Commercial Pilot Late Starters

[Mamakim]

Hi All,

Am approaching 30 years of age and am thinking of a career change....

Just wondering how many commercial pilots out there started to fly professionally later on in life and:

Did it help you when you first started out due to your age?

Did you find that you progressed quicker due to life experience and other skills from previous work that you could bring to the job?

Did you find it to be worse or better than what you thought?

What was your first job?

Where are you now?

Has it been worth it?



Thanks all........

[Capt Claret]

Just wondering how many commercial pilots out there started to fly professionally later on in life and:

1. Did it help you when you first started out due to your age?

2. Did you find that you progressed quicker due to life experience and other skills from previous work that you could bring to the job?

3. Did you find it to be worse or better than what you thought?

4. What was your first job?

5. Where are you now?

6. Has it been worth it?


[list=1]
Started learning @ 26 yrs, first full time job at 29, now 48. I don't think my age helped but it didn't hurt either. Having a wife & 2 kids made it hard from the perspective that one couldn't really pack the car and head bush.

I don't think so. Almost every employer I've worked for was seniority oriented.

Hard to answer. Nothing said to me could convince me not to try. A raft of retrenchments in the early 90's was disheartening but I have learned that life goes on, and where at the time I thought I'd never fly again, I know that to be a fairly unrealistic view.

Casual joy flights over Eildon Weir, xmas to easter, '84 & '85. First full time flying job was instructing at The Space Base AKA NASA and then CATA, Feb '86 to Dec '87.

Alice on an overnight ;). Seriously, LHS of a 146 and with some luck and application, soon a B717.

ABSOLUTELY. Ups and downs like anything. But until this year, I'd had close to 20 years of being paid to have a good time. It's only recent changes that have taken the gloss off for me.
[/list=1]

[ravan]

G'day Mamakim
I started at 41 years old for a change of career. Didn't have the money when I was younger and was too lazy to work 2 or 3 jobs to provide the money. When I finally got the cash I thought "Never die wondering" so got stuck in and did it.

Being older certainly made me appreciate the need to work hard at it and I had learned the required discipline to get on with the job.

After getting the bare CPL I went to an Instructor Rating. Life experience helped to make up for some of the flying inexperience and helped me to get the job initially.

The last 8 years have been spent continuing the learning from working with people more experienced than me and slowly becoming a better pilot (I hope!)

I was lucky to get work with the company I trained with and have been able to pick up some charter experience with them as well as instructing.

I sometimes envy those who started young because the learning curve for them would have been tough but the opportunities for career advancement are many and varied. If there is anything that I regret it would be the fact that career opportunities get pretty limited as you get older. Combined with the fact that my wife has a well established career and can't be chasing me around the countryside while I look for other aviation jobs which may or may not pay more than what I earn now, this lack of opportunity has narrowed down the prospects somewhat. It would appear that G A will be where I spend my aviation career and that would be my only disappointment I think. Not a bad sector of the industry to pass through on the way to something better but best not to get stuck there!

Anyway enough rambling.... "what was your first job?" and "where are you now?" -- Same company I trained with, now working as instructor/charter pilot.

"has it been worth it?" -- absolutely, at least I'll never "die wondering"

Should you do it? Only you can answer that but with you being only 30 I would think that there will still be enough opportunities out there for anyone willing to work hard and plenty of reward in the career.

Best of luck and I hope you enjoy the ride!
:ok:

[sir.pratt]

i'll be getting my cpl before the end of the year, at 37. self funded, self studied. will look for instuctors rating after that - not sure whether to go flight school/aero club or self study - there are benefits with both. and i WON'T die wondering. btw - went solo in may 2004.

[permFO]

CC- Just interested in what the glossy bits were that no longer shine for you?

[Capt Claret]

PermFO

The farce that is securty screening in this day and age.

I'd be interested to know if the security folks have detected any real weapons. Not scissors or the pilot's leatherman, or the F/O's aerosol deodorant..... :yuk:

In my humble opinion, given that I hold an ASIC card and I've been checked by ASIO, AFP, local law enforcement and god knows which other organisation/s, why do I need to undress and re-dress just to get to my aeroplane?

I object to being presumed to be a terrorist before I board the aeroplane I'm about to command, and remember that on Sept 11 it was the aeroplanes that were the weapons.

I am deeply saddened that the country I was born into, where one was free to visit one's local, state/territory, or federal parliament, without being strip searched, has gone. In my opinion this is almost entirely due to our federal government sticking its nose where it didn't belong.

Once I get to the aeroplane I still love my job, but where 12 month ago, if I won lotto I'd be at work the next day, now, I'd probably be there to hand in my notice.

[ITCZ]

Then you will not be pleased to know that 'beginning of shift" drug and alcohol testing is in the pipeline as well.

[Capt Snooze]

'Then you will not be pleased to know that 'beginning of shift" drug and alcohol testing is in the pipeline as well.'


Now that proposal actually has some logic in it, as opposed to the security checks!

But let's apply it to everyone working around aircraft. Some of the ground staff display signs of recent usage occasionally! Aviation is a dangerous work environment for everyone.


(Disclaimer: I don't want to see it either, but it has a lot more logic than the security stuff.)



Snooze

[ITCZ]

Capt Snooze, maybe, but the devil is in the detail. Who will be tested? How often? Who will be doing the testing, and will they be as 'thoroughly' trained as the friendly Group 4 staff we now deal with?

Back to the thread...

Got my first fulltime flying job at age 30. Now sitting with 2 hairdryers, erm turbofans either side and quite happy with the view, if not the struggle to get from my car to the aeroplane first thing of a morning.

Nothing particularly special about me or my circumstances. So there is nothing stopping you from doing the same.

Good luck!:ok:

[Capt Snooze]

ITCZ,

Couldn't agree more!

My point was merely the relative likehood of a crewmember being affected by alcohol or other, as opposed to he or her being a suicidal terrorist.

Back to the thread.

Mamakim.

As you may glean from many of the threads on this forum, the career you’re contemplating has many negatives. Having said that many of us have had an interesting life (I was going to say career) in the job, and have managed to be financial at the end of it, give or take a divorce or two.
However, your question related to a late start. Thirty five years ago, and up to perhaps fifteen years ago, this was a valid concern. The only way to the sophisticated equipment and hence ‘the money’ was through the major airlines. I still have in my possession a letter from Ansett noting that ‘your date of birth precludes you from further consideration’, this at the age of twenty-six. Later when this became discriminatory, the age to experience ratio was applied to a similar effect.
The industry today has changed. The majors are no longer the only road to success, and sadly are no longer a guaranteed road to success. The regionals and supplementals now are viable career paths and are less concerned about late starters. Additionally, the pay and work conditions at the majors are now on a downward path bringing them closer to the regional conditions. Long haul pay and conditions are progressively approaching a situation where they no longer compensate for the negative lifestyle aspects of the job. In other words, there is now a career path outside the major airlines, and the major airlines themselves are less attractive. We are in fact back to the late forties and early fifties in terms of opportunities and relative conditions. Because of this, age is not as important, and is some circumstances an asset.
Having said that, the path from zero to the regionals is tough. It was tough forty years ago when I started, and sometimes I think it’s tougher now, although it’s very hard to judge from my current perspective. I suspect I would be less tolerant of what I did then, today. If you are older and therefore more likely married or partnered, and particularly if you have kids, it’s tougher. You will need to be flexible, patient, and persistent. You will need to ‘keep your nose clean’, and ‘network, network, network’ to use the current buzz words.
In one sense you are asking the wrong question. Perhaps it should be, do I want to take on this particular career, as opposed to my current one? Age, pre-thirties at least, is really not a factor. If you choose to do it, good luck. I hope it works out for you.


Snooze

[permFO]

Thanks CC-I can't imagine that the drug and alcohol testing is going to be anything other than harsh. There go the overnights. You won't be able to risk having a bottle of wine with dinner for fear of having it still in your system the following morning.
It was interesting reading the report on VXF where one of the contributing factors was the temperature in the cockpit. Pre 9/11 the crew would just open the cockpit door to allow the cabin air into the cockpit but now the crew has to cope with potentially dangerous temperatures. By dangerous I mean it obviously affected their judgement.

[Mr Whippy]

Mamakim,

I know someone who recently got a command on regional turboprops... his age? mid 50's. He's been in the industry for 10 years. It's definitely feasible, just depends how bad you want it.

[MOR]

I started acquiring licences at 26 and had my first commercial job at 30 (flying a B25 Mitchell bomber - great first job! Sadly it was only for a short period).

I went to the UK and ended up a training captain on a 146.

I enjoyed every minute of it, but I'm with Capt Claret - it isn't the job it used to be. Pilots used to be trusted and held in high regard. Not any more - these days you are just an aerial bus driver. Pay, conditions, respect and job satisfaction have all diminished.

My beef isn't so much with security - although it is a joke in Europe - but with the way the job has changed. You can blame the Low Cost carriers for that.

When I first started, it was always understood that you wouldn't work more than about 60 hours per month, and that Crewing would always accomodate reasonable requests for changes and days off. We were all trusted to only call in sick if we really were, and to go easy on the galley supplies.

When I stopped, we were working to max hours all the time, Crewing had completely stopped negotiating days off and other requests, all sickness was being investigated, and we now have to pay for anything we grab from the galley.

In short, pilots have become a commodity to many airlines, and the trust and respect has largely gone. The effect on morale has been profound. I'm not sure I woud want to be starting now.

The good news is that, if you can get to Europe, you have a good chance of progressing quickly to command and beyond. I have had two 40+, low-hour acquaintances get into BA recently. I have trained a lot of guys in their mid-40's, starting their first airline job.

Of course it may be a lot harder in Oz...

[overpitched]

Another way to go for a late starter is go rotary wing. For whatever reason the average age of starters in the helicopter industry seem to be older.

In my late 20's I did a couple of fixed wing lessons but didn't really enjoy it. Once in a helicopter I never looked back.

I recieved my commercial licence at 33 y.o and it took about 7 years to get the hours to get out of the bush and get a job flying a news chopper in a capital city. And I think that would be about average.

The industry is no better that fixed wing GA but the flying is a heap of fun, of course there is no flash airline job waiting for you at the end of it all.

[Howard Hughes]

of course there is no flash airline job waiting for you at the end of it all.

It actually sounds a lot like the fixed wing stuff to me.

If I could do it all again, I'd certainly be going the heli route!! What an amazing job it must be flying one of those big EMS machines!!

Cheers, HH.

:ok:

[tinpis]

Another thing to definitely factor into your planning is ill health.

Have a look at few pilits close up sometime, the 50 year old looking ones are generally in their 30's
I get asked where my daughter is quite often(my wife) and when out shopping with my daughter she is often complimented on taking her old grandad for an outing

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