Wing Training Day is one of the most important dates in the cadet calendar! It is an annual competition, which for our wing, is held at Kirkham Grammar School, and hosts a plethora of events, including first aid, drill, shooting and a flight simulator competition! It is also a great day for cadets to meet up with friends from other squadrons from various camps!
The first event of the day was drill – and considering 27 cadets from 471 turned up, choosing the drill team was very hard! Warrant Officer Ashcroft finally whittled it down to the 13 (12 in the squad, and one I/C (calling out commands), which this year was Cadet Corporal Sherrington) required to take part in the drill competition! The inspection came before the sequence, and with the 13 well turned-out cadets being inspected and receiving high marks from the judges, which was a great chance for Civilian Instructor (CI) Cornwell to get some shots for the video of the day. The drill sequence went really well, with few mistakes throughout the sequence!
After drill, Cadet Corporals Greenwood & Clifton and Cadet Savage headed over to the aircraft recognition competition with their amazing instructor: CI Clark! The trio did remarkable – knowing 25 out of 30 aircraft shown to them! Around this time, Cadets Tabarn and Williams competed in the BMFA Dart competition, located in Kirkham Grammar’s sports hall, which was also the location of the wing volleyball trials! More on that later.
After lunch, Cadet Sergeant Ball led his banner drill team, consisting of Corporals Greenwood, Sherrington, Pym & Clifton, too the banner drill competition. The five did a great job, considering it was their first time completing the sequence with added distractions! There were several mistakes, but none too big for Sergeant Ball to handle! Following this, the first aid team, led by Corporal Markey, including Corporals Cookson, Pym & Sherrington, completed their individual and team scenarios, which they were pleased about but still have their faults!
Corporal Sherrington & Cadet Lloyd then competed in the flight simulator competition, which they ran out of time on during their descent, and consequently weren’t allowed to land. Also on the day were displays of diorama, modelling and media comms (photography) entries – including 471’s!