Flight Equipment Technician

Morning accountability: verify all IMRL items in custody are present and inspection status is current. Pull the day's work order queue — two scheduled 90-day parachute inspections and a pre-installation check on a replacement anti-G suit. Brief the junior tech on the parachute inspection sequence before starting: walk through the MIM chapter, identify the TPI steps, confirm he understands why each step is sequenced the way it is. Conduct the inspection with him performing, you verifying each step before he proceeds, and the CDI signing the work order at the designated hold points. Afternoon: NATEC website check for new TCTDs on your primary equipment categories; one new directive on LPU-36P connectors gets flagged to the division officer for evaluation. End of shift: complete work order documentation, update the IMRL due-date board, stage completed assemblies for pre-issue inspection.

Daily IMRL accountability for assigned items. Weekly work order queue review with division SNCO — aging work orders get assigned, completed work orders get submitted for QA review. CDI performance tracking: each CDI maintains a log of completed CDI inspections for annual recertification; at E4 you're building this record. Weekly MIM and NATEC directive status review. Scheduled inspections follow the IMRL calendar without exception; a late inspection requires a formal extension request through the Maintenance Officer. Monthly safety stand-down brief from the wing aviation safety officer covers recent mishaps and HazRep trends.

CDI qualification on parachute rigging and survival kit assembly is the technical anchor — it requires demonstrating proficiency on every step of the MIM sequence, not just the overview. Maintenance Data System (MDS) work order review: at E4 you're reviewing junior technicians' work orders before submission, which means you need to catch transposed serial numbers, missing signatures, out-of-sequence steps, and expired component entries faster than the CDI does. IMRL management at the working level: tracking inspection due dates, condition codes, and reportable discrepancies in the unit's IMRL master record, understanding which items drive aircraft readiness status. NATEC directive tracking: at this tier you should be the person who catches new TCTDs when they're posted and flags them to the CDI before the next inspection cycle. Mentoring junior techs through qual cards without doing the work for them — a junior tech who cannot independently perform a step is not qualified regardless of who helped; the CDI qualification gate enforces this.

COMNAVAIRFORINST 4790.2 Chapter 10 (Collateral Duty Inspector program): this is the legal authority for your CDI qualification — read it before you apply for the course, not after. NAVAIR 13-1-6.4 (Parachute and Aircrew Personal Protective Equipment) with all current changes: at E4 you're now the person verifying that junior techs are working from current revisions, which means you need to track change status. MCO 4400.177 (Individual Material Readiness List): the IMRL governance document covering accountability, reportable condition codes, and annual inventory procedures. OPNAVINST 3750.6 (Naval Aviation Safety Program): Hazard Reports (HazReps) and Aviation Safety Action Program (ASAP) inputs are now your responsibility to initiate when you identify a safety-of-flight discrepancy — understanding what triggers a mandatory report versus an internal correction is critical. NATEC website maintenance (natec.navy.mil): CDIs are responsible for checking TCTD and MIM change status; at this tier, own that task for your primary equipment categories.

At E4, the standard is: every work order your name appears on is technically correct and complete before it leaves the division; every junior tech you supervised can independently articulate why each MIM step they performed was required; and your IMRL line items are within their inspection windows with zero unreported discrepancies. A CDI who signs work orders he didn't fully verify is a CDI who eventually triggers a flight safety mishap report that traces back to his signature.

Approving a parachute pack on a rigging sequence where the junior tech skipped the twist count because the count 'looked right' — the MIM step exists because visual estimation has killed aircrew. Signing off oxygen system leak checks without verifying the test pressure held for the full duration specified in NAVAIR 13-1-6.7; time-pressure inspection is a known failure mode. Failing to catch an expired component in a survival kit because the tech pulled the kit date and not the individual component service-life dates — the kit date and the component dates are separate entries. Authorizing transfer of an IMRL item without verifying the receiving unit's documentation matches your outgoing documentation; transfer discrepancies create orphaned serial numbers that surface in wing-level IMRL audits.

The CDI qualification decision is binary — pursue it aggressively at this tier or accept that you'll be a supervised technician while your peers are signing work orders. The Marines who pick up CDI qualification as Cpls arrive at Sgt already trusted with inspection authority; the ones who wait arrive as Sgts still needing the school. The second decision is whether to pursue a B-billet (Recruiter, DI duty, MSG) at EAS — B-billets build FITREP material and broaden the record, but they pull you out of the technical community for 2-3 years, which can create skill gaps in a fast-changing ALSS technical environment.

In a MALS paraloft, the CDI qualification process is more formal and more documented — the MALS QA department runs the training program and the qualification record is maintained at the squadron level. In an active fixed-wing or rotary-wing squadron, CDI qualification is still required but the operational pace means you're qualifying against equipment that's actively flying, which makes errors more immediately consequential. Fixed-wing squadrons with ejection-seat aircraft (AV-8B, legacy F/A-18 airframes still in some reserve units) require CDI qualification on explosive egress system components under stricter TPI protocols than rotary-wing units.

The outstanding E4 tech has a running personal IMRL inspection calendar on the division's whiteboard — not because anyone told them to, but because missed due dates affect aircraft readiness and aircraft readiness affects the squadron commander's brief. They run pre-inspection briefings with junior techs before complex work orders, walking through the MIM chapter step by step so the tech knows what to expect before the CDI is watching. They also write HazReps when they find safety-of-flight conditions rather than waiting for the CDI to decide whether to report — aviation safety reporting is a leadership behavior, not just a senior's task.

At E5, you're running the division's daily inspection schedule, reviewing and submitting work orders for QA, tracking IMRL inspection status across all categories (not just your assigned items), and mentoring Cpls toward CDI qualification. The Sgt-level job is fundamentally about managing people and process rather than performing inspections personally — you'll still do hands-on work, but your primary output is measured by how the junior techs perform, not how you perform individually.