News May / June 2007

May / June 2007

1001 Garelochhead

By Cdt Stephen Kelly

On the 18^th of May at 1820hrs, myself and Cadets Hastie, Kayani A, Kayani QA, Fleming, Flight Sergeant Kayani along with Flying Officer Callan and Pilot Officer Kayani left from the squadron for Garelochead , stopping along the way to pick up Greenock cadets. We arrived at about 2015hrs. We were then briefed on what activities we would be doing at the weekend. After the briefing we were put into flights, I was in flight B with Flight Sergeant Kayani and Cadet Fleming and cadets from other squadrons. We then got our bags and headed up to our billets.

On Saturday morning I woke up at exactly 0700hrs and got into my greens, after we all had breakfast it was drill practice and we spent half an hour going through what we needed to do for the drill competition. The rain came on heavily and the cadets were allowed to use the N.A.A.F.I for shelter. While we were in there we played games like wink wink murder and various leadership exercises. The staff then put us into flights and did an exercise where we were to put a list of items in order of importance due to the circumstances, your flight was then to pick someone to stand up and read out your answers and why you would put them in that order. The next exercise was to talk about three subjects and a person from your flight would stand in the middle of the floor and give a talk on the subject they had chosen. Each flight did this until they had talked about each subject. During this exercise some flights were taken outside to do the confidence course, my flight was the last to go on it. The rain had cleared up but the grass was still wet. The confidence course is a 6ft wall, a 10ft wall, wooden beams with chicken wire on them acting as steps then you had to jump off at the top, you had to cross a log which was over ditch full of mud, and a grassy slope which ended then you had to jump off. Then you had to run up a hill where there are monkey bars, and then there is an “A” swing, after that you ran to the finish line. I thought it was going to be easy because I have done it before but this time we had to complete the course with a bucket of water and our task was do the confidence course without spilling all of the water. This was fairly easy until it came to the “A” swing where I volunteered to take the bucket over. I grabbed the rope with one hand and hooked the bucket under my other arm and I swung across and as I jumped off at the other end the bucked tip slightly and I got absolutely soaked! Our flight did this exercise in around eight minutes and our flight spilt the least water. After dinner we found out that there would be no night ex due to the poor weather, so we had a disco instead.

On Sunday the first activity was drill practice, after my flight did the drill comp we were sent to our billets to pack up and clean up. After we had cleaned up we went to the briefing room and did a quiz against other flights, once the scores were added up for the whole weekend it was announced that my flight won most of the events.

The whole weekend was really fun and I learned new things and made new friends. The only disappointment was that there was no night ex, better luck next time.

ICTC No.8

By CI Craig Gladwell

On Friday 25/05/07 I attended the eighth Civilian Instructor Course at HMS Caledonia, Rosyth. The course is intended to evaluate and prepare new adult staff for service with the ATC. I was kindly given a lift by then Pilot Officer Kayani (now Flying Officer; by the way congratulations Naveed) to the base where we were shown our quarters and given an initial brief. On Saturday morning, still recovering from socialising, we started the course proper.

The course is very intense and is run alongside the Instructor Cadet Training Course; this is one of the few courses where staff and cadets are seen as one and the same when training. We were taught about; Public Relations, Health & safety, Instructional technique, leadership, Interview techniques, Admin & regulations, Adult staff responsibilities and even drill! By the time Saturday was over we were exhausted and still had to work on a presentation task we were given as homework AND study for our exam the next day.

When Sunday morning came everyone was guzzling energy drinks to stay awake. We then gave our presentations to three wing staff officers and discussed it with them. If we weren’t awake by then we sure were after a drill practice with AWO Leonard before lunch. After lunch we had interviews with the wing commander and then sat our final exam (by the way the answers are A,B,B,A,D, only joking) and got our results: we all passed!

We formed up for our final parade (which happened to be Wing Commander Campbell’s last parade) and performed a march past after being presented with our certificates.

Overall this course has a reputation as being ‘death by PowerPoint’ and to an extent it is. However, I found the course very insightful and a great tool for what I hope will be a long career in the ATC. The staff of CITC have to be commended for the professional manner the course was put together. Now that I’ve applied for uniformed staff all I need is that illusive interview…

CLIC Sargeant

By Cdt Kayani QA

The CLIC Sergeant Tri challenge on the 12th of May was a sponsored activity event for Army, Air and Sea cadets. 3 ATC squadrons 498, 2166 and ourselves competed against 20 or so Army cadet teams from across the Glasgow and Lanarkshire battalion (The Sea Cadets didn't turn up). The events included Orienteering, Cycling and Raft Building and more than 130 Staff and cadets attended in total. It was a miserable rainy day when we met at the squadron at 9.15am . The cadets who were going were Cadet Hastie (P), Cadet Kelly (S), Cadet Kayani (A), Corporal Kayani (Z), Flight Sergeant Kayani (H), Cadet Fox (C), Flight Lieutenant David McvVean and myself.

It was taking place at Motherwell right next to Strathclyde Park. We arrived there at 9.45am which left us with 15 minutes spare time. The C.O . and the Flight Sergeant went out of the van and got our brief, five minutes later they returned to the van and gave us the brief. There were two teams, in the first team was, Corporal Kayani (Z), Cadet Kayani (A), Cadet Fox (C) and the Commanding Officer. In the second team was Flight Sergeant Kayani (H), Cadet Kelly (S), Cadet Hastie (P) and I. There were three events which took place that day and they were cycling around the lake, canoeing up to a certain point and returning to the start and the last but not least orienteering.

My team were the first one’s to go and our first event was orienteering. We had to go in two teams, in the first team was Flight Sergeant Kayani (H) and Cadet Kelly. In the second team was Cadet Hastie (P) and myself. We were being timed and we had to complete the event under forty five minutes. Cadet Hastie (P) and myself kept running looking for certain letters and numbers on a pole and which we had to write on our sheet. After when we have found all of them and marked them on our sheet we had to run back to the starting point. Flight Sergeant Kayani (H) and Cadet Kelly (S) had finished before us and were waiting for us, after a while they had realised that we were taken to long to finish the Flight Sergeant and Cadet Kelly came looking after us. Once they had found us we explained why it was taking us so long to complete it and the reason was, because someone had switched our poles around. We all began to run to make it to the finish point which was also the starting point. Once we had all made it the timer stopped and our time was forty three minutes.

The second event was cycling. There was no time limit on this event but to do well you had to get the fastest time. You had to cycle up to the bottom of the steep road and one person had to run up the road and take a picture of a certain number for proof and then cycle back to the finishing point. The whistle blew and we started to cycle, we all were in one straight line while we were cycling. Finally we reached to the point were someone had to run up the road and take a picture of the number and the person was Cadet Hastie (P). The Flight Sergeant, Cadet Kelly (S) and I were waiting at the bottom of the road for about 20 minutes, when we saw Peter run down the hill shouting “I’ve got it guys”, as soon as we heard him saw him we got on our bikes and were ready to go back. Our finishing time was forty six minutes. We went back to the van and had our lunch while the Commanding Officers team were doing canoeing.

The last but not least event was canoeing. The Flight sergeant Kayani (H), Cadet Kelly (S), Cadet Hastie (P) and I had to walk down to the starting point which was at the lake. Once we got their a man told our brief and explained all the rules to us, he also mentioned that there was no time limit in this event you just had to get the best time to win. Among ourselves we had to discuss how we are going to plan it, once we had planed it and told him that we have planned it, he then blew the whistle which meant we only had two minutes to set it up. Flight Sergeant Kayani (H) and Cadet Hastie (P) had to grab two canoes and tie them up with ropes, Cadet Kelly (S) was grabbing life jackets and helmets and I was grabbing the paddles. When we were all ready the Flight Sergeant pushed us from behind and then jumped in himself. We were pushing ourselves to the limit and for a moment I was about to fall out of the canoe and in the water luckily the Flight Sergeant grabbed me back and once we had finished our time was nine minutes and we bet the Commanding Officers team by eleven minutes. When we walked back and when we had finished all three events we got a game of football and just waited until they had counted all the marks and gave awards out.

It was finally the time when they started to give awards out but no one from our squadron got any but my team were top five in canoeing but overall the cadets and I had a great time also I would love to go again and I should recommend this to anyone.

Upcoming Activities

Llanbedr

Windermere

RAF Leeming

Mahrihanish 07

Ramstein

Rheindalen

Back to Top

Newsletter

Jan / Feb

Mar / Apr

May / June

July / Aug

Sep / Oct

Nov / Dec