First time space-a, as active duty, a...

Author Message   Dakota Ray Senior Member Username: Rhammer Post Number: 469 Registered: 05-2007 Posted From: 69.62.147.217 Posted on Sunday, June 13, 2010 - 09:24 pm:    You may have a similar problem staying with your family on the way out. Obviously your wife and you are "linked" for travels. Getting 5 seats on the same flight can present a problem especially with some of the loads on C-17's and limited seats. As a Cat 3, you will be "called" much before the Cat 6's. You may not have any indication if they will make the same flight. Flying as a family unit would be great but the chances are slim in that time frame. I would make some plans to meet them over there. Good luck and Happy Trails!!!   nolan shane henson New member Username: Nolan1754 Post Number: 3 Registered: 06-2010 Posted From: 71.20.23.42 Posted on Sunday, June 13, 2010 - 08:54 pm:    thanks for your help, bill. its going to be a wild one, i would like to stay with my family to get to where we are going...but on the way back i'll have to leave them behind since i am CAT3 sand they are CAT6 also i am on more of a time constraint. thanks again   Bill Mathews Senior Member Username: Bill_mathews Post Number: 1227 Registered: 06-2003 Posted From: 173.71.47.192 Posted on Saturday, June 12, 2010 - 02:06 pm:    Your plan gets more interesting? Now three Cat 6 and 1 Cat 3 out of Travis. When do you plan to depart? As mentioned before, travel in the Summer (and especially now for Travis) can be dicey. Does your family have time demands (job, school) for their outbound leg and return? One time years ago, it took us a week to get from FT Worth to Hickam, Guam & Yokota as we spent 2 days in HI and 4 days stuck in Guam; so expect the unexpected. If your family is flexible, my best guess is for all to head from Travis whenever they find a C17 flight to Elmendorf, that is continuing on to Yokota (and can you put in for Leave at the last minute?) The Travis to Elmendorf C17 occurs on the weekends, but not every week. Travis use to have a weekly or biMonthly KC10 flight to Yokota on the weekends, but not sure if this still occurs. Any flight from Travis through HI to Yokota can take all the seats for lower Cat. travelers, making it difficult for Cat 6. If you hope to travel with them, you may have to wait at Travis for 4 seats a few days. If you must travel together, out of Travis, you will need lots of luck. The Alaska routing, if you get lucky, could be the best/fastest to Yokota. Otherwise all could CommAir to SEATAC and hope that Cat 6 are moving there. Remember if it were easy, more people would fly SpaceA. My best guess is only 5% of eligible folks use it; and even less in the Summer.   nolan shane henson New member Username: Nolan1754 Post Number: 2 Registered: 06-2010 Posted From: 132.49.221.26 Posted on Friday, June 11, 2010 - 07:53 pm:    i was planning on driving down to travis from mountain home then flying out from there...my dad's retired marine corps and he's going to meet me there and fly out with my mom and sister...with them being catVI it might be a little crazy. hopefully it works out, my main worry was getting back from yokota, thanks for the help   Bill Mathews Senior Member Username: Bill_mathews Post Number: 1226 Registered: 06-2003 Posted From: 173.71.47.192 Posted on Friday, June 11, 2010 - 03:40 pm:    I see Mountain Home AFB on your email address. If you depart from there, then Commair to Seattle and fly SEATAC to Yokota (not Kadena to keep it simple) and return. Your risk is the CommAir tickets cost. And your back up PlanB will be having (hopefully) 2 SEATAC flights when you depart, ie. don't fly to Seattle for the last flight of the week to Japan. Then allow plenty of time to get back to Seattle to wait (at McChord??) for your return CommAir flight to Idaho.   Bill Mathews Senior Member Username: Bill_mathews Post Number: 1225 Registered: 06-2003 Posted From: 173.71.47.192 Posted on Friday, June 11, 2010 - 03:33 pm:    You did not say where you live/depart from to get to Travis. With a very short Leave time to travel, SEATAC Patriot flights to Japan may be your best bet. As a Cat III on Leave, you should be ok to/from Yokota. Start home with 3-4 days left on your Leave, so you have plenty of time to get back to SEATAC (Seattle).   John R Garrison Senior Member Username: Majorg Post Number: 2733 Registered: 02-2006 Posted From: 208.81.157.86 Posted on Thursday, June 10, 2010 - 06:06 pm:    nolan: Welcome to the Board! If you have not yet done so, please familiarize yourself with JohnD's SpaceA Pages (link top left), the general layout of this site and the Search Function (magnifying glass at top center) of this site. Nearly all questions can be answered from those three sources. Having read thru the FAQs is a great start and I would suggest reading thru the other sections on JohnD's site as well. In relation to your proposed trip, traveling SpaceA to/from California to Hawaii in the summer even as a Cat III, will be very challenging. We try to avoid the Summer (15 May to 15 Sep) as this is typically one of the busiest times (Christmas (15 Dec-10 Jan) being the other) with a lot of competition for spacea. Please ensure that you are prepared to spend more time in terminals than you can imagine. Also be prepared for additional food, lodging and expensive, last minute commercial tickets should you be time restrained upon your attempted return. As stated often on this site, experienced SPATS avoid Christmas and Summer travel whenever possible. In sum, can it be done??..Yes, Just be mentally prepared for things to not go as smoothly as you might be expecting...and be pleasantly surprised when they work out. Happy travels, John   nolan shane henson New member Username: Nolan1754 Post Number: 1 Registered: 06-2010 Posted From: 132.49.221.26 Posted on Thursday, June 10, 2010 - 05:30 pm:    Hello fellow travlers, This is the first time that i will be flying space-a as active duty, i've flown many many times as a dependent before so i know that process pretty well, i only have 18 days of leave, but i only plan on spending a week in japan(yokota or kadena) flying from travis with my wife as a dependent. Im going to take all of my leave to give me time to get back, just wondering if anyone has experience flying active duty from yokota to travis and if a week and a half ,or so, would be sufficeint time to get back to the states(travis) so im not AWOL!!!! thanks for any help/stories