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I want to be a professional (non-airline) pilot when I grow up
- Thread starter Gatordev
- Start date
(Just kidding. Go get a beverage... fun to watch.)
Domestically, the biggest non-govt employers are EMS and the oil companies. I will let someone else speak of EMS as I do not have first hand experience. However the oil companies in the GOM generally work 7 on / 7 off or 14 on / 14 off. You will start a shift on Tue, Wed, or Thu. Generally the progression is from VFR PIC to IFR SIC to IFR Captain. Small ships (VFR only) such as the 206L4 and 407 work fields - lot of takeoff and landings. Mediums (Bell 412, Sikorsky S-76, Augusta 139) as well as Heavy's (Airbus 225 and Sikorsky S-92) generally fly back and forth to the same big platforms.
International oil and gas is 28/28, 42/42, or 60/60 depending on the company and the aircraft.
As for websites, www.justhelicopters.com is domestic, www.jsfirm.com is primarily domestic and www.pprune.org is international.
International oil and gas is 28/28, 42/42, or 60/60 depending on the company and the aircraft.
As for websites, www.justhelicopters.com is domestic, www.jsfirm.com is primarily domestic and www.pprune.org is international.
Other than a minority of corporate jobs, all these jobs are low paying time builders to get to that coveted seat at the majors...not careers.
Working with many contract FW guys here in the 'Stan from all branches, also have a contact with AAR flying Pumas. As I get ready for leaving the service myself, jsfirm.com was mentioned, some of the larger EMS companies have sites one can post resumes to.
I think that's a bit of a loaded statement. I seem to have read that in the last year, that may be the case, and that over the last <small period of time>, the industry's record hasn't been stellar, but I think the actual facts are a bit more complicated. Things like a VFR operator versus an IFR operator come into play.
One could say that for FY14, F-18s are the most deadliest gig in Naval Aviation (7 Class As). But obviously there's more to the story than just that (5 H-60 Class As).
Single engine/single pilot VFR EMS operations has a pretty bad run over the last decade or so. Lots of "going into a zone at night on NVGs and balling it up" or losing and engine and Auto-ing to the deck. There's been a pronounced shift to multi-engine/multi pilot IFR operations due largely to insurance rates skyrocketing for VFR ops.
Back in the day, most of the offshore stuff was single engine, single pilot. Nowadays, it is mainly multi-engine, multi-pilot. Good news for us as it means more pilots. A few of the other rules were that single engine could not take off until after sunrise and had to be on deck 30 minutes prior to sunset. Gotta get up early!
Fire jobs pay well especially if you can get on with someone like Calfire since it's year round. Downside is you're gone a lot in the summer. Problem with rotor jobs is they pay less than fixed wing. Course some people are not happy with making $120k plus in the airlines.
I will say that my friends who have fought fires said it was the most fun flying they ever did.
This thread seems as good of a home for my rumor mongering. Just met a CBP employee at my kid's music lessons. She said that they're going be opening hiring for RW pilots soon and will have multiple openings.
Also am in a class with a VR (herc) bubba who said that there's now an established pipeline to transition former Helo drivers with no FW time to the Herc. So SELRES FW flying for former helo bubbas is now possible if you're willing to spend the time in Corpus.
Also am in a class with a VR (herc) bubba who said that there's now an established pipeline to transition former Helo drivers with no FW time to the Herc. So SELRES FW flying for former helo bubbas is now possible if you're willing to spend the time in Corpus.
I had a looooong talk with several CBP A&M recruiters a couple of weeks ago. BL: they are desperate for pilots. While they're not really changing their requirements (other than working on legislating the removal of the poly for SECRET holders, not just TS), they seem to be willing to be very flexible in how they interpret the requirements. They're also able to hire not just from USAJobs, but also push a direct hire request to HR and go around OPM. Apparently offers to start the various wickets of the process can come as soon as a week after the application is submitted. Also, apparently of the 5,000 new hires for border security, 500 of them will be A&M, which is a staggering number given how small they already are.
Several of the recruiters were prior Army guys and while they were still recruiters, if you talked with them for a bit and asked good questions, they could see you were generally interested in the job and would word their answers a little differently to try and give an honest answer rather than just, "It's great! Join now!"
As someone who has a little over a year left and still would need a disability rating to get hired, they wanted my resume on the spot, which they then scanned into the system so I was already on file.
That's been sort of an on again/off again thing in VR for a while. Some years they don't take helo guys, other years it's OK as long as you did a fixed wing tour along the way (i.e. station pilot or primary IP). Sometimes the business rules are different for SELRES and FTS flying backgrounds, sometimes not.
About five years ago or maybe longer now, there was a helo guy in one of the VR squadrons who wasn't doing so well and the command FNAEB'ed him. He found something in an instruction somewhere that said they should have sent him, being a helo guy with no airplane time since primary, to a multiengine short course (for example, modified advanced in Corpus). Long story short, his Congressman saw it his way. That sent some, uh, ripples through the VR community for a few years and there no more helo bubbas for a while (unless you'd done a f/w tour). There's more to it than that but those are the salient points.
There's a modified advanced syllabus in every pipeline. It's basically a template for transitioning pilots, occasionally used, and of course it can get tailored to individuals, case by case. Also, of course, it costs money...
Customs & Border Protection. I spent 22 years flying with them. (I've been retired for a few years, so my info might be somewhat dated.) Basically, you get hired after a long process, go to FLETC for 4 months to learn how to be a cop (Air Interdicton Agent), report to your assigned branch, and then begin training in various aircraft. You do not have to "pay your dues on the street." If you report to a legacy Border Patrol branch, you'll likely fly small helicopters and light aircraft, primarily looking for border crossers. If you report to a legacy Customs Service branch, you might fly Astars, Blackhawks and maybe transition into Cessna Citations, flying patrols looking for air smugglers, airspace security missions, air surveillance support to special agents, etc. Your first year you will be a GS-11, the next year a 12, and then a 13, all with an additional 25% LEAP, Law Enforcement Availability Pay, which means they own your ass at all times, just like the military. Retirement is good, as long as you have enough discipline to max out the Thrift Savings Plan and never, ever touch it until you retire after 20. A large percentage of CBP pilots are former military and bring their attitudes and sense of comaraderie with them.
I've no idea how CBP will get 5,000 new agents, or even 500, as long as the current hiring process and poly are in place.