Hi all,
Im going to RIAT this year and part of the SWAT team.
Does anyone know what duties and the difference of the SWAT team to the RIAT team?
I heard its more relaxed in the evenings and treated more like adults because everyone is over 16 and more senior, is this true?
I also heard that it is much more hard work being in the SWAT team.
Thanks
Woody
From what I saw in the years I was there helping, they are first out in the morning, last in at night. So yes lots of hard work and I doubt you’ll get as much free time as a non SWAT cadet. Although I’m sure they have perks and get freebies etc, I just wouldn’t know what!
as an ex SWAT cadet and now general RIAT Staff i can offer my view
duties will include suppot “Site Services” these are the Rangers who build the airshow from airfield, every thing but grandstand and hospitality chalets come under Site’s responsibity, it sounds like a lot but the majority will be coning areas (green cone road, around aircraft etc), fencing, keeping people in/out of areas and stake and roping - a tiring task hammering in the stakes into the ground for the 3mile crowdline!
there will also be similar tasks in the car parks and plenty of triple R (“portable” road sectino which “clip” together over grass serface) and other such “dogs body” style tasking.
hard work is subjective, but i can confirm it is more physical (lots of humping and dumping of kit/gear etc) and so requires the physical ability of older (larger?) Cadets as such it is exhausting which makes it hard.
as mentioned you’ll often be first out and last in, particularly the closer you get to show days (i recall returning at 2300 on the Friday night on one of my SWAT years!) to ensure all tasks are completed on time.
you may be treated like adults, but a change in culture has occured (rightly so) over the past 3 or so years to remind SWAT they are still cadets. before first name terms were the norm, and an evening into Fairford was almost guaranteed.
however too many issues happened, and with a change of SWAT staff and change in culture those days have gone.
as such, you’ll be using ranks and surnames, leadership is much more relevant (most SWAT are SNCOs) and once back on camp are expected to act like the Cadets you are, which may be different to your working attitude - certainly dont try to pull rank because your SWAT and thus have a “higher” priority, everyone’s role is equally important and SNCOs/SWAT should have the maturity to realize this.
if you do this, you’ll keep the camp staff happy and thus management team happy
What does SWAT stand for in this context?
officially - Special Work And Tasking
[history]
and was orginially set up as Site Services were short staffed and the CWOs on camp were all setup to help, it then grew into 18+ with four wagons - two minibuses, and two flat beds, typically working in two teams with the bed moving the kit to location, and bodies in the minibus helping to unload and set up what ever the cargo (cones, fencing etc) was.
with the reduced number of 18+ Cadets in the Corps age limit has reduced to 16 to maintain the numbers. [/history]
although various permitations originate around
Silly Willies And Tits - open your mind where these may go (i have chosen to avoid foul/offensive text but i am sure you can work it out)
Pity they couldn’t find a name that didn’t sound so pretentious 
[quote=“wdimagineer2b” post=6963]Pity they couldn’t find a name that didn’t sound so pretentious :P[/quote]It is clearly a backronym!
Without question.
Will Samuel L Jackson be there?
Sounds like third world slave labour to me.
Gotta admit, I thought I was the only one thinking this.
Gotta admit, I thought I was the only one thinking this.[/quote]
Some people seem to think thats what cadets are for…
Gotta admit, I thought I was the only one thinking this.[/quote]
Some people seem to think thats what cadets are for…[/quote]
like all of the above
Gotta admit, I thought I was the only one thinking this.[/quote]
Op Nimrod, you’re far from the only one thinking this
you may acuse me of being bias, and i can understand why but bare with me.
the only people who have the view of “slave labour” are those staff who have not attended and seen it for themselves.
there is a big split in our Wing of those who have gone/are regualrly involved and those who arent and make it known their opinion on the “slave labour” i guess in a hope to put people off.
except in the last 4 years there has been nealry 2 applications for every place, at least 1200 bids for only 750 places.
these bids coming nationally as far a field as NI Wing and Jersey.
so it can’t be all that bad if it is that popular.
in a bid to counter these comments and to fall inline with other policy all Flight staff have a working time matrix for thier cadets, which is filled in showing when the cadets are on task, on stand by and when they are stood down in an attempt to ensure working hours/rest time is in the correct ratio.
in terms of SWAT, although often “out” (of camp) for 12 hours or more the actual working time is not much more than half of this. a fair proportion of the time is spent standing by waiting for a task to finish or delivery of gear to arrive. each task has its own sequence and is done so to ensure access to the airfield is open or closed during the correct times during the build up to the show, as such some tasks cannot start until others are done which creates plenty of hours waiting around for completion of tasks.
When I did SWAT back in the day(twice), we referred to ourselves as Stupid W****** And Tarts which was far more accurate 
SWAT was very very hard work when I did it. Very little sleep, massively long days and a good old knees up in Fairford town nightly. However, that was over a decade ago now and the world has changed. Plus, as others have mentioned, there were some pretty serious issues that resulted in a change of culture.
I attended RIAT for the first time as a member of staff a couple of years ago and I was really suprised how much things have changed. I don’t think it is accurate to say ‘slave labour’ (I do think it used to be like this - certainly was when I did it) any more - things seemed to be a lot more controlled, calm and the SWAT lot were getting decent kip and were not allowed off camp to the pub. Quite right to.
They do still do a great deal of physical work, but things are not as they once were. Which is a good thing.
I would say having helped as staff there for half a dozen years, that the work times are much more tightly controlled than they were when I first started. Also some of the ridiculous tasking has been removed as far as I could tell.
Still sounds like the ATC is regarded as an unlimited source of free labour. What exactly do the cadets and\or ATC get out of volunteering a large number of young people to carry out basic navvying?
I’m sure that somewhere it stated the RAFCT had now donated £1m to ATC units?
and as identified over £1m donated over the years.
in addition to the financial benefits this is a great chance to raise the profile of the ATC/ACO, a national effort of the Organisation working together, is for some Cadets the only chance they get to see military aircraft up close that are not Tutors, Vigilants or Vikings and to speak to the ground crew, is a thoroughly enjoyable and rewarding camp as shown by the massive number of bids verses available allocations and beds!
Sounds like a good old fashioned SWO’s working party in the days before Healtha and safety in other words as quoted above slave labour.