Radar, Airfield and Weather Systems (RAWS)

If you held the 1C8X3 AFSC, you kept the systems that let aircraft find the runway and land safely. Radar, Airfield and Weather Systems technicians deploy, install, maintain, and repair the ground radar, airfield navigation aids, and meteorological sensors that air traffic control and aircrew depend on. You worked on airport surveillance and precision approach radar, instrument landing systems (ILS), TACAN, VOR, and the weather sensors feeding observations to forecasters. The career field was built in 2020 when the Air Force merged 1C8X1 Ground Radar Systems and 1C8X2 Airfield Systems into one electronics-maintenance trade.

I came at the civilian world from the federal engineering and environmental side after the Navy, and RAWS lines up with that path better than almost any other Air Force job. You are a high-voltage, RF, and antenna-systems technician who keeps safety-critical equipment inside tolerance. That is the exact background federal engineering-technician and electronics shops are short on. The training proves it. Tech school runs roughly seven and a half to eight months at Keesler AFB, starting with basic electronics theory and troubleshooting before you ever touch a live radar.

Civilian employers value this background because the work is unforgiving. A radar that drifts out of calibration is not a cosmetic problem, it is an aircraft-separation problem. You learned to diagnose complex RF and digital signal paths, calibrate navigation and sensor systems against published standards, and keep uptime on equipment where downtime has real consequences. That blend of high-stakes maintenance and documented precision is rare in the civilian labor pool.

RAWS sits next to two related Air Force jobs that people confuse with it. 1C1X1 Air Traffic Control operates the systems you maintained, and 1W0X1 Weather forecasts off the sensors you kept running. Your trade is the electronics maintenance underneath both. To see how your AFSC maps across civilian and federal options, start with our military career crosswalk.

I built my own second career on the federal engineering side, and RAWS techs have a cleaner shot at it than most. You already maintain safety-critical electronics to a documented standard, which is the whole job in a GS-0802 or GS-0856 shop. The work is real. The fix is making a resume say it in the language a federal HR specialist rates. — Brad Tachi, Navy Diver veteran & BMR founder

The clearest civilian lane runs through electronics and avionics maintenance, and the pay tracks the technical depth of the work. Per BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (May 2024), electrical and electronics installers and repairers earned a median of $71,270, and avionics technicians (O*NET 49-2091.00) earned a median of $81,390. Electrical and electronics repairers of commercial and industrial equipment (O*NET 49-2094.00) cover the closest direct match to ground radar and navaid maintenance, working on the same class of complex powered systems you kept running on the airfield.

Two market realities are worth naming honestly. First, geography matters. The best-paying electronics-maintenance jobs cluster around aerospace hubs, major airports, defense contractors, and FAA facilities, so where you land changes your number more than your skill does. Second, the FAA and its contractors run their own training pipelines for the exact ILS, radar, and navaid gear you touched, which shortens your ramp but means competition concentrates near those sites.

Telecommunications equipment installers and repairers (O*NET 49-2022.00) earned a median of $64,310 (BLS, May 2024), and that field has been pulled upward by 5G and weather-radar buildout, both of which use RF and antenna skills you already have. If you would rather chase the engineering tier, electrical and electronics engineering technologists and technicians (O*NET 17-3023.00) earned a median of $77,180 (BLS, May 2024), a realistic target once you stack an associate degree on top of your service experience.

Veterans with the same RF and electronics-maintenance signature show up across branches. If you are comparing notes, the Navy ET Electronics Technician and AT Aviation Electronics Technician ratings chase many of the same employers. For a head start on writing the experience down, our military resume builder is built for exactly this translation, and when you are ready you can build your resume now.

Federal service is where a RAWS background converts most directly, because the government classifies the work you already did. The strongest fit is GS-0856 Electronics Technician and GS-2604 Electronics Mechanic, the two series that cover hands-on maintenance, calibration, and repair of electronic systems. The FAA staffs thousands of these positions to keep the National Airspace System running, and the ILS, radar, and navaid equipment in those jobs is the same family you maintained in uniform.

From there the ladder runs into GS-0802 Engineering Technician, where your troubleshooting and documentation experience supports engineering projects, and GS-0855 Electronics Engineering for those who finish an engineering degree. Quality and compliance roles in GS-1910 Quality Assurance value technicians who can verify that systems meet published standards, which is what your calibration logs already prove. Telecommunications work falls under GS-0391, and program coordination under GS-0340 Program Management once you move toward supervision.

Grade placement depends on time in the work and education. Many RAWS veterans qualify at GS-7 to GS-9 on experience alone, with GS-11 and above opening as you add a degree or specialized certifications. Veterans Preference adds points to your eligibility rating, and as a separating or former service member you may qualify under VRA or VEOA hiring authorities that let agencies bring you on outside the standard competitive process. The FAA, Navy and Air Force depot commands, NASA, and the Army Corps of Engineers all run electronics shops that want this exact background.

For the mechanics of writing a federal resume that an HR specialist can actually rate against the standard, our federal resume builder handles the formatting and KSA framing. The same GS-0856 and GS-2604 targets apply to electronics maintainers in other branches, including the Coast Guard ET Electronics Technician. When the resume is ready, you can start your federal resume.

If you are staying in electronics, avionics, or RF maintenance, your terminology already translates. FAA shops, defense contractors, and telecom employers know what a navaid and a radar transmitter are. This section is for RAWS veterans targeting roles OUTSIDE the radar and airfield trade, where a hiring manager has never heard of a TACAN and needs your experience in plain business language.

The pattern that works is naming the system, the standard, and the outcome instead of the acronym. A line like ''Maintained ASR-11 airport surveillance radar'' means nothing to a manufacturing plant manager. ''Maintained safety-critical electronic systems to published calibration standards with measurable uptime'' tells that manager you can keep their line running. Below are common before and after translations.

• ILS / TACAN / VOR maintenance becomes Navigation and sensor system calibration and repair. Before: ''Performed scheduled maintenance on ILS and TACAN navaids.'' After: ''Calibrated and repaired precision navigation and sensor systems against published tolerances, sustaining mission-critical availability.''
• Airport surveillance / precision approach radar becomes Complex RF and high-voltage systems diagnosis. Before: ''Troubleshot ASR and PAR radar faults.'' After: ''Diagnosed and resolved faults in complex RF and high-voltage systems, restoring service on safety-critical equipment.''
• Performance trend analysis becomes Predictive maintenance and reliability monitoring. Before: ''Analyzed radar performance trends.'' After: ''Tracked equipment performance data to predict failures and schedule maintenance before unplanned downtime.''
• Administrative cybersecurity and elevated-privilege tasks becomes Systems administration and network maintenance. Before: ''Performed software updates and privilege management on radar processors.'' After: ''Administered software updates, networking, and access controls on networked control systems.''

For more on turning service language into civilian terms, the 50 military terms translated to civilian language glossary and our guide to hidden military skills civilians do not know you have are both worth a read. To apply these rewrites to your own bullets, the military resume builder walks you through it line by line.