Naval Communicator Military Occupation Code 262. I was going to learn a for real trade in the Canadian Navy. My very first trade course, and no, I have no idea why the first course was labeled as QL3 – military logic at its finest.
Bunting Tosser comes from long ago when there wasn’t any such thing as radios, cell phones or gasp, even the internet. Back then, when you wanted to talk to another ship, your friendly bunting tossers would hoist flags to get the message across – I suspect that the ever famous GGF hadn’t been invented yet.
When I was introduced to to this trade, the Naval Signalman was responsible for
- flag signals
- flashing light morse code signals
- semaphore – short distance arm signals
- ship to ship tactical radio signals
- fleet maneuvering
- ship ceremonial
- ship to ship/shore messages
I am sure I have left out a few things. Needless to say, it was a lot. On the start date of the course we were all huddled together in our little home room and were welcomed to Communications School. We were in the basement of the building, the upper deck was home to the Radiomen. All they had to do was make sure the ship could talk to the shore, admittedly an important task but let us be real for a moment – Signalmen were by far the more important people.
And thus we started.
First lesson, what was morse code? Many of you will have seen/heard it in movies – a long series of dots and dashes when done by light or series of di dah sounds when done by radio. For the record, any time you see or hear it in the movies, the only thing that is accurate about it is the blinking light.
QL3 standard was reading 8 words per minute. At the beginning of everyday we would go outside, rain, shine, hurricane or whatever mother nature had to throw at us, and read a biffer. Each corner of Comm School had a blinking light set to 4, 6, 8 or 10 wpm and you went out and read it.
It took me about 3 weeks to finally get to the point I could read 4wpm, once you get the hang of the pulsing light, it gets to be relatively easy. At week 4 we had to start sending morse code by light and we all discovered that reading a human sender is much easier than reading a machine. It was also very clear to see who had been drinking the night before. One Monday morning I looked at that stupid light and just couldn’t focus long enough to read anything other that the SFX (Signal Flashing Exercise that started each biffer) before my breakfast decided to reappear – not my best moment but I digress. At the end of the course I hit 10wpm and was happy.
Next up, Flag Signals
John Looks Out On Life 