I'd add that the nature of the flying, and the length of the missions,
depends in part on the size of your state and the type of terrain. Out of
Redding you may fly grid patterns over the valley, or contour searches in
some pretty wild mountainous terrain. The other SAREX mission profiles are
route search and, on a search with widely scattered grids, high
communications relay, which means flying a holding pattern way up there and
working the radios accurately, and continually, for three or four hours.

Grid pattern flying, ironically, can be the most fatiguing of all because in
the summer it's monotonous and precise flying in bouncy thermals. Scanners
often get airsick. Be prepared. When it's really rough, a two-pilot crew
can trade off time at the controls so as to settle the stomach. The
backseater is SOL.


"Kevin Dunlevy" wrote in message
...
I often see SAREXes begin on Friday evening, go all day Saturday and most
of
the day on Sunday. The staff members generally stay for the whole SAREX,
but not all mission crews do. Between work, wife and weather, I have not
been to many SAREXes this summer. I hope to go to one next weekend, but
one
of the Ws will probably limit my participation to one day. Turnout is
typically higher on Saturdays than Sundays, and Sunday SAREXes are likely
to
start later and end earlier than Saturday SAREXes. You are less likely to
have down time waiting for sorties on Sunday, because the staff is fully
up
to speed by then and with fewer aircraft and aircrews, dispatching moves
more quickly.

I've mostly flown sorties as Mission Pilot, at first for my own training,
but now often to train Mission Pilots, Observers and Scanners. I've also
worked staff positions for Air Operations and Planning. In Air Ops I
briefed, dispatched and debriefed aircrews. In Planning, I took clues,
used
resources like aviation charts, airport directories, and the internet to
try
figure out where the missing aircraft might be and plan sorties. Then I
worked with Air Ops to dispatch sorties to look at the suspected areas.
Eventually, I intend to work up to Incident Commander, but I want to get
more experience before doing that. At this stage of my life, I'd rather
fly
than work staff positions, but I understand that I should do what is
needed
rather than what I want to make the system work better.

You will need to take a Form 91 checkride to become a Mission Pilot. The
Form 5 is like a PTS for a private pilot. The Form 91 is more mission
specific to CAP and includes more low level flying, use of the SAR GPS,
DFing, flying search patterns, and ground reference manouvers.

The tone of a SAREX is very different from an actual SAR. Things are much
more easy going at a SAREX than when you are actually looking for a
missing
aircraft. Kevin Dunlevy


"Robert M. Gary" wrote in message
oups.com...
Thanks! I noticed that the one in Redding next weekend is two days. Is
that common. I'm not sure I can give up both weekend days. Can you just
go for one day?

-Robert