The two officers pleaded guilty during a summary hearing held in front of 50 Air Force members at 4 Wing Cold Lake on Monday. However, he said both have accepted responsibility and worked to understand the harm that was caused by their failure to act. Corey Mask, who were the senior officers in the room, didn't intervene. This is not something that I'm familiar with even in my 33-year career." "Someone has to be there to be able to say: 'Hey, this is stupid, knock it off,"' he said.Īsked how a roomful of fighter pilots would assign such a name at a time when military members are supposed to have been warned about inappropriate sexual behaviour, Huddleston said he was at a loss. ΓǪ And I feel that it is still a tradition that we want to support, but with structure."Įxactly what form that structure will take remains uncertain, but Huddleston said one idea is to have a senior member in the room who will not drink and whose job is to control the group. Yet he also said that he does not want to change the basic structure of such review boards, adding: "They're still going to be social events, because it is about esprit de corps. The call sign, which was homophobic and targeted a female pilot, was assigned during what is known as a "call sign review board" on June 22 at one of Canada's two fighter-jet bases, 4 Wing Cold Lake, Alta.ĭespite their official-sounding name, such boards are social events where pilots tell funny or embarrassing stories about each other over drinks before deciding on an appropriate nickname for new aviators.ĭescribing the call sign assigned on June 22 as "egregious," Huddleston said the nickname and review board clearly crossed the line and "had nothing to do with esprit de corps, it had nothing to do with teamwork."
Huddleston's comments follow a disciplinary hearing last week in which two senior officers under Huddleston's command were reprimanded and fined for not intervening after a sexually inappropriate call sign was assigned to a junior fighter pilot. "So, I think it's important to have that team spirit, that esprit de corps, that camaraderie." "They're a tool that's been used for many years to bring those teams that are focused on fighter operations together," Huddleston said. Yet he also defended such nicknames as important for morale and esprit de corps. Iain Huddleston said he is aiming to have a formalized process for assigning call signs in place by the end of January. In an interview with The Canadian Press, Maj.-Gen. While the Royal Canadian Air Force plans to add more control over how fighter pilots get their call signs, a senior officer says there are no plans to abolish the nicknames - or the social gatherings where they are handed out.
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