Scanning the 301^st Air Force Reserves Fighter Squadron

Fort Worth Naval Air Station Texas (11/26/2001)

The 301^st flies F-16s from Fort Worth Naval Air Station. Often you can hear some exciting training with the help of a good antenna. I use a Radio Shack discone. They often depart Fort Worth NAS about 20:00 and head southwest to the Brownwood Military Operations Area (MOA). Their call sign for the group is "Spad". You'll hear the leader of a group of planes identify as Spad 31, 41, 51, etc. Military aircraft are equipped with a VHF and a UHF radio that usually have 20 preset or "Push" buttons for quickly tuning frequently used frequencies. Here's what I know about the F-16s presets and other frequencies they use. Several of the frequencies were contributed by Brian, thanks. "?" means it's an educated guess, "??" is less certain.

Training seems to include dog fighting and targeting with the help of AWACS and aerial refueling sometimes. I've heard AWACS use the call sign "Magic" and "Chalice", and tankers use "Turbo". Different groups of F-16s play the bad guys as "Migs". Magic will give targeting information ("picture") to the leader Spad #1. Note, military radio is similar to amateur radio and opposite of common local public safety radio, in that transmissions start with the receiver's unit, then the sender's unit, then the message. For example, "Spad 51 - Magic, picture 2 group..." Magic is calling Spad 51 and the message follows. If you are use to police and fire radio, you might expect to hear Magic to Spad 51 and then the message. It's seems trivial, but it can make a difference when you're trying to figure things out. See also Fort Worth ARTCC

A Scanning the Dallas/Fort Worth Area visitor contributed the following…

- static mission crew callsigns for AWACS:

963 Airborne Air Control Sq, Tinker AFB: Chalice

964 AACS, Tinker AFB: Bandsaw

965 AACS, Tinker AFB: Darkstar

966 AACS, Tinker AFB: Dragnet (This is the training squadron)

961 AACS, Kadena AB Okinawa: Brigham

962 AACS, Elmendorf AFB, AK: Focus

NATO AWACS, Geilenkirchen Germany: Magic

Note: The Tinker based aircraft flight deck call sign is "Sentry XX." They talk to ATC on VHF as to free up another UHF for the mission crew to use. The flight deck for the 962nd is "Yukla XX" Nato uses "NATO XX".

- other stuff:

E-8 JSTARS mission crew: "Jackknife"

RC-135 RIVET JOINT mission crew: "vacuum"

EC-130 ABCCC mission crew: "Alleycat, Bookshelf"

Thanks for the information!

Air Combat Training - WAV file on 317.7 - Brownwood MOA 54K "Hot/Cold"

Air Combat Training - WAV file on 317.7 - Brownwood MOA 76K "Knock it off"

Air Combat Training - WAV file on 317.7 - Brownwood MOA 114K AWACS

Air Combat Training Glossary

UHF Radio (All AM)

Other frequencies heard (AM Unless stated otherwise)

VHF Radio (All AM)

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