personally it was the Mid 80's and Maggie Thatch shut everything where I lived and it was purely a way out of being on the dole

I must admit after a few years of lashing it up and enjoying life it turned into career.

Main reason for joining was a long term safe job.

 

[Kryten]

For me it was a number of things - both my grandfathers served in the war; one was a wireless operator on Lancasters in Bomber Command, the other was in the Navy and served on board HMS Victorious, so there was always a standing joke that as a compromise I would join the Fleet Air Arm.

But what clinched it for me was going to an air show in the late 80s and seeing a Harrier do its display - as a a kid in his mid teens I remember thinking that any place where you can work with aircraft that can simply stop in mid air has to be pretty cool. Personal events then overtook me and it made joining up more of a life choice than a career choice - and I'll be honest; not a day goes by where I don't miss some aspect of Service life - granted, there was a lot of crap, but the benefits of being in the RAF in my view outweighed any negatives.

 

[Billy Whizz]

16 years living on RAF camps.........

 

[Oldstacker]

For me it was a combination of things

A school trip to the Biggin Hill Airshow in the early 70's
A failure to gain sufficient good 'O' Levels to go into the 6th form
Knowing I was going to have to find a career with minimal qualifications
Seeing the recruiting advert in the newspaper offering both a career and the opportunity for training and qualifications in a high tech environment

Never regretted joining, and the camaraderie, experiences and development that I had for 23 years was, I think, better than any mediocre 'A' Levels I might have got had I stayed at school would have given me.

 

[FOMz]

I needed a haircut and wanted some free socks...

 

[MontyPlumbs]

Wanted to get into Engineering and (at the time) was too old for a normal apprenticeship. The majority of my family have been in the RAF/Army so looking back it was kind of inevitable at some point...

 

[busby1971]

Bored and nothing else available in the local area due to young Miss Thatcher getting rid of all the jobs in South Yorks.

Would do it again in a heart beat.

Sent from my SM-T715 using Tapatalk

 

[ninjarabbi]

I actually went to join the marines but their CIO was shut, the RAF's was open and it was raining. That was 33 years ago.............where does the time go to?

 

[penfold93]

Dead end jobs no interest in the pottery industry, just went into the CIO on a whim went to the Army desk and they offered me CMT not really my cup of tea so popped over to the RAF desk who offered me Medic but added there are other medical trades and the rest is history. Nearly 27 yrs later and I'm still here.

 

[Tedlooney]

I was training to be a radio zob in the merchant navy but found riding my motorbike and going out with girls more interesting than studying so failed the first year miserably. The only thing I could think of to save face was to become a pongo. Fortunately on the way into the CIO I was intercepted by the RAF recruiter who convinced me that the RAF was a better option.

 

[THE_GREAT_BIG_JOKE_TG4]

didn't really have much choice, if i'd stayed where I was I would have either ended up at HMP or worse, didn't fancy the army or navy so it only left the RAF. And nearly 15 Years later i'm still here. Theres been good times and bad times, but the good times have def outwieghted the bad. And if i hadn't joined up I wouldn't have found the best thing to happen to me AKA Zero Alpha.

 

[dessp2]

Sat in a painfully boring French lesson at School. A new lad sat next to me and started telling me about the Air Cadets (Never heard of it before). Went along one night and that was it, loved it. Three years later joined the RAF, best thing I have ever done and would do it again without question. Often think what would I have done had I not joined up as North Manchester didn't have much to offer.

The RAF in my opinion pulled me out of poverty, I won't go into exactly how bad it was but it wasn't good (although we have a great Mum and Dad and me and my brothers had nothing, but we were very happy).

I now have a SNCOs pension rolling in every month, my wife and Kids live in our four bed detached in a very desirable area, and I work in the Middle East on a very good tax free salary, all thanks to joining the RAF.

 

[vim_fuego]

You went one of four ways in the town I grew up in mainly...

1. Left school at 16 and worked in K Shoes factory with most of the rest of the towns population.

2. Left school at 16 and went into an apprenticeship in one of the construction trades

3. Stayed on at school and left at 18...went to Uni if your parents had the means

4. Left school at 16...got the train to Carlisle and went to the AFCO.

I looked at option 1 and that just scared the shizzle out of me...you went into the factory at 16 and did the same thing, perhaps on a machine, until 65.

Option 3 wasn't an option...my older brother had done it, eaten up my parents meagre funds and used his degree to sell cattle feed...nice.

I tried option 2 for a year...as a plasterer...the definition of an apprenticeship in that part of the North was slave labour whilst being habitually bullied...in fact getting paid on time was optional...split fingers from the lime, back already getting fecked due to the then hundred weights bags of plaster needing lugging up flights of stairs...it was ****e although the ability to skim a wall or ceiling to this day has stood me in good stead.

So option 4 was tried...did 25 years and what I did over that period is now earning me some serious coin on the outside as a Consultant.

 

[Past Engineering]

As a service child I grew up with the RAF and had moved around the country and world quite a few times. My dad decided I needed to get a better education, so sent me to the service boarding school (Crown Woods, Eltham SE London), where I had a cracking time on the whole but did not really like the education bit much. Joined the Air Cadets, but it was all classroom stuff and marching, so joined the Army cadets, much more fun with weekend night exercise running around firing blanks and parachute training etc.

On coming up to leaving, my choices were trying an apprenticeship in engineering but these were 5 odd years long and apparently not well paid until qualified and experienced (surveyors etc), trying to get a job wherever my parents were, used to work for a greengrocers in High Wycombe area for a while, saw the RAF recruiting office, popped in for a word and joined up eventually as a rigger, went in at 15 1/2 as my education needed a bit of a boost apparently, spent two years at her majesties finest (Halton), passed out and on £40.00 pound a week, which was far more than my friends from school.

Joining was against my fathers wish for some reason, but stayed until age 47, left as a Chiefy and gained a good position within BAES and am now comfortably retired at 64, which is 4 years later than my original plan, but still works for me.

 

[foxOneFive]

The bloke with the daglo table tennis bats, marshalling a desert cam herc in Cyprus I believe? Can't find said pic anywhere. But ten years later I was that man only a lot cooler without the bats!
Just remember that fan in middle of room and some arse chucking a towel into it "me sometimes"

 

[gray]

Watched the Shackleton's flying around as a boy. Always wanted to join for some reason. Passed all the tests at Biggin Hill, failed on my accent.
****ed off, but retried when I was older ( and theoretically) wiser. 26+ years later and not regretted any if it... But should have joined up earlier...

 

[tornadofairy]

Arrived back in the UK after doing the overland bit to India and Nepal back in the 70's. Met my future wife and realised there was no prospects for a cartographic draughtsman where I lived. My prospective father-in-law was a 23 year ex-Navy man, my Dad had been in the Army, so I figured the military might be a good way of getting some more qualifications and a decent wage. So having been a plane spotter (I got better...lol), the RAF was the only way to go...
Went to the CIO without any real idea of what I wanted to do and was skillfully manoeuvred into being a techie. Not regretted it as it led to a nice little earner in Saudi afterwards and then onto university. There were days while I was in when I loathed it, but then any job has those days I'm sure.

 

[fourteen2two]

Ex scaley brat (dad was RM), so travelled a bit. I didn't fancy being a boot neck and had been in RAF cadets at school and enjoyed it.
Should have done better at school,hindsight being wonderful! So had a couple of dead end jobs.
Went to talk to RAF careers and joined in 71. Some not so good times but no regrets. Met wife on fitters course ( she was PMRAFNS).
Got more civvy qualifications in the RAF then got a good job afterwards, leading to early retirement at 63. No kids or mortgage so enjoying retirement and plenty of travel, but not much this year!

 

[Shiny10]

Left school at 15 and wanted to go into Engineering. Went to Youth Employment Office and said that QH were looking for 'Platers' (Boilermakers). They sent me to the 'Barnsley Electro-Plating Co' where I became a Laboratory Assistant for two month's. I then went to Qualter Smiths (machine tool makers) and told them I wanted to be a Turner, they said that there were no vacancies at the moment but I could start in the Core Shop (making sand castles), they lied. Then went to the NCB and said I wanted to be a Fitter. They said that everyone did a 3 month sandwich course and would be recommended for 'day release' if they were successful. I got the 1st prize from the pit (wristwatch) and the first prize from the Technical College (book on engineering). I spent the next year with the Surveyors and when the fitters went in another direction at college I objected and was informed by the Training Officer that that I was destined for Underground Management not Engineering. I then met my mate Terry who had just spent 9 years as a A/C Lecki, he convinced me that the RAF didn't do marching but they would never let me be a Sootie like his mate Fred Pomeroy (never met the gent). Did 26 years as a sooty, including several as a VC10 GE, enjoyed the first 22 but, at last, I eventually managed to get into Engineering.