US Army Flight Jackets

[FtrPlt]

I very much enjoyed the thread on the history of US Army flying helmets and thought a similar discussion flight jackets would prove useful.

 

For the period 1970s thru 1990s, the Army issued a nomex cloth flight jacket in both lightweight (Jacket, Flyers, Lightweight) and cold weather versions (Jacket, Flyers, Cold Weather).

 

The 1974 issue jackets were simple garments with pen pocket on the left arm and two slit-type handwarmer pockets which were secured by two velcro strips within the slit. The winter jacket shared the same pattern with the addition of a quilted lining. The early issues that I've seen do not appear to have had the velcro tab for leather flightsuit nametags. This makes sense as I believe these jackets were intended to go with the Vietnam-era 2-piece nomex flying uniform which used the standard embroidered name and branch tapes.

 

I received my lightweight and cold weather jackets in 1985 and by this date the pattern had changed slightly. The versions I received had the same handwarmer pockets but they had pocket flaps which were held closed by two external velcro tabs.

 

The cold weather flight jacket also gained the same pocket flaps along with a velcro opening high on the back to allow access to an extraction harness apparently worn by tank crews. The jacket nomenclature changed from "Jacket, Flyers, Cold Weather" to "Jacket, Cold Weather, High Temperature Resistant".

 

Early Cold Weather Jacket

Early Cold Weather Back

Early Cold Weather Label

 

Early Lightweight Jacket

Early Lightweight Pocket Detail

 

Later style cold weather jacket with flapped pockets and rescue slot in upper back:

Reverse of later pattern jacket

 

I'm hoping others will be able to fill in the blanks for jackets prior and after these. I'm pretty sure the L-2B and MA-1 were the likely pre-1970s jackets. I'm not sure what was worn when the 2-piece BDU flying uniform came out

[Sabrejet]

The first example looks very like an Army nomex tankers' jacket I used to own!

[FtrPlt]

The first example looks very like an Army nomex tankers' jacket I used to own!

 

The tanker jacket was an off-shoot of the cold weather flight jacket. When the velcro slot was added across the back, the jacket was renamed "Jacket, Cold Weather" and issued to both aircrew and tank crew. Different NSNs on the packaging but the same number on the actual jackets.

[alexborn2run]

Hi so i just bought this jacket and am wonderring if it is the real deal?

The seller said it is an original Vietnam war flight shirt, but looking at the collar it has an army aviation patch which wasnt introduced until 1983?

Were the flight shirts of this type still in use in the 80s?

[mohawkALSE]

The shirt itself is most likely a late nam era 1971-73 or so. They remained in inventory til they were no longer serviceable. I believe FtrPlt told me he wore a second hand 2 piece flight suit at Ft Hood in the 1980s so its possible something like this occurred here with this shirt having the Avn Branch insignia.

[FtrPlt]

MohawkALSE is correct. The VN-era two-piece suit was worn well after the VN-war ended. I wore one while at Ft Hood in 1986/87 and one other pilot was still wearing his in 1989. I'm not sure if they had a wear-out date?

 

There were two versions of the hot weather flyers shirt -- the type as shown with patch-type pockets and a slightly later style which had slanted, zippered pockets like the CWU-27 flight suit. The later version was cut like a shirt and was intended to be worn tucked in at all time. The patch-pocket type could be worn tucked in or untucked.

[lucky52]

Same thing here.In the Texas guard we wore the two piece well into the 80s.Then for a while we had both types to wear and I don't remember when they finally phased out the two piece.