My late father-in-law’s RAF Service Records show that, on joining up, he was classified as ‘Medical Category Grade 2, F.167a Not suitable for training at present’. I believe that ‘Medical Category Grade 2’ was applied to “Those who, while suffering from disabilities disqualifying them from Grade I, do not suffer from progressive organic disease, have fair hearing and vision, are of moderate muscular development, and are able to undergo a considerable amount of physical exertion not involving severe strain”. However, I do not know what the F.167a means or what the implications of this assessment were. After basic training he appears to have spent about a year at RAF Feltwell, before being posted to Air Command, South East Asia – but I have no idea what he did there or inn subsequent postings to No.227 Group and RAF Chaklala. Could anyone offer any help, advice or suggestions please?
By: bazv - 4th November 2018 at 22:03
As regards the RAF Form 167A,I had a feeling it was a record of ‘Trade Test’ or similar…
From the T E Lawrence Studies (Lawrence of Arabia) website – http://www.telstudies.org/reference/tna_air1_2696.shtml
border: 1 cellpadding: 3 [TR] [TD=”width: 50% bgcolor: #FFFFFF”]1925/ Aug 20 RAF Form 167. Results of Unit Group or Central Trade Testing Board Examination and Trade Test Card.[/TD] [TD=”width: 50%
bgcolor: #FFFFFF”]Lawrence recommended for reclassification as AC/2[/TD] [/TR]
That link would seem to confirm that F167A is a record of Trade Test/Qualification.
Nice to see Lawrence being promoted from Lt Col to Aircraftman 2nd class 🙂
By: bazv - 4th November 2018 at 21:48
Hi Andrew –
Your FIL’s medical category should be a combination of Letters and numbers…
This quote from another forum may help regarding WW2 medical categories…
Originally posted by Ross McNeil on the RAF Commands forum
The letter “A” represents “fitness for air duties,” and “B” represents “fitness for ground duties.” Numerals are placed after the letter “A” to denot the type of flying for which the person is fit, viz:-
1 Full Flying Duties
2 Limited Flying Duties
3 Combatant passenger
4 non-combatant passengerThe letter “p”, “t” or “h” is added after both “A” and “B” to indicate limitations of fitness, as follows:-
p permanently unfit
t temporarily unfit
h home service onlyExample: A2hBh indicates fitness for limited flying at home and ground duties at home. (“p” and “t” are not employed in conjunction with a numeral.)
A category of “h” does not preclude service as far as Gibraltar, or service in one of HM ships based on a home port, so long as the ship is not ordered to tropical waters. In special cases individuals in this category may be boarded by the Central Medical Board to ascertain their fitness for service in specified stations abroad.
The categories were changed either later in the war or sometime post war – my category for RAF ground crew was A4G1Z1 – a pilot with no restrictions would have been A1G1Z1 but as you can see the categories were still in a similar format to WW2 categories.
Sign In
November 4, 2018 at 11:06 am