For those who have currently been pilots for 5+ years, are you glad you became a pilot?
Jammysticks - I’ve over a decade in a previous career, and the same again flying for airlines. I’ll try and answer your questions.
1) Does the job get boring after a few years? From what I understand, after you've become familiar with the aircraft, routes, procedures, etc, there is little intellectual challenge or room for creativity. Have you found this to be the case, and if so, how significantly does it impact on your enjoyment of the job?
Short answer, no. Crossing the ITCZ at night doing Mach 0.84 is never, ever boring. In fact I’d suggest being bored in the cruise is probably a good thing. Any job can get a bit ‘samey’ eventually, but as already mentioned, flying offers good opportunities to refresh the experience every now and then. Depending on where you end up, it may be possible to change base, seat or aircraft type. Or airline, obviously. Any of these can bring new challenges and enjoyment.
The intellectual challenge is there every time I fly, which is one reason I still enjoy the job. Familiarity with the aircraft, routes and SOPs comes with experience, but operating safely and efficiently as a crew in a highly dynamic environment is still a satisfying workout for my brain. Even now it gives me a buzz that I can jump into an aircraft with 2 or 3 other pilots who I’ve probably never met, and fly it 5,000 miles. And if the passengers find it boring, I’ll take that as a compliment.
What has changed is my perspective. When I started off I was overjoyed to have achieved my dream, and fizzing with excitement. I can still remember scraping the ice off my car at 4am and driving to work with a silly big grin on my face - and that was 3 or 4 years into the job. The novelty has long since worn off, and I could spend all day listing the downsides of flying, but fundamentally I still enjoy it; the mental challenge (see above), the views, the opportunities to travel the world and do things I’d never have done in my previous life (e.g. jungle trekking in Malaysia, snorkelling in the Red Sea, cycling across the Golden Gate bridge, dining al fresco in Rat Alley in Hong Kong...). And I’m lucky enough to have a salary that funds a decent lifestyle, even when part time.
2) How realistic a possibility do you think it is that the job will be lost to automation in the coming decades? Of course, only somebody who is both a pilot and an AI expert could answer this with a high degree of certainty, but I would still like to get a sense of what the general sentiments are on this!
I fly one of the most modern airliners out there. It can autoland but there’s a big long list of system / technical failures that will prevent it doing so. It can plan a vertical path from top of descent to touchdown, but invariably, real-world considerations (weather, traffic, ATC vectoring or speed control, etc etc) will require human intervention to manage the flightpath efficiently and safely. Interpreting the weather radar is art as much as science. And that’s before we get on to some of the more entertaining software glitches and gotchas. It’s a state of the art aircraft, but the tech has a long, long way to go before we’re flying 200+ passengers around in pilotless airliners. I’d be surprised if it happens in my lifetime.
3) What surprised you about the job, good or bad? What might I not be factoring into my considerations here?
Good stuff: The teamwork, camaraderie and social life of regional flying – still the most fun I’ve ever had at work. The fact that I never stop learning, and that I’m still enthusiastic about my job (as are colleagues with 20-30 years experience). The way aviation is an incredibly small world, and everyone seems to know (or know of) just about everyone else. The views from the office window. 1st class desserts.
Bad stuff. Fatigue. Constant erosion of terms and conditions. The lack of job security – even in an airline that until last year had never made a pilot redundant. Being checked in the sim every 6 months. The knowledge that a problem at my annual medical could mean game over. The way rostering can make or break your quality of life. The inability to attend family get-togethers unless planned a year in advance.