![]() Navy policy states sailors who have to qualify must do so within 18 months of reporting aboard. Since 1997, the pins have been a mandatory part of Navy shipboard training. “More so than it being a mandatory requirement, I think the Navy wants to try instilling warrior ethos,” she said. Varner, as the command master chief, is responsible for making sure her sailors get qualified. ![]() “I’ve seen things I’ve never seen before because I was always down in the engine room.” Qualifying sailors have to observe or take part in special evolutions, like sea and anchor detail, flight quarters or underway replenishments. As they demonstrate knowledge, warfare-qualified sailors who are specialists in that particular area sign the books.īut getting those signatures isn’t all about enduring lectures. The standards for each pin are put into books that each candidate must take to lectures and practical demonstrations and on watch. “You actually know a little bit of all the stuff.” “All the things you need to be a well-rounded Seabee,” he said. Petty Officer 1st Class Travis Rogers, from Naval Mobile Construction Battalion THREE, deployed to Atsugi, said the personnel qualification standards for the SCW pin include basic first aid, chemical biological and radiological warfare, weapons familiarization and general military tactics. The SCW pin, with the Seabee community’s mascot, a machine-gun toting bumble bee, at its center, is least recognizable pin, but is highly sought after by sailors because of the unique difficulty attached with getting it: one has to be assigned with a Seabee battalion. It has silver wings protruding from a shield with the words “Air Warfare” emblazoned on it. The EAWS designator indicates a sailor’s expertise with particular types of aircraft and functions within a squadron. ![]() The ESWS pin, silver with crossed swords over a ship breaking the water, shows that a sailor has learned the ins and outs of a surface ship. Air warfare qualified sailors use AW, Seabees add SCW, and submariners put SS after their rank. The SW represents his surface warfare qualification. Sailors are allowed to put the designation in their rank, much like a doctor attaches “M.D.” to the end of their name.įor example, Petty Officer 2nd Class Mark Roland, one of Curtis Wilbur’s ESWS coordinators and an electronics technician, known as an “ET” in the Navy, would write his name ET2(SW) Mark Roland on Navy correspondence. Senior sailors said the programs started in the late 1970s and early 1980s to instill pride in service and help sailors stand out among their peers.Įarning a pin is a big deal, said Master Chief Petty Officer Carol Varner, command master chief of the destroyer USS Curtis Wilbur, based at Yokosuka, Japan. ![]() But the rest of the Navy - surface ships, air wings and Seabee battalions - have had their own designators for only a couple decades or less. The submarine community has had a warfare pin for almost 80 years. They are also the currency of promotion boards, whose decision as to whom makes chief petty officer could rest on whether sailors have these pins.ĭepending on sailors’ specialties, they either have to earn the Enlisted Surface Warfare Specialist pin, the Enlisted Aviation Warfare Specialist pin, the Seabee Combat Warfare pin or the submarine service insignia.
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