What’s the best prank in uniform you've seen? Comment below!

Discreetly telling a 2LT that her rank was on upside down, then watching the scramble.

When I checked into a school at NAS JAX after AIT, the duty NCO sent me to the next barracks to ask for 50yards of flight line. The duty NCO there said they'd just used the last of it and sent me to the next barracks. After that one, I figured out that it was a prank and went back to my assigned barracks and told the NCO he was a very funny guy.

I once pranked our civilian secretary. Smoking inside was forbidden by this time, so whenever she was away from her desk, I'd light a match. You could smell it, but of course there was no real smoke. She wandered around all day, asking, "Do you smell smoke?" She was very good natured about it once we told her.

I was the LCPO (Leading Chief Petty Officer) on staff and when we deployed we supplemented the staff with TAD personnel from our battle group. Since I had access to service records I instructed all the staff members to begin making statements concerning how much one of our TAD workers looked like me, not all at once but over a period of four months or so -. Eventually one evening we got around to "sea stories" about our previously lives and I told a story about how I used to ride shotgun on a delivery truck while I was in high school. Named this man's town, the street (lived on Oak St. I said Maple St. (which actually made it more believable)) he lived in, etc. and stated the year I was doing this. OBVIOUSLY I talked about how this housewife would invite me in and as a 16 year I was introduced to the adult Disneyland. By this time he'd turned white and was freaking out, only let it go on for about two more minutes and then told him he'd been set up for the last four months. More mature now and I kind of regret just how freaked out he became. But at the time, in the Gulf was just something you did to your shipmates.

Someone snuck into the provost marshal's office and switched out the national anthem tape for morning colors and put in a Led Zeppelin tape.

(Part 2 of 2)
One day he came down downstairs and found his beloved beetle to be MIA. Since the Fang Gang shop was close by he came storming to see if any of us... I mean THEM had seen anything. In particular, he was looking for me since I was acting NCOIC at the time. Well, his "storming in" changed to, what could only be described as, "shock & awe" when he stepped into the line shack on that cold winter morning and came face to face with the tail lights of his beetle as it sat in the middle of the floor with Marines sitting around drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes (yes, we used to actually smoke inside in those days) as if nothing unusual was going on.
"Good morning SgtMaj." "Can we help you SgtMaj?" "What brings down here SgtMaj?"
Let's just say that the non-PC, colorful metaphors and expletives that he unleashed that morning turned the very air a nice shade of Navy blue.
It seems that some stalwart, mischievous, wrench-turners had decided that they would simply pick up the SgtMaj's car, bring it up two steps, and put it in the middle of the line shack.
After he settled down just a tiny bit, shouts of "welcome to the squadron SgtMaj" could be heard from everyone in the shack as well as those who had gathered outside to watch the explosion, followed by boisterous laughter as the wind was taken completely out of the SgtMaj's sails.
Being the respectful Marines that they were, they offered to pick up his beetle and take it back down the steps and place it on the hardtop for him.
How I wish I had a photograph of his face.
Sadly, after that, we couldn't get rid of him. The SgtMaj decided that his "secondary" office would be in the line shack keeping a good-natured eye on "that bunch of hooligans that stole my bug".
At least that's the way I heard it!

OH the SSG TC'sMY!!! Where do I start?? This one is the initiation for Butterbars on the tank. First round down range is assisted with his headgear, ie: beret or patrol cap. :)

Shooting tank gunnery at Hood, summer, hot and dusty as hell. Up in the range tower the SSG TCs and PSGs were there evaluating the crews when I noticed my Loader walking by. And he's carrying the water bottle from the gunners station. Now this Soldier came to me from Korea, 5'6 and 265lbs. It was a good 1/8 of a mile from boresite line to the mechanics. He disappears behind the trees. Then he come walking back thru, bottle empty. I asked my PSG what was going on with Chunk? He sent him on the task of getting TIS coolant to the TIS system. TIS = Thermal Imaging System. There's no such thing. Guess you had to be there. It's a tanker thing.

New Pvt in the PLT. Sent him down with a tire pressure gauge sheets of paper of each tank with lines drawn to each road wheel to write the PSI on. We lost track of time and thinking he'd be back within a half hr. So we (SPC & below) went searching for him. We found him under one of the tanks hiding and afraid. He didn't want to come back bc he couldn't find the valve stems to check the PSI. Oppps.

We had a SGT being promoted to SSG in Graf. After being pinned, the CO put him in the front leaning rest and started knocking them out. Well, a bunch of the other SSG's snuck up with 2 full cans of garbage from the Mess Hall and dumped it on him. OH MY.....it reeked!!! The new SSG bulldogged them and dragged them into the pile of stench. Great laugh.

It eventually became well known that a test for trainees at the prototype nuclear reactor, was to put a tiny piece of paper between the contacts of a switch, so when it was supposed to close a circuit, it wouldn't. He was supposed to respond to the resultant problem, and it tested his troubleshooting. Later, aboard ship, I was called to the reactor control console to fix a non-starting auxillary pump. When I traced the circuit with my meter, I found an open stop switch, which usually sits closed until pushed. I told the operator to push the stop button and try again. It worked. My offer to inspect the switch was declined. I still wonder if that hoary old trick was tried on me...

New aboard the ship, but already been in for 8 months, I got sent for a bucket of steam. I grabbed a bucket and headed over to the ice cream stand on Pier 1 in Newport. Got a chunk of dry ice, put it in he bucket, a little water, and covered it with a towel and returned the "steaming" bucket to the perpetrator.

Kool-aid powder in the shower head, or edge dressing on the bare feet of someone passed out...