Aaron's "Soft Winging"

We're going to play a little catch up, so be on the lookout for more posts. March was a month of celebrations. I want to start out and share a very fun event, which was Aaron's soft winging. A few weeks back Aaron started a post about this milestone, but he never finished it. Here is what Aaron wrote after he landed his final flight in flight school:
"Thursday, March 8th at 2:24 CST Megan and I got the chance to celebrate a huge stepping stone in our lives and our career.  After a long and hard series of training schools, I finally got my wings today!  We couldn't have asked for better weather.  It was sunny, clear, and about 76 degrees when I landed.  Just to recap for everyone, we got into Pensacola late in the evening on Saturday, July 3rd, 2010.  Shortly thereafter I was enrolled in IFS (Initial Flight Screening) then API (Aviation Preflight Indoctrination) followed by Primary, Intermediate, then Advanced Flight School.  All in all it took 1 year, 7 months, and 26 days from start to finish.  Was it worth it?  You bet!  Now we're off to NAS Whidbey Island, where I get to start training in the E/A-18G for the next year or so prior to shipping out with a fleet squadron.  We're going to miss Pensacola, but we're glad to be done with training and moving on to a new adventure with the Navy!"

The "soft winging" happens after a student's final flight. Friends and fellow squadron members gather together to congratulate them after landing. The final flight is done in a section of three planes, sometimes four. Before landing the planes fly over the flightline and perform a maneuver called "the break". (Planes are flying together in a form/line, think of Blue Angels.) At the center of the field they separate and prepare for landing. After landing and taxiing back to the hangar the finishing students shed their flight gear and line up in front of the crowd, where their instructors "soft wing" them. The instructor ceremoniously rips off their old name tag and replaces it with a new name tag that has the official NFO wings above their names. The official winging (with a metal pin and dress uniforms) happens at a ceremony held at the end of the month.

 Removing the old patch.

The new patch with wings!



After they are soft winged, the celebration continues as a bucket of ice water is dumped onto the students. Following this a bottle of champagne, (they used Welch's Sparkling Cider for Aaron), is sprayed on the student. This is a time filled with excitment and pride of achievement. We are so glad to have made it through flight school, and are excited to move back to Washington!

If you look, one of the Blue Angels is in the picture. 

There are not very many times when I am allowed to visit Aaron at his "office." It was a treat to be there on the flightline and so close to the different aircraft.