About

Editorial Guidelines

Writing Articles

Download Guidelines

General

ARMY AVIATION magazine is the official publication of the Army Aviation Association of America (AAAA) and reports on news and developments pertinent to the field of U.S. Army Aviation branch and on AAAA related news, chapter activities, membership and awards. ARMY AVIATION magazine is a “publication of record” and archived with the Library of Congress and various other Department of Defense organizations. We strive to ensure our submissions and content are complete in fact and details, historically accurate, and free of error.

All potential contributors must contact the editor in advance of submitting articles and manuscripts in order to coordinate publication support and meet editorial requirements. Unsolicited submissions that have not been coordinated in advance may not be accepted or published.

Shorter news items, calendar events, award presentations, letters to the editor, and chapter news items may be sent at any time.

There is a finite amount of editorial space in the magazine and not all submissions can or will be used. It is best to contact the editor in advance and coordinate your submission.

Closing Date for Copy

Please contact the editor with your intention to contribute an article to ARMY AVIATION. Copy should be submitted so as to arrive at the magazine’s editorial offices on or before the dates indicated below unless modified by the editor. Accepted articles received on or before the dates below may be scheduled for publication in the issue indicated; late submissions may be held for a subsequent issue or dropped.

Issue Material Due Date
January 31 Nov. 9, 2023
February 28 Dec. 8, 2023
March Jan. 10
April/May+ Feb. 12
June 30 Apr. 10
July 31 May 10
August/September* July 10
October 31 Aug. 12
November 30 Sept. 10
December 31# Oct. 10

+ Aviation Mission Solution Summit Issue (copies distributed/mailed during the event)
* Annual Blue Book Aviation Directory (mailed end of September) – updates of data for units, offices or organizations have
a different suspense date and will be announced separately.
# Annual Industry Partner Directory – updates of data for companies and businesses have a different suspense date and will
be announced separately.

Clearance

In keeping with Defense Department and Army regulations, articles produced by Army organizations, service members or federal employees which state official policy or are intended to be official statements by individuals about some aspect of DoD or Army policy must be reviewed and cleared for publication by an appropriate servicing public affairs office in your organization’s chain of command. Please allow time for this clearance process and make sure your article is cleared BEFORE submission to the editor.

Editing of Submitted Materials

The magazine reserves the right to edit all manuscripts for style, grammar, historical accuracy, clarity, punctuation and length. Due to press deadlines, we cannot always provide copies of edited text to the author for final review prior to publication. We will endeavor to keep the author’s original concept, context, intent or idea when editing. We edit text in accordance with industry standards and primarily use the Associated Press Stylebook as our reference. Our exceptions to the AP Stylebook are for Army ranks and their abbreviations and U.S. Postal service two-letter state abbreviations. We use the Army’s standard 2- and 3-character capitalized alpha-numeric rank abbreviations to indicate ranks (i.e., PV2, SSG, 1SG, WO1, CW5, 1LT, COL, BG, MG, etc.). For all other non-Army ranks, we use the indicated AP rank abbreviations or service specified abbreviations (i.e., Air Force: Staff Sgt. (or SSgt)).

Use of Abbreviations and Acronyms

The author is required to spell-out all abbreviations and acronyms the first time they appear in the text. Help our readers to understand what you are referring to, don’t make them guess.

Article Reformatting Requirements

  • Word processor formats supported are Microsoft Word and ASCII text.
  • Authors will use the standard Times New Roman 12-point font, with 1-inch margins (top, left, right and bottom) in their documents. TABs will be set at “.13” of an inch.
  • Line spacing will be set at “single” space. DO NOT use “preset” spacing before or after paragraphs or double spacing.
  • DO NOT use the “Auto-numbering” or “Auto-paragraphing” for subparagraphs; manually type your numbers and subparagraph indicators.
  • DO NOT use “Auto Bullets;” instead use either the asterisk (*) or plus (+) symbols to indicate bulleted text.
  • DO NOT “center” or “justify” headlines or body text; instead, use LEFT alignment for all titles and text.
  • Manuscript length should not exceed 1,200 words; please contact the editor before submitting if you need to exceed the length limit.
  • If you do not understand these formatting requirements, please contact the editor.

Photos and Graphics

  • Photographs and graphic elements for use with an article must be sent as separate items or files; DO NOT embed
    photographs, charts or tables in your article Word document file.
  • Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Publisher files have a problem with embedded graphics that corrupts the image and/or
    renders them un-extractable or useable with our magazine publishing software.
  • Photographs should be scanned at a minimum resolution of 300 DPI (dots per inch); digital photographs should be taken at
    300 PPI (pixels per inch); and both be saved as a .JPG file.
  • On digital cameras, phone cameras, etc., a setting of 6 megapixels at 3008 x 2000 (approx.) or larger will produce the
    required minimum resolution for printing.
  • DO NOT scale up a low resolution image to achieve 300 DPI/PPI.
  • Supporting graphics (charts and tables) can be provided in PowerPoint or Excel format for each slide or chart to be used
    with the article. Photographs used in PowerPoint should be a minimum resolution of 300 DPI. We will convert the
    PowerPoint slide into a useable product. The font used in PowerPoint slides must be at least Arial 12 or Times New Roman
    12.
  • Contact the editor about use of other formatted graphics.

Imagery Captions and Credits

When submitting images (photos, graphics and charts) for use with an article, the author is required to identify the source and individuals who produced the imagery. It is ARMY AVIATION magazine’s policy to identify and give credit for visual products.

Imagery captions and credits need to be placed at the end of the manuscript or article. Each image should be identified by its file name and include a brief caption or cutline describing the people, equipment or action that is featured.

Example:


Photos and Cutlines

< 00325.JPG >
ARMY PHOTO BY SPC JOHNNY CREWCHIEF
A 1st Bn., 82nd Avn. Regt. UH-60 Black Hawk lands to insert Soldiers near Mazar-i-sharif, Afghanistan, Aug. 5, 2021.


Author By-lining of Articles

The magazine will not accept unsigned articles or comments for publication. An author’s given legal name must be provided with each submission. The writer may request that his or her name be withheld from publication; or the author may use a “nom de plume” when the article is printed. But all submissions must include the author’s legal name, office or job title, unit or organization, office address, and commercial business contact telephone numbers.

In addition, we encourage senior officers to recognize or share co-authoring with junior-ranking military and civilian individuals who contribute significantly to production of the article.

Each author is required to provide a brief “Author Bio-sentence” with his or her duty title, organization and location (installation, city and state, or country) at the end of the article.

Examples are:


Single Author: Mr. Army Civilian is the director of the Aviation Branch Safety Office, U.S. Army Aviation Center of
Excellence at Fort Rucker, AL.
Co-Authors: COL Hard Charger is the commander of the 101st Combat Aviation Brigade and MAJ Army Pilot is the commander of Company A, 1st Battalion, 101st Aviation Regiment. Both are assigned to Ft. Campbell, KY.
“Nom de plume” Author: The author is a chief warrant officer with 15 years of aviation experience and a veteran of Operation New Dawn, Fort Bragg, NC.


Submission of Materials

The easiest method of sending articles and materials is to submit via e-mail directly to the editor. Contact the editor at editor@quad-a.org or call (203) 268-2450, Ext. 142 for additional guidance.

Please note that it may be easier to post your submission materials to an FTP site from which we may download them.

There can be challenges when attempting to email file sizes greater than 15 megabytes in total size to us.

Articles and graphics may be submitted on CD/DVD. These disks must be accessible by standard CD-ROM readers.

Send materials on or before the due date to: Army Aviation Publications, Inc.; ATTN: Editor; 593 Main Street, Monroe, CT 06468-2806; Telephone: (203) 268-2450.

Letters to the Editor (Dear ARMY AVIATION)

Some topics or personal opinion editorials are best addressed as a letter-to-the-editor format and not as an article. In cases where the author is providing personal or non-official viewpoints, the magazine prefers to address the issue as a “Dear ARMY AVIATION” letter to the magazine. Maximum length for a letter is 200 to 250 words. Submission requirements are the same as for an article in regards to formatting, font sizes and use of abbreviations. Submitters must provide their name and contact information; however, names can be withheld upon request.

Industry News

ARMY AVIATION magazine covers industry related news from companies with news items directly related to the U.S. Army Aviation branch. We print 100-word or less “news briefs” and recently awarded U.S. government contract announcements. We typically do not run product endorsements; or news on products, services or materials that are not under some direct contract or purchase with the U.S. Army aviation community. Contact the editor for more information.

Award Announcements

ARMY AVIATION magazine prints the names of individuals recently honored with the Order of St. Michael and the Order of Our Lady of Loreto awards in the “AAAA NEWS” membership news section under the column heading of “AAAA Awards.” We do publish individual OSM and OLL award announcements on a space available basis. We require OSM/OLL submissions to include both a high resolution, quality photograph and a fully completed announcement form (Word document version). Forms may be downloaded from the AAAA website or requested by email from the AAAA National Office. Award announcements without photographs or without all required information, or that are not recent presentations (submitted within 1 month after the presentation) will not be published. Do not embed your photographs in the Word document. The magazine reserves the right to edit all submissions for style, grammar, historical accuracy, clarity, punctuation and length.

Chapter News

ARMY AVIATION magazine prints news of recent AAAA chapter activities that are considered to be news-worthy and of general interest to the Association. Contact the editor for submission guidance. The magazine reserves the right to edit all manuscripts for style, grammar, historical accuracy, clarity, punctuation and length.

In Memorial

ARMY AVIATION magazine attempts to honor recently deceased members of AAAA with a listing of their name in the “AAAA NEWS” membership news section under the column heading of “In Memoriam.” In some cases, the magazine runs an abbreviated obituary for AAAA members who have made a distinct and lasting contribution to the Association and/or the Aviation Branch (i.e., Medal of Honor recipients, Hall of Fame inductees, charter members and AAAA National Office service). Unfortunately, we do not have the editorial space to provide obituaries or long write-ups for every deceased member. We reserve the right to decline obituary submissions in lieu of listing the deceased individual’s name. The magazine reserves the right to edit all manuscripts for style, grammar, historical accuracy, clarity, punctuation and length.

Return of Copy

Authors must coordinate with the editor prior to submission if copy or any hard copy photographic materials are to be returned. The author is to provide an envelope bearing sufficient return postage and the return address information. Contact the editor to discuss.

Website

Visit the AAAA web site www.quad-a.org for additional magazine information, editorial and advertising information, and announcement forms for Orders of St. Michael and Our Lady of Loreto presentations.