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ASE8-E9

Aviation Support Equipment Technician

E-8 to E-9 (Senior NCO) · Navy

E1–E3E-4E-5E-6E-7E8–E9
HEADS UP

At SCPOAS and MCPOAS, the aviation maintenance community knows the senior chiefs and master chiefs in the AS rate by reputation — by which commands produced the best AS slates, which LCPOs the Chiefs who selected under them credit, which inspections passed without findings. Your reputation in the rate is the record you leave behind. It outlasts the rank.

The Honest MOS Read
As SCPOAS or MCPOAS, you are the senior enlisted aviation support equipment voice in a wing, a command, or a major aviation staff. The work-center LCPO assignment is behind you; the territory is larger. You may be running the senior enlisted GSE maintenance posture for a carrier air wing across multiple squadrons, serving as a senior maintenance chief at an FRC or COMNAVAIRFOR staff, or sitting as the Command Master Chief where that path has opened. The weight of the work shifts: fewer maintenance log entries to review, more command-climate shaping; fewer eEVALs for AS2s, more weight placed on the ones you write for Chiefs and AS1s; fewer certification currency tracking tasks, more COMNAVAIRFOR readiness review preparation. You write fewer eEVALs, but the eEVALs you write are the ones that pick the next Chief and Senior Chief slate. A Master Chief who cannot write an eEVAL that distinguishes a competitive Senior Chief candidate from an average Chief is producing evaluations that damage the advancement prospects of the senior sailors who need the most credible evaluation they can get. The standard for Master Chief-level eEVAL writing is not just action-result-impact — it is wing-level or command-level outcomes that the selection board can evaluate against the competitive standard of the rate. You sit at command-team sync as the senior enlisted voice on every enlisted GSE decision: accession, training, retention, certification-currency posture across all the work centers in your purview, HAZMAT program compliance at the command roll-up level. You translate NAVAIR, TYCOM, and air wing maintenance strategy into command-level talent decisions. Which sailor goes to which advanced NEC pipeline? Which Chief is ready for the SCPOAS board and which one needs another eEVAL cycle before competing? Which LDO or CWO application needs command endorsement and which one needs honest counseling about the record? These decisions are yours, and you are making them at the scale of a wing or a major command. The Safety Investigation Board is the most consequential accountability moment in the AS rate. When a GSE failure results in a Class A mishap or when a maintenance record falsification is discovered during a COMNAVAIRFOR inspection, the SCPOAS or MCPOAS is in the room as the senior enlisted GSE voice, and the AAR the air wing commander briefs upward comes from your assessment. The credibility you have built across the career is the foundation of that assessment's weight. The post-Navy transition plan is active, not pending. At SCPOAS and MCPOAS, sailors and junior Chiefs are watching whether the senior chief is still working or counting days. Work until the last day. The airline ground operations management position, the FAA-recognized supervisor credential, the NAVAIR contractor program role — build these while you are still on active duty. The aviation industry and the defense contractor community actively recruit from the AS rate's senior enlisted leadership tier, and the senior chief who retires with a plan in motion is in a materially different position than the one who starts planning after the retirement ceremony.
Career Arc
  • 01SCPOAS selection — Senior Enlisted Academy (SEA, Naval War College Newport RI) fellowship slot; SEA is the PME requirement for senior chief competition and the framework for Master Chief board eligibility.
  • 02Senior enlisted GSE authority at air wing, COMNAVAIRFOR, TYCOM, or FRC level — territory expands beyond single work-center LCPO to command-roll-up accountability.
  • 03MCPOAS selection (where path opens) — Master Chief board; CMC eligibility window if pursuing the command senior enlisted advisor path.
  • 04eEVAL profile for Chiefs and AS1s — the eEVALs you write at this tier determine who picks up Senior Chief and Master Chief; the competitive standard the board uses to evaluate your rated sailors is a reflection of your eEVAL credibility.
  • 05Fleet-wide AS rate workforce development input — the senior chiefs and master chiefs in the rate are the human capital the Navy's aviation maintenance workforce planners consult; your feedback on training pipeline quality, NEC content currency, and advanced school effectiveness shapes the rate.
  • 06Post-Navy transition underway — FAA A&P credential, civilian aviation GSE management network, NAVAIR contractor or airline ground operations senior management positioning.
Common Screwups
  • ×Pretending to be the senior technical voice on a GSE baseline where your currency has lapsed. Senior chiefs and master chiefs in the aviation maintenance community lose authority by faking technical depth they no longer have. The Maintenance Officer and the air wing JOs see it inside the same brief. 'Brief me on the update — I want to understand it from you' is stronger than pretending currency you do not have.
  • ×Letting a Chief-led work center drift on HAZMAT accountability, PCMS certification currency, or QA compliance because 'the Maintenance Officer will catch it before it becomes a problem.' You own enlisted execution at the command roll-up. When the COMNAVAIRFOR inspector finds a work-center gap that the SCPOAS LCPO knew was developing, the finding is attributed to senior enlisted leadership, not to the individual work center.
  • ×Going public with disagreement with the CO, the air wing commander, TYCOM, or NAVAIR policy. Take the disagreement to the CO's office or the air wing commander's staff directly and privately. Walk out of that room aligned. The goat locker and the wardroom both enforce this at the senior enlisted level — a SCPOAS or MCPOAS who voices public disagreement with command policy loses the credibility the rank is supposed to convey.
  • ×Confusing the wind-down to retirement with the job. Until the last formation, the formation is your job. The aviation maintenance community is small. The senior chief who was still working and setting the standard in the last year is remembered differently than the one who was clearly counting down.

A Day in the Life

  • 0500-0530Reveille. Check command-level maintenance readiness dashboard — OOMA/3-M roll-up across work centers in purview. Any significant status change affecting the morning CO or air wing commander brief needs to be addressed before the brief.
  • 0530-0630Physical training. The SCPOAS/MCPOAS maintains the physical standard that the command's enlisted force watches as a measure of whether the senior enlisted standard is performance or decoration.
  • 0630-0700Dress, command. Pull command-level readiness status — certification currency roll-up, deferred discrepancy summary, HAZMAT compliance status across work centers. The morning brief requires answers, not research.
  • 0700-0730CO/XO morning brief or air wing commander staff sync — senior enlisted GSE readiness status briefed with data. Any risk to the day's flight schedule or to the command's COMNAVAIRFOR inspection posture flagged proactively.
  • 0730-0900Chiefs Mess engagement — CMC meeting, senior enlisted leadership sync, personnel action reviews in progress, advancement candidate pipeline status briefings. The SCPOAS or MCPOAS is a standing participant in the command's senior enlisted leadership structure.
  • 0900-1100LCPO Chief mentoring cycle — one-on-one eEVAL bullet development sessions, Chief board packet reviews, accession program candidate assessments. At minimum one meaningful Chief mentoring conversation per week.
  • 1100-1200Command-level walkthrough — SCPOAS-level inspection of work centers across the GSE portfolio: sampling maintenance record quality, HAZMAT log currency, PCMS certification status. Discrepancies briefed to the relevant LCPO before close of business.
  • 1200-1300Lunch. The SCPOAS on duty section remains accessible through the lunch period — flight operations and maintenance accountability do not observe hard lunch stops.
  • 1300-1430Policy and administrative work: COMNAVAIRFOR inspection preparation, NAVAIR technical directive review, command accession pipeline documentation, eEVAL cycle drafts for rated Chiefs and AS1s.
  • 1430-1530Command presence during flight operations — flight deck or hangar bay walk during the afternoon flight event window. Not supervising; visible. The standard the senior enlisted leader expects is the standard the deckplate observes being enforced by presence.
  • 1530-1600End-of-day brief with CMC or XO on command climate, personnel action status, readiness posture for tomorrow's flight schedule.
  • 1600-1800Senior enlisted professional development — SEA reading list material, NAVAIR aviation maintenance workforce development publications, command Master Chief symposium preparation, post-Navy transition planning.
  • 1800-2200Evening. Post-Navy credential development (FAA A&P enrollment, civilian network engagement, NAVAIR contractor relationship building), personal professional reading, family time. The senior chief who has no plan after the last formation is the senior chief who starts over unnecessarily.

Weekly Cadence

The SCPOAS/MCPOAS week is organized around three layers: the command's operational readiness cycle, the senior enlisted professional development obligation, and the long-term talent pipeline output. All three are real accountabilities; none of them can be neglected for the others. Monday is the command readiness reset. The weekend's maintenance posture is reviewed at the command roll-up level, personnel actions in progress are updated, and the Chiefs Mess sync establishes the week's professional development priorities. The CO or air wing commander's Monday brief is the week's first credibility test — the senior enlisted who walks into that brief with current numbers and a clear readiness picture sets the command's confidence level for the week. Midweek is execution: LCPO Chief mentoring conversations, work-center walkthrough inspections, command-level accession program pipeline reviews. The Thursday afternoon walkthrough should be the SCPOAS's own internal inspection of the command's GSE documentation posture — finding the discrepancy on Thursday afternoon means correcting it before Friday's review, not discovering it during the COMNAVAIRFOR inspection. Friday is the accountability close-out. Command-level readiness data is verified and briefable. Pipeline candidate status is updated. eEVAL cycle documentation for the current rating period is advanced. The week ends with the same discipline it started with — no administrative debt, no outstanding personnel actions left open, no command readiness brief that is not backed by current data. The senior enlisted leader who cannot close the week clean is the one who is accumulating the debt that surfaces at the next major inspection.

Key Skills — How to Drill Each

  1. 01
    Run a senior-enlisted command climate across a maintenance command or carrier air wing that produces certified ASs, commissioning selectees, and retention rates above the type-command average.
    Command climate at the SCPOAS/MCPOAS level is measured by outcomes, not by intentions. Which sailors advanced? Which LCPOs produced work centers that passed COMNAVAIRFOR inspection without findings? Which commissioning program candidates selected? Which Chiefs are competitive for SCPOAS? The senior chief who can walk into the TYCOM readiness review and brief these outcomes by name, with dates and selection results, is the senior chief whose command climate is real and not aspirational.
  2. 02
    Brief the CO, air wing commander, TYCOM, or COMNAVAIRFOR on enlisted GSE readiness and risk — in language the flag officer can defend at the next echelon.
    The senior enlisted brief to a flag officer is not the Maintenance Officer's brief with more experience behind it. It is a command-climate brief with equipment readiness context. The flag officer wants to know: are the sailors ready, trained, and certified? Is the work center's QA posture sustainable at the current operational tempo? What are the talent management risks — NEC pipeline gaps, retention concerns, certification currency lags — that could affect the next deployment cycle? Brief those answers with data, with honest risk assessment, and with a recommendation. The flag officer who has to ask follow-up questions to get to the risk assessment is the flag officer who wonders why the senior enlisted advisor is in the room.
  3. 03
    Sit on Chief selection board panels, command CMC slates, and LDO/CWO/commissioning accession panels.
    Board participation at the SCPOAS/MCPOAS level requires the ability to evaluate a record against the competitive standard of the rate — not the individual's personal qualities but the record's evidence of professional performance, operational depth, and development output. The board member who advocates for a sailor based on personal relationship rather than record is the board member whose credibility at subsequent boards decreases. Evaluate the records. Defend the conclusions. Maintain the confidentiality the convening authority requires, permanently.
  4. 04
    Translate NAVAIR, TYCOM, and CNO aviation maintenance strategy into enlisted talent management and GSE readiness decisions at the unit level.
    NAVAIR aviation maintenance strategy changes as aircraft platforms change, as GSE equipment baselines update, and as the Navy's operational demand patterns shift. The senior enlisted GSE leader who reads the NAVAIR workforce development publications and the TYCOM readiness guidance is the one who can brief the CO on how the command's current talent pipeline maps to the next three years of the rate's requirements — not just the current year group's needs.
  5. 05
    Walk a COMNAVAIRFOR or TYCOM quality-assurance review or a Safety Investigation Board records investigation as the senior enlisted GSE voice.
    The SCPOAS or MCPOAS in a COMNAVAIRFOR inspection walkthrough is being evaluated on technical knowledge, documentation standards, and the command climate that produced the work center's posture. Know the NAVAIR technical manuals that govern your portfolio. Know the NAMP's QA requirements. Know the COMNAVAIRFOR inspection criteria before the inspector's team arrives. The senior enlisted leader who is discovered learning the inspection criteria during the inspection has not done the preparation work the rank requires.

Manuals & References — What Chapters Matter

  • COMNAVAIRFORINST 4790.2 (NAMP) — full library
    At SCPOAS and MCPOAS, you are cited from the NAMP more often than you cite it. The Safety Investigation Board, the COMNAVAIRFOR inspector, the JAG officer reviewing a maintenance record falsification case — all of them are quoting NAMP sections. You should know the sections they are likely to quote before they quote them.
  • NAVAIR 00-80R-14 — Ashore Safety Precautions for Aircraft Operations
    You brief flight-line safety trends at command level and sit on mishap review boards. When a GSE-related safety incident occurs — a near-miss on the flight deck, a ramp strike, a HAZMAT incident — the SCPOAS or MCPOAS is the senior enlisted voice in the safety investigation and the mishap review board. That role requires fluency with this document, not familiarity.
  • NAVAIR maintenance engineering guidance, time-compliance technical directives (TCTDs), and Naval Air Systems Command fleet-impact communications for the GSE portfolio
    Engineering changes, TCTDs, and NAVAIR fleet-impact communications update the GSE maintenance procedures the work centers execute. The senior enlisted leader who stays current on these communications is the one who can brief the CO on whether a newly issued TCTD creates a maintenance burden that affects the deployment readiness schedule — before the Maintenance Officer asks.
  • MILPERSMAN — enlisted personnel actions at the senior-enlisted threshold
    The SCPOAS and MCPOAS are in the room for the command's most serious personnel actions: NJP proceedings for senior enlisted, separation actions, high-visibility maintenance misconduct investigations. The MILPERSMAN is the procedural reference. Know the applicable articles before the meeting, not during it.
  • Senior Enlisted Academy (SEA, Naval War College Newport RI) reading list and CPO/SCPO/CMC Symposium materials
    The SEA curriculum and the CPO/SCPO Symposium materials are the PME framework for senior enlisted professional development at the wing and command level. The senior chief who engages with SEA reading list material outside the fellowship window is the senior chief who shows up to command-team discussions with a broader professional foundation than the work-center management background alone provides.

Standards — How to Hit Each

  • SEA fellowship or equivalent senior-enlisted PME complete before competing for command CMC slate.
    Apply for the SEA fellowship within your year group's eligibility window. The fellowship is competitive; the application requires command endorsement and a strong eEVAL profile. SEA completion is not mandatory for SCPOAS advancement, but it is expected for CMC competition and the Master Chief board reads it as evidence of commitment to senior-enlisted professional development. Do not let the operational tempo of a demanding LCPO tour become the reason the SEA application did not get submitted.
  • Command-level COMNAVAIRFOR or TYCOM quality assurance inspection passed without senior-enlisted-attributable findings during your tenure.
    A senior-enlisted-attributable finding in a COMNAVAIRFOR or TYCOM quality assurance inspection — a certification currency gap at the command roll-up level, a maintenance record falsification in a work center you supervise, a HAZMAT compliance failure across multiple shops — is the kind of finding that follows the MCPOAS board submission. Prevent it by running command-level internal inspections, by ensuring the Chiefs who run work centers under your supervision are running their own internal inspections, and by reviewing the command-roll-up QA data before the external inspector does.
  • LDO/CWO, commissioning, and advanced-NEC accession pipeline producing 1+ selectee per year from your command.
    Track the accession program pipeline at the command level — not just the work centers you directly oversee but the command's entire enlisted accession output. The SCPOAS or MCPOAS who can brief the CO on the command's accession program productivity by name, program, and selection cycle is performing at the level the rank requires. The one who cannot brief it is not managing the command's talent development at the appropriate level.
  • eEVAL profile the senior rater can defend at command and TYCOM level — your rated chiefs pick up Senior Chief and Master Chief on schedule.
    The eEVAL standard at SCPOAS/MCPOAS level is measured by whether the sailors you rate are advancing at a rate consistent with or above the TYCOM average for the AS rate in their year group. If your rated chiefs are not advancing at a competitive rate, the first question the senior rater asks is whether the evaluations were written to the standard or whether they were uniformly generous in a way that obscures meaningful differentiation. Differentiate honestly. The competitive sailor needs to know what makes the record strong; the average sailor needs to know what needs to change.

Technical Mistakes — Concrete Consequences

  • Pretending to be the senior technical voice on a GSE equipment baseline where currency has lapsed.
    Aviation maintenance communities are technically deep and professionally unforgiving of credibility fraud. The SCPOAS or MCPOAS who overstates technical currency in front of the Maintenance Officer, the air wing commander, or the COMNAVAIRFOR inspector is identified as either dishonest or out of touch — neither of which is recoverable at the senior enlisted level. 'Walk me through the current procedure — I want to hear it from you before I brief the CO' is the honest alternative, and it is the answer that builds credibility rather than depleting it.
  • Letting a Chief-led work center drift on GSE accountability without intervention because the SCPOAS does not want to undermine the Chief's authority.
    The SCPOAS who avoids the difficult performance conversation with an underperforming LCPO Chief because of collegial loyalty is allowing a command-level accountability failure to develop. When the COMNAVAIRFOR inspection finds the drift, the finding is attributed to senior enlisted leadership — not to the individual LCPO Chief who generated it. The senior enlisted leader's authority comes from holding the standard, not from protecting sailors who are not meeting it.
  • Treating the build-up to retirement as an opportunity to ease off the professional standard.
    The aviation maintenance community is a small professional world. The sailors who are watching the SCPOAS or MCPOAS in the last year of service will be the AS2s and AS1s who are making maintenance decisions on the flight line for the next decade. The standard the senior chief set — and the standard the senior chief abandoned in the last year — are both remembered. The legacy is the whole record, not the highlights.

Career Decisions at This Rank

  • Command Master Chief (CMC) competition versus staying the senior rate technical track as SCPOAS/MCPOAS.
    The CMC path is a separate competitive selection process, not an automatic next step from Master Chief. CMCs serve as the CO's senior enlisted advisor across all ratings — it is a generalist leadership role that takes you out of the AS rate's technical community. The MCPOAS who stays the rate's senior technical track is the senior voice at the wing or NAVAIR staff on AS workforce development, training pipeline quality, and technical standard-setting. Both are legitimate and valuable. The honest question: at 18-22 years of service, do you want to be the command's senior people-leader across all ratings (CMC), or do you want to be the most senior technical voice in the AS rate at the wing or NAVAIR level (MCPOAS)? Neither is more important. They are different jobs.
  • Post-Navy transition timeline and lane selection.
    The post-Navy civilian aviation career for the Master Chief AS has multiple high-value lanes: airline ground support equipment management (United, Delta, American, Southwest, FedEx, UPS all have GSE management career tracks that pay well and actively recruit from the military); airport operations management at major hub airports (FAA-adjacent regulatory experience from the AS rate translates directly); NAVAIR defense contractor program management (Northrop Grumman Aviation Services, L3Harris, DRS, and others maintain NAVAIR aviation maintenance support programs staffed by retired senior enlisted); GSE manufacturer and service organizations (JBT AeroTech, Textron GSE, Mallaghan, Tronair — the companies that make and service the equipment you maintained). The FAA A&P credential opens the broadest range of options and should be pursued while still on active duty through evening or online community college programs. Start the civilian network as SCPOAS; do not wait until the retirement orders are cut.
  • Extending active duty service versus retiring at the first eligibility window.
    The honest math at 20 years for a SCPOAS or MCPOAS: the retirement pay and benefits are real and valuable. The civilian aviation market for Master Chief-level AS experience is also real and pays more than the retirement plus civilian pay combination if the transition is done well. The sailor who extends because the career is genuinely productive and there are meaningful billets left to fill is making a different decision than the sailor who extends because the transition plan is not ready. Do the civilian math honestly before making the extension decision. The AS rate's senior enlisted community needs its most experienced leaders in the billets that shape the next generation — not marking time in a secondary assignment because the retirement planning was not done.

How the Seat Varies by Unit Type

  • Carrier Air Wing (CVW) Senior Chief — deployed with CSG
    The highest-visibility and highest-accountability assignment for a SCPOAS in the AS rate. The CVW senior chief is the senior enlisted GSE voice across the entire air wing's maintenance operation — multiple squadrons, multiple aircraft types, the full GSE portfolio on a deployed carrier. The COMNAVAIRFOR and TYCOM readiness reviews that occur during deployment cycles are evaluated against the CVW senior chief's management of the AS community's collective readiness. The eEVAL and MCPOAS board competitive value of a CVW deployment tour as a senior chief is significant.
  • COMNAVAIRFOR / TYCOM Maintenance Staff
    Staff assignments at the COMNAVAIRFOR or TYCOM level put the SCPOAS or MCPOAS in policy and standards roles — writing the instructions and guidance the fleet work centers execute. The policy experience is career-differentiating for CMC competition and for NAVAIR contractor positions after retirement. The direct deckplate management is minimal at the staff level; the influence on fleet-wide AS standards is larger than any single carrier air wing can achieve.
  • FRC Senior Chief / Senior Maintenance Chief
    FRC assignments at the SCPOAS level involve senior oversight of GSE overhaul and intermediate maintenance production across a large facility. The production metrics are different from flight-line management: overhaul throughput, first-article inspection pass rates, component certification documentation quality at the depot level. The post-Navy transition to defense contractor GSE program management is strongest from a senior FRC assignment — the depot-level technical depth and the production management experience are both directly marketable.
  • Command Master Chief (CMC) — if selected
    The CMC role is a fundamentally different assignment from the SCPOAS rate-technical track. The CMC is the CO's senior enlisted advisor across all ratings — the morale, welfare, discipline, and professional development of the entire command's enlisted force. The AS-rate technical background is one dimension of the CMC role; the cross-rating people leadership is the dominant one. CMCs selected from the AS rate bring technical credibility to the command's aviation maintenance climate, but the CMC role itself is not a technical position.

What Good Looks Like at This Rank

The good Master Chief Aviation Support Equipment Technician is the senior enlisted GSE voice the CO, air wing commander, and TYCOM all name without prompting when the question is 'who do we send to represent the AS community in this readiness review?' His command's AS advancement slate briefs above the TYCOM average. His commissioning and advanced-NEC accession rate is in the upper third of the rate across the fleet. His rated chiefs pick up Senior Chief and Master Chief on schedule, and the command can name the sailors he developed without being asked to produce a list. The hallmark of the good Master Chief is not what happened in his watch section or his work center — it is what happened in the careers of the people who worked for him. The AS1 who became the LPO and then the Chief. The AS2 who got the honest counseling about the LDO program, applied, selected, and is now in the wardroom. The ASAN who was about to separate and stayed because the Master Chief had the right conversation at the right time. These outcomes do not appear in the eEVAL; they appear in the rate's community over the 20 years after the Master Chief retires. When he retires, the airline ground operations management position and the FAA-recognized supervisor credential are already in his wallet. The goat locker's standard for what a senior chief and master chief in the AS rate should look like was shaped partly by his tenure in the mess. That is the legacy. Build it from the first day the anchors go on.

Preview — The Next Rank

For the SCPOAS competing for MCPOAS: the Master Chief board is the most competitive selection process in the Navy's enlisted advancement system at the senior tier. The record has to demonstrate command-level impact — not work-center management but wing-level or COMNAVAIRFOR-level outcomes. Commissioning program selectees by name. Chiefs advanced to Senior Chief under your mentorship. COMNAVAIRFOR inspections passed without senior-enlisted-attributable findings at the command roll-up level. SEA completed. The competitive MCPOAS record is a career-spanning document, not a summary of the last two years. For the MCPOAS considering the CMC competition: the CMC selection process evaluates whether the candidate can serve as a senior enlisted advisor to a CO across all ratings and communities. The AS rate technical background is a credential; the cross-rating and cross-community leadership perspective that the CO needs from a CMC is built through exposure to multiple commands, multiple mission sets, and multiple rating communities. The MCPOAS who has spent the entire career in the AS rate's aviation maintenance world may be the best GSE leader in the fleet and still be less prepared for the CMC role than the MCPOAS who has had tours in diverse commands. For the MCPOAS approaching the retirement window: the legacy is the record you leave in the rate's community. The sailors who advanced, the LCPOs who became Chiefs, the Chiefs who became senior chiefs — the Master Chief who retires having built a generation of junior AS leaders has completed the job. The retirement ceremony is the last formation; until then, the formation is the job.
FAQ

AS E8-E9 — Frequently Asked Questions

Q01What does a E8-E9 AS (Aviation Support Equipment Technician) actually do?
As SCPOAS or MCPOAS you run the senior enlisted GSE maintenance posture for a carrier air wing, an FRC facility, a COMNAVAIRFOR or TYCOM maintenance staff, a major training command — or you sit as Command Master Chief where the path opens.
Q02What's the most important thing to know as a E8-E9 AS?
At SCPOAS and MCPOAS, the aviation maintenance community knows the senior chiefs and master chiefs in the AS rate by reputation — by which commands produced the best AS slates, which LCPOs the Chiefs who selected under them credit, which inspections passed without findings.
Q03What does a typical day look like for a E8-E9 AS?
Time-blocked day at the E8-E9 AS rank tier: 0500-0530 Reveille. Check command-level maintenance readiness dashboard — OOMA/3-M roll-up across work centers in purview. Any significant status change affecting the morning CO or air wing commander brief needs to be addressed before the brief, 0530-0630 Physical training. The SCPOAS/MCPOAS maintains the physical standard that the command's enlisted force watches as a measure of whether the senior enlisted standard is performance or decoration, 0630-0700 Dress, command. Pull command-level readiness status — certification currency roll-up,…
Q04What mistakes get E8-E9 AS soldiers fired or relieved?
Pretending to be the senior technical voice on a GSE baseline where your currency has lapsed. Senior chiefs and master chiefs in the aviation maintenance community lose authority by faking technical depth they no longer have. The Maintenance Officer and the air wing JOs see it inside the same brief. 'Brief me on the update — I want to understand it from you' is stronger than pretending currency you do not have; Letting a Chief-led work center drift on HAZMAT accountability,…
Q05What career decisions matter most at the E8-E9 AS rank tier?
Command Master Chief (CMC) competition versus staying the senior rate technical track as SCPOAS/MCPOAS — The CMC path is a separate competitive selection process, not an automatic next step from Master Chief. CMCs serve as the CO's senior enlisted advisor across all ratings — it is a generalist leadership role that takes you out of the AS rate's technical community. The MCPOAS who stays the rate's senior technical track is the senior voice at the wing or NAVAIR staff on AS workforce development, training pipeline quality, and technical standard-setting. Both are legitimate and valuable.…
Q06What's next after E8-E9 for a AS (Aviation Support Equipment Technician) in the Navy?
For the SCPOAS competing for MCPOAS: the Master Chief board is the most competitive selection process in the Navy's enlisted advancement system at the senior tier.
Q07What manuals and regulations does a E8-E9 AS need to know cold?
COMNAVAIRFORINST 4790.2 (NAMP) — you are cited from it more often than you cite it; command-level NAMP compliance rolls up under your name.; NAVAIR 00-80R-14 — Ashore Safety Precautions for Aircraft Operations: you brief flight-line safety trends at command and TYCOM level and sit on mishap review boards.;…

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Published by the Honest MOS Editorial DeskVerified against DoD/.gov sourcesUpdated May 2026Editorial standards