Originally Posted by
excrab
I’ve always tried to encourage anyone who wants to fly for a living, but….
I’ve worked for four flying clubs, only one of which now exists, three corporate operators, none of which are still flying, and seven airlines, only two of which are still in business. I’ve been made redundant from airlines twice, and each time spent most of the family’s savings to live while searching for another job, and now find myself at the age of sixty two either getting up at three in the morning to go to work, or landing at four in the morning to finish work. I get to see horrible grimy parts of airports that passengers never see and spend hours waiting in the night for ambulifts and crew busses that are horribly late or never turn up. I might or might not work for a major uk tour operator whose management don’t give a stuff that any of it’s pilots or cabin crews who were flying on the morning that free bidding for winter leave opened cannot book a single weekend day off between October this year and March 2024.
Of the thirty eight years and almost twenty thousand hours of my flying career so far, it would be fair to say that the most enjoyable were the seven years at the beginning that I spent instructing for a decent flying club that treated it’s staff well, and was prepared to help finance advanced instructor ratings, so kept instructing interesting. All the rest was just done for money.
Drive the train, have a life that your family can enjoy, earn good money in a secure job protected by proper union recognition and which has a decent and secure pension scheme. Fly for fun, instruct as a hobby.
“Why do we still wish to fly commercially ?” Because we have to make our own mistakes, and people only give us the advice that we want to hear…
I will say that compared to the “aviation dream” sold on social media, pprune is a far healthier balance - although of course it does on occasion swing too far the other way.