Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Pilots....Call signs?

Just watched Top Gun with the kids.....If it's been asked before forgive me, but to the armed forces pilots here (Jorge,etc.) what was your call sign and how did you get it?

Just watched a clip on the tube about pilots call signs and how they got them (Nasa channel or Smithsonian, can't recall).

Anyway, a pilot was starting to taxi a B1-B Lancer and had a small problem and throttled back down. Unknown to him a ground crew member mistook his intentions and circled on foot behind the aircraft.
The pilot quickly resolved the issue and powered back up, and the powerful thrust from the engines sent the man tumbling down the runway for about 100 yards, tearing up his duty attire and received a good case of road rash, but was not seriously injured.

He was called "Trasher" by everyone after that, and the handle stuck.

That was not an Air Force practice when I was in. In Vietnam, we each had an assigned call sign, but it was unit based. At my first assignment, we all had the call sign Tonto, and I was Tonto 04. At Ban Me Thuot, I was Mike 58. The unit commander always had 01, the ops officer was 02, and so forth. But there were no "cutesy" nicknames. In Training Command, your call sign changed with every flight.

That may have changed, because I now see pilots with nicknames on their flight suit name patches.

Pretty much how Rocky described it back in the day. I do recall that a few wise crackers got creative now and then. Call sign for one of my units was Killer Spade+whatever number you were assigned. Then this black guy showed up and..........he said he didn't need a number. So he was just "Killer Spade".

FWIW, the Vietnamese held the spade graphic and an evil bad luck symbol.

Call signs have been a part of Naval Aviation since WWII (actually since radios were installed on airplanes). It was a great way to "clear six" in combat if there was a bandit on your ass (or a SAMs eventually). Call sings were (are) assigned using a variety of methods, if your last name is "Rowe" for example, odds are your call sign is going to be "Skid" (or if word gets out from the laundry your skivvies had a few "bacon strip" stains on it.). Last name Little? callsign "chicken", etc.

The other method as it was alluded to was for something you did (usually stupid). We had a guy whilst doing preflight on a jet's tail on a carrier, leaned over way too much, lost his balance and went over the side. Callsign "Splash". Lastly, if you had a particularly hideous physical characteristic, that could be used as well.

Hey, speaking of grotesque physical characteristics, that gives me an idea! Let's have a callsign contest for this guy (after all he's god's gift to military aviation):



I'll offer up a free box of ammo to the winner (determined by me of course)...

Shîtbird is my entry.

Don't know who he is, but he's got a resemblance to Buford T...

Draw in a pencil thin mustache, maybe....

Keep em' coming, lads bullets are on me.

Porky or hog as in boss hog, is my entry

Either “Tigger” or “Baloo”, I can’t decide.

Update, here are the prizes offered:
1. 308 150gr Winchester Power Points, Federal Hi-Shoks or Norma Whitetail
2 270 WCF, 130 Winchester Power Points or Remington Core Lockts
3. #006 Springfield: 180 Winchester Power Points

Choose one!

I suppose Burnsie would be too obvious.

kwg

Flameout.

My entry "Giggles"

Fuel truck delivery boy "DOFUS"...

Though it's uncommon for an AF pilot we had a pilot appropriately nicknamed CRASH.
From the story I was told and he never denied it, he was flying a pilot pro, crash and dash. It was supposed to be the last approach, full stop at the end. Crash was having a rough day flying. Seconds before decision height someone said over the intercom "cheer up, this is our last approach". Crash, in the right seat thought he heard "gear up" instinctively reached for the landing gear handle and retracted the gear. Pilot pushed the throttes up to the firewall, forced the nose up but the boom scraped the runway surface. A couple of seconds later they would have trashed my airplane... 🤬

Would this "Crash" bear the surname "Davis," by any chance??

No. Smitter...

Not a military pilot, but my brother was, his call sign was Fats (our last name Alberts)

There was a Cuban in one of his squadrons his was Bobaloo.

Call sign.....Lizzo

Call sign .......Too for