Cessna T-37 Single Spin Recovery Bold Face

For those who might have forgotten, I think it goes like this:

Throttles – Idle

Rudder and Ailerons – Neutral

Stick – Abruptly full aft and hold

Rudder – Abruptly apply full rudder opposite spin direction (opposite turn needle) and hold

Stick – Abruptly full forward one turn after applying rudder

Controls – Neutral after spinning stops and recover from dive

(43 words as I remember)

And if that doesn't work there was always this:

Handles - Raise

Triggers - Squeeze

The above bold face items were two of the  memory items required in the Air Force's undergraduate pilot training program while in the T-37 phase of instruction. The first is the spin recovery, and the second is the ejection sequence.

The course ran for about a year and successful completion would result in the award of silver wings and the aeronautical rating of pilot.

Bold face memory items were required to be committed to memory and recalled verbatim. Every morning, a briefing was conducted to go over items pertaining to the day's flying. One of the segments of the briefing was known as the "stand up".

A designated instructor would present an emergency scenario and then call upon a student to stand and verbally walk though all the steps required to resolve the emergency. Should the event require the use of a memory item, the student was expected to recite the bold faced item perfectly as a first step. Incorrect recitation would be followed by a command of "sit down".

This meant that the student was grounded for the day. This morning dog and pony show probably induced more stress in the students than would an actual emergency in the aircraft, and came to be widely hated by all.