Jared wrote:
While I was at work I heard a helicopter so I ran outside the shop and looked up and flying over(not too high) were too big army helicopters. I'm not sure what they were but anyway, just as they flew over I got this weird feeling in my stomach.
Yes Jared, I too get a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach when I see a flight of military helicopters go over- especially if they're Huey's. Good Lord, something might fly off of one of them at any time, injuring countless on the ground! Or if they're -47s, the torrential downpour of all the hydraulic fluid is enough to poison crops all along their flight path.
You obviously have "the bug" for flying. Fine. Well do something about it, man! I agree with Crab: stop mincing about like a Sheila and join the Army. ...Unless that mincing about like a Sheila is for real, in which case the Army probably wouldn't take you despite that "don't ask/don't tell" farce your military puts on.
I do not agree with tripletach. If you start off in mechanic training with the stated *real* intention of becoming a pilot, mechanics will consider you to be a poseur, a fake...someone who is not serious about mechanicking. You will be unmercifully ridiculed behind your back and possibly to your face. "Oh, not good enough to *just* be a mechanic?" they'll say out loud or just think to themselves. Mechanics/engineers are fiercely proud of their skills and ratings. Justifiably, too. Not everyone can be a good mechanic. I certainly cannot- I can barely figure out which end of a screwsaw to hold. Mechanics keep sending me out for another gallon of rotor wash. My safety wire pattern looks like a normal "S"- okay, maybe that last one's a little too esoteric. Point being, I'm no mechanic.
Finally, check out the report of the missing helicopter in the Gulf of Mexico. Just disappeared. Coast Guard sent out search aircraft- no trace yet found. The chances that the 206 is sitting on a little mound of marsh with it's crew enjoying a nice picnic lunch while waiting for the Coast Guard to find them are disappointingly slim. The chances that the 206 went right to the bottom are increasingly high.
Many pilots say to themselves (and others), "The risk of death does not bother me." They say this quite convincingly, and I'm sure they're sincere, just as I was at the start of my career. Not so anymore. Now the risk of death bothers me greatly. I find myself letting the more junior pilots take the riskier flights. I find myself opting for the twin when I have the choice even though "statistically" it's no safer than a single. Hey- I've made it this far without dying, why push my luck?
When I hear about fatal helicopter accidents I get a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. Because I know that for as long as I've been in this business...for as many times as I've done the same type of thing that the guy who crashed was doing...it could easily have been me that I'm reading about. (Wait, I probably wouldn't be reading about my own accident...oh nevermind.)
I used to think that dying in a helicopter crash would be noble or some bull!!!!. Yes, I would die "doing something he loved" and my family would understand and accept it. Bollocks! I've grown up, see. I don't want to die in a helicopter crash anymore. But the risk is always there. Always. We minimize it or ignore it or pretend it doesn't exist. But it does. It might not be *the* deciding factor in your career choice, but it ought to be one of them.