Us army personnel serial numbers

In , the system was changed to a three-digit number with the first digit indicating an aircraft type. In , this was changed again, and all aircraft including those withdrawn from use were allocated serials starting with V In , the V prefix was removed and replaced with digit 1 to make four-digit serial numbers, which continues to the present. Since , executive aircraft operated for the Secretary of the Treasury were assigned their own sequence beginning with 1. The early Army aircraft had large black serials marked on the fin or rudder, and in it was usual to prefix the serial with SC for signal corps, or later AS for aerial service.

Later, the prefixes were not always marked, and were eventually dropped. From , the serial number was applied to the fin or boom if a helicopter , and the first digit of the fiscal year would be removed. The serial would not be allowed to be less than four digits for example B serial number was marked , but there was no upper limit for example YPA was marked as When the original fiscal year of a serial became ten years earlier than the current fiscal year, the tail number was often prefixed with a zero, for example instead of for UH-1H fiscal serial This was for disambiguation purposes, to avoid confusion with tail numbers for later fiscal years.

The practice was generally abandoned in the s. The notion that it was O for Obsolete is a widespread myth. In , the fin serials were changed from a minimum of four digits to five digits and in all serials were limited to five digits for example KCR is marked as the system is still in use.

In , camouflaged tactical aircraft were marked with modified presentation with the fiscal year followed by the last three digits of the serial number. Also, the letters AF were often added as a prefix or nearby. Whatever the serial presentation on the fin, the full fiscal serial is always presented in a technical data block, which is normally on the port left side near the cockpit.

Often a portion of the aircraft serial number is also painted on the aircraft nose as is done with helicopters or on the nose landing gear door as is done on fighters and bombers to help ground and air crew personnel speedily identify a certain aircraft as it approaches while taxiing into or out of parking spots or elsewhere around an airfield.

Each Navy aircraft normally has its serial plus the type designation marked in small letters on the rear fuselage. Sometimes the last four digits of the serial are painted on the fuselage or fin.

Sometimes the last three digits are used as the side codes, but on operational aircraft this is normally a squadron assigned code instead of a shortened serial number.

Aircraft serials are part of the Aircraft Visual Identification System, which also includes the aircraft's tail code and Modex. Prefix letters were retained for a short time, but in they were replaced with single letter A for aeroplane another name for 'airplane'. In order by year of creation, these were:. The following are the original service numbers which were first issued to United States military personnel: [2].

The original Air Force enlisted force was composed of personnel formerly of the United States Army Air Forces who continued to use their Army service numbers upon transfer to the Air Force in Thus, there is no established "first" enlisted service number of the U. Air Force since thousands of airmen simultaneously transferred into the Air Force on 18 September Service numbers were eventually phased out completely by the social security number; the Army and Air Force converted to social security numbers on 1 July , the Navy and Marine Corps on 1 January , and the Coast Guard on 1 October Beginning in , the military began a further effort to protect the use of social security numbers, even within the military itself.

New regulations declared that on all but the most official of documents such as a DD Form or evaluation reports social security numbers would only list the last four digits.

Regulations also were enacted to redact the social security number of reporting seniors which were written in their entirety on the personal copies of evaluation reports given to service members. The reason for this was to prevent possible identity theft issues committed by service members who had received a bad evaluation or who were disgruntled with their commanding officer [5].

The general design of United States service numbers was created first by the United States Army and later adapted by the other branches of the armed forces. Between each branch, service numbers are assigned differently while some branches make a conscious effort to separate officer and enlisted numbers while others do not.

It is therefore common in the U. The Army is the only branch of service to begin both officer and enlisted service numbers at No. Marine Corps officer numbers also begin at No.

There is also no service No. The entire range of United States service numbers extends from 1 to 99,, with the United States Army and Air Force the only services to use numbers higher than ten million.

A special range of numbers from one to seven thousand 1— was also used by the United States Air Force Academy for assignment only to cadets and was not considered part of the regular service number system.

Military Pension Records. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Notify me of follow-up comments by email. Notify me of new posts by email. Check Out Our Latest Blogs ».

US Army Serial Numbers. Leave a Reply Cancel reply Your email address will not be published. Tag Cloud 19th century 20th century 23andMe America ancestor ancestors ancestry Ancestry. Privacy Terms About Us.