Warrant Officer Warrant officer (WO) is a Military rank, rank or category of ranks in the armed forces of many countries. Depending on the country, service, or historical context, warrant officers are sometimes classified as the most junior of the commissioned ...

Murugesvaran Subramaniam, is a senior

Royal Air Force The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of t ...

non-commissioned officer, who currently serves as the Warrant Officer of the Royal Air Force.

Early life

Subramaniam was educated in

Malaysia Malaysia is a country in Southeast Asia. Featuring the Tanjung Piai, southernmost point of continental Eurasia, it is a federation, federal constitutional monarchy consisting of States and federal territories of Malaysia, 13 states and thre ...

until the age of 19 when he moved to the UK. He earned a Bachelor of Law and a Diploma in Higher Education in Finance and Legal Studies from

Sheffield Hallam University Sheffield Hallam University (SHU) is a public research university in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England. The university is based on two sites; the City Campus is located in the city centre near Sheffield station, Sheffield railway station, whil ...

Military career

He joined the

British Army The British Army is the principal Army, land warfare force of the United Kingdom. the British Army comprises 73,847 regular full-time personnel, 4,127 Brigade of Gurkhas, Gurkhas, 25,742 Army Reserve (United Kingdom), volunteer reserve perso ...

and served in the Royal Engineers with 106 Field Squadron/12 Force (Air) Support Group, 36 Engineering Regiment. He then joined the

in 1998 and was posted to air defence duties at

RAF Neatishead Remote Radar Head Neatishead ( ), and commonly abbreviated RRH Neatishead, is an air defence radar site operated by the Royal Air Force (RAF). It is located approximately north-east of Norwich in the county of Norfolk, England. Originally kno ...

and subsequently

RAF Buchan Remote Radar Head Buchan or RRH Buchan is an air defence radar station operated by the Royal Air Force. It is located at Stirling Hill, south of Peterhead on the Aberdeenshire coast of northeast Scotland. The unit is based at the operations sit ...

. In 2004 he was posted to the Maritime Component Command Northwood as the Recognised Maritime Intelligence Operator, working in an Intelligence Production Cell (IPC) in support of

NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO ; , OTAN), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental organization, intergovernmental Transnationalism, transnational military alliance of 32 Member states of NATO, member s ...

maritime operations and

anti-submarine warfare Anti-submarine warfare (ASW, or in the older form A/S) is a branch of underwater warfare that uses surface warships, aircraft, submarines, or other platforms, to find, track, and deter, damage, or destroy enemy submarines. Such operations ar ...

. In 2007, he was reassigned to

RAF High Wycombe Royal Air Force High Wycombe or more simply RAF High Wycombe is a Royal Air Force station, situated in the village of Walters Ash, near High Wycombe in Buckinghamshire, England. It houses Headquarters Air Command, and was originally designed ...

, working on pan-government reliance operations, and also gained a number of qualifications while there. In 2010, he was selected for an assignment to

Buckley Air Force Base Buckley Space Force Base is a United States Space Force base in Aurora, Colorado named after United States Army Air Service First Lieutenant John Harold Buckley. The base is run by Space Base Delta 2, with major units including the U.S. Space ...

with the

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the Air force, air service branch of the United States Department of Defense. It is one of the six United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its ori ...

as part of the

Space-Based Infrared System The Space-Based Infrared System (SBIRS) is a United States Space Force system intended to meet the United States' Department of Defense infrared space surveillance needs through the first two to three decades of the 21st century. The SBIRS prog ...

(SBIRS) programme, where he qualified as a Systems Crew Chief, and later a Flight Chief.
In 2014, he returned to the UK and was posted to

RAF Fylingdales Royal Air Force Fylingdales (RAF Fylingdales) is a Royal Air Force List of Royal Air Force stations, station on Snod Hill in the North York Moors, England. Its motto is ''Vigilamus'' ("We are watching"). It is a radar Military base, base and i ...

as a Crew Chief, supervising the operation of the

Ballistic Missile Early Warning System The RCA 474L Ballistic Missile Early Warning System (BMEWS, 474L System, Project 474L) was a United States Air Force Cold War early warning radar, computer, and communications system, for ballistic missile detection. The network of twelve rada ...

(BMEWS). He would later take up the role of Deputy Plans and Mission Support Flight, which saw him posted back to

and service in principally administration jobs. In 2019, he was promoted to

(WO) and appointed as the commanding WO of the RAF's Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD) and the

Link 16 Link 16 is a military tactical data link network used by NATO members and other nations, as allowed by the MIDS International Program Office (IPO). Its specification is part of the family of Tactical Data Links. Link 16 enables military aircra ...

system. In 2021, he was appointed as the inaugural Command Warrant Officer to the

United Kingdom Space Command United Kingdom Space Command (UKSC) is a joint command of the British Armed Forces organised under the Royal Air Force, and staffed by personnel from the Royal Navy, British Army, Royal Air Force and the Civil Service. The UKSC has three funct ...

(UKSC), and the following year was selected as the first RAF WO to attend the Command Senior Enlisted Staff Course at

Baltic Defence College The Baltic Defence College (BALTDEFCOL) is a multinational military college that was established by the three Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) in 1999. It serves as a centre of strategic and operational research and provides professi ...

Estonia Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia, is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, and to the east by Ru ...

, where Subramaniam graduated with the Commandant's Award. He was appointed as the Warrant Officer of the Royal Air Force in April 2023.

Personal life

Subramaniam is married to a

civil servant The civil service is a collective term for a sector of government composed mainly of career civil service personnel hired rather than elected, whose institutional tenure typically survives transitions of political leadership. A civil service offic ...

who is also employed in the RAF, and they have one daughter. He enjoys many sports, such as

rugby Rugby may refer to: Sport * Rugby football in many forms: ** Rugby union: 15 players per side *** American flag rugby *** Beach rugby *** Mini rugby *** Rugby sevens, 7 players per side *** Rugby tens, 10 players per side *** Snow rugby *** Tou ...

hockey ''Hockey'' is a family of List of stick sports, stick sports where two opposing teams use hockey sticks to propel a ball or disk into a goal. There are many types of hockey, and the individual sports vary in rules, numbers of players, apparel, ...

and

cricket Cricket is a Bat-and-ball games, bat-and-ball game played between two Sports team, teams of eleven players on a cricket field, field, at the centre of which is a cricket pitch, pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two Bail (cr ...

. Subramaniam is

Hindu Hindus (; ; also known as Sanātanīs) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism, also known by its endonym Sanātana Dharma. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pp. 35–37 Historically, the term has also be ...

Awards and decorations

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Subramaniam, Murugesvaran Alumni of Sheffield Hallam University British military aviators British people of Tamil descent Living people Malaysian emigrants to the United Kingdom Malaysian people of Tamil descent Recipients of the Meritorious Service Medal (United Kingdom) Royal Engineers soldiers Warrant Officers of the Royal Air Force Year of birth missing (living people)