 I joined the Air Force to better myself and to get a college education out of it. My grandfather served in the Vietnam War and my dad had to went to Army basic training. He suffered an injury during that and even though he didn't complete it, my grandfather also went through war for the Army. It kind of gave me a motivation and drive to join the Air Force. I was in in my high school career and I started taught to recruit or I did Air Force JRIT so junior reserve officer training corps and I started to like the lifestyle of it. I started to like the way they carry themselves through that and I just liked the benefits that came with the military and the way people would basically transform themselves and become a better version of themselves. So I've been in the Air Force for two years and about two to three months and I'm currently in A1C and Amur 1st class. So to the Air Force I am a special missions aviator which is AFSC one alpha non X1. So I actually went into depth prior to me shipping out. I went to depth four months prior to me actually shipping out for the Air Force and I talked to my recruiter a little bit about the jobs that I wanted and what I wanted to do in the Air Force. So he sat down with me and he told me that he actually got a pre-slot for which the recruiters get and hooked me up with the special missions aviator jobs. I had gotten this job prior to going to basic training and knowing what I was going to be. This job was definitely something I wanted to do. Prior to me actually picking a job that I wanted to make in my dream sheet I actually went to airforce.com and looked at all the different aircrew jobs that the Air Force had to offer and I came across special missions aviation and I knew it was something I definitely wanted to do. I researched everything I could about the job and about other people's stories through YouTube and just googling and everything that I could. I can only find the actual airforce.com version of the job with the video on there to get the most I could out of it and it was definitely something I wanted to do off the gate. There was another two or three aircrew jobs that I wanted to do but this job to me spoke to me specifically of its mindset and its mission set. So when I was going through the process to join the Air Force there was a couple of the jobs that I wanted to do. If I had to go back and do it again I would definitely put down a loadmaster or a in-flight refueler so a boom operator for the Air Force it would be probably the two top ones I would do. If I had to put down more I would probably do something along the lines of aircrew and if I had to go down I would also do maintenance. So for me I was 17 years old at the time when I joined the Air Force and I definitely signed a four-year contract just because nobody did in my family for recent years of the time and they weren't ever in the Air Force so I only signed a four-year contract just to see how I would feel in the Air Force and if just basically testing the waters with it to see how I would like the Air Force or not but I would definitely recommend if you see a job that you like and that really speaks to you and that you think you're gonna like I would definitely sign a six-year. Me personally I would would have gone back and signed a six-year just to get more out of this job in a longer period of time. So initially tech school for my job was at Lapland Air Force Base so as soon as I graduated to basic training I went straight to tech school on Lapland Air Force Base at the 344th Trans Squadron which is basically at the corner of the base and from that it was a pipeline job so I went to multiple different bases including Fairchild Air Force Base, Curlin Air Force Base, and Herbert Field Air Force Base. Tech school for me was a long I think all in all it took me a year and nine months to finally earn earn my wings and to be able to perform my job without an instructor with me but the year and nine months also included gaps in training so when you're going through the Special Missions Aviator Pipeline they don't have a streamline to where you can basically go through the whole job course by course you're gonna have gaps in training where you're gonna have to basically stop and take a break because there's classes already ahead of you that are backed up so all in all for me it took me a year and nine months. I definitely enjoyed my tech school I came from a small town in North Carolina and it got me to go travel the world it got me to go travel across the United States and see what was out there it allowed me to meet multiple people from different countries and different states and just see their mindset and outlook on their jobs that they have especially as here there was a bunch of different aircrew jobs with us and it also just allowed me to basically better myself I was always a kid that would put stuff off but being a Special Missions Aviator going through the pipeline it definitely allowed me to push myself and to keep going harder at what I wanted to in order to become what I wanted to be. So for a Special Missions Aviator you get to pick your aircraft so like you make a dream sheet of jobs at basic training you get to make a dream sheet of the type of aircraft you want to be on for being a Special Missions Aviator which would include an AC-130J, HA-60, CV-22 or the UH-1 also known as the Huey and so for those aircraft for the AC-130J specifically what I'm on the only base you can go to right now is Herbert Field Florida because that is a newer aircraft to the Air Force they are currently working to set it up I don't know the squadron here and also going to Canon Air Force Base. So about my job through a day-to-day basis a Special Missions Aviator basically is a flight engineer a loadmaster and aerial gunner it's something that the Air Force decided to combine three jobs into one so my day-to-day basis when I go to fly we'll actually have a set down brief with the crew and decide who's going to be on either a one or five millimeter gun on the aircraft or the 30 millimeter gun on the aircraft or you'll be playing as the loadmaster flight engineer for the flight and basically whichever one you decide on you get put on that's when you uh go ahead and do that for the day so if I was a loadmaster the flight engineer of the day I would be managing fuel on the aircraft I'll be running emergency procedures if need be and if I was on the one of five or the 30 millimeter I'll be basically running that gun and operating the gun throughout the entire flight and making sure that if there's any malfunctions that happen with the gun I'll be there to fix that but when I'm not flying on non-flying days when you graduate from the pipeline training and you go to the squadron you will be able to get an extra duty so you're not sitting around all day so for me I'm a MCC so I'm a mission control center airman so basically when I'm not flying I'm sitting on a desk and I am getting aircraft status if the aircraft is parked in the right spot if it's got the fuel on it if it's got the right ammo loadout come to it and if there's anything wrong with the aircraft I'm there to inform the crew and let them know so in a work week the honestly varies for us because we are a flying squadron so sometimes in a week you could be flying three times a week and flights usually range anywhere from four to six hours so that automatically right there is 18 hours if it's six hour flights throughout the entire week but if some majority of the time you're going to have at least one flight a week but if you have one flight a week you'll be for me MCC we're working at six hour shifts so Monday so if I flew Monday then the rest of the week I'd be working six hour shifts so right around probably I would say 30-35 hour work weeks so for a special mission aviator I know for every AFSC you get a degree assigned to you from the community college of the Air Force for us we get assigned the aviation operations degree and basically that can push you towards getting a private pilot's license to allow you to go to the airlines that's currently what I'm working on but as a special mission aviator all in all you could definitely go towards a flight engineer or you can go to as a load master and in a way you can also be a mechanic you just have to work a little bit more towards that one versus going to the flight engineer load master area yeah so for special mission aviators it's definitely a high deployment job because for AC-130Js as specific we are a cast assets so we're close to air support and downrange we're always flying every single day eight hour missions just so that we know the guys on the ground are safe but for definitely for other airframes you're always going to be deploying because a special mission aviator is on an aircraft that's vital to a mission whether you're cv-22s and field x-filling guys if you're on a hh-60 doing kassavac or if you're uh ones they don't deploy overseas but they do stay home station in order to help with states out rescues over in the mountains or anything like that but most definitely you're going to be deploying a lot with the special mission aviator career field yeah so definitely i'm trying to make the air force a 20 year career it might not be as a special mission aviator i definitely want to end up commissioning one day and become the pilot for the air force but if that does not work out the way it's planned i will definitely make a special mission aviator 20 career just because the lifestyle and the people in the job make it so much more fun and uh so many more adventures to have in this job so i would definitely make this a 20 year career of no doubt about it so for me being a special mission aviator right now my top job since i'm still enlisted my top job would probably go next to a load master but a special mission aviator definitely still outranks that to me in my eyes because of learning all the things that we get to do to help support the mission i would definitely stay with this job but like i said once i commission if i do get the commission i would definitely go to be a pilot for su-17s because that is the best platform yeah so brand new air force airman becoming a special mission aviator you definitely want to stay in the books you definitely don't want to you can do other things in the outside life but you don't want to have when it comes to study time make sure you don't have any outside distractions i know when i went to lagland for the very first time going to my job training i definitely had a couple of airmen on my haul that were special mission aviator candidates if you will and i asked him like hey how was that job how was this how was that and they would kind of put you down about it there's gonna be a lot of people that's going to try to beat you down about this job because it is a definitely a hard job to learn but stay in the books and trust yourself you're definitely going to be able to pass this job with flying colors and as air force wide goes i would definitely don't be afraid to ask questions you're going to have a supervisor don't be afraid to go over to them and ask them i personally was scared to ask sometimes just because i didn't want to get made fun of or ask some stupid questions but definitely ask for help when needed and definitely stay in the books and try to understand the best as possible you can when learning this job yeah so if you want to find me to have any further questions with me or just see how my day-to-day lifestyle is i definitely post a lot of it on instagram and you can find me on there at adam underscore honey cut that's adam underscore h u n e y c u t t and also you can uh add me on snapchat adam h three