Go Get WHAT?

One of the rights of passage in any military organization is to mess with the new people and send them on a fools errand.  People can be very creative when they send the “unknowing” new guy on expeditions to find phantom items.  I’m sure the other branches of the service have their stories as well.  I’ll share some of the ones I have pulled, or that I have seen done.

He Really Did Fall For It!

One that I really didn’t expect to work was when we sent the new guy for a specific “part” for an aircraft.  Now this was back in the early 80’s, but even then sex education was a thing so when he was sent to the supply people to get a 3 foot fallopian tube, I thought he wouldn’t fall for the obvious…but he did!  This was back before women served on ships so it was rather fun to see him searching high and low for this part.  It’s really hilarious when the guys who get these requests don’t even bat an eyelash at the request and tell him that he has to fill out a requisition first, and it has to come from Maintenance Control.  It can literally last for hours until someone lets the poor soul in on it.

Relative Bearing Grease?

One of my favorites was when we were working on a bird in the hangar bay on the USS Forrestal, and I had a new guy with me.  On the S-3 Viking, there is an internal equipment bay that houses a large number of electronic boxes.  These boxes are held down by special fasteners and one of them was giving me some trouble when trying to unfasten it.  I had a new guy with me so I told him we needed some “relative bearing” grease to get it unstuck.  Long after I completed the job I was doing he finally came back after someone gave him a bottle of white out with the words “relative bearing grease” written on it.

Prop Wash…

One of the most common items that guys on the ship were sent for was a bucket of “prop wash”.  If you actually try to get prop wash in a bucket, most likely the bucket, and possibly you, will end up over the side of the ship in the water.  Jet blast and prop wash go hand in hand and to be avoided on the flight deck.  These searches can go one for a while especially when squadron after squadron swear that they just ran out and to “try the next squadron” to see if they have some.

Not So Fast Chief…

Every now and then the new guys would extract their revenge for being sent on these silly fools missions.  I did not personally see this but heard about this one:  The new guy was sent to get 50 feet of “chow” line.  About 20 minutes later he came back and said, “OK Chief, I got your chow line.  Now what?”  The Chief looked outside the hatch and there were 30 or so sailors lined up outside.  Score one for the new guy.