This is not a job for a flying enthusiast. Long haul sectors are, erm, long - and essentially boring. You'll get good at crosswords, reading (even the ops manuals are seen open on our flight decks!), small talk, looking out the window, etc, etc. You'll learn to live with one or two landings a month, and you can forget any demonstrations of flying prowess - it's all minimum handling and minimum risk stuff. You want to demonstrate how good you are at poling, get a share in an Extra 300 at the local flying club! Or join the RAF Reserve.
As for commuting, if you live somewhere that offers 5-10 flights daily to Heathrow, you may be able to justify travelling on the day of your flight. If there's only one or two flights daily from where you live, well, it's pretty obvious what you have to do.
Your time at home depends hugely on the kind of roster you have. If it's full of East Coast trips, you'll have up to six trips in the month and not a lot of time at home. If you have a Far East roster, you'll get away with three trips in the month and 17-18 days at home. Getting partners and friends away with you is not that straightforward; most trips these days are full. If you want to guarantee getting them home, you may be wise to buy (refundable) full-fare economy tickets. That said, it's fairly rare for flight deck companions to be left down route - but it's quite common for them not to get on the outbound flight!
Rosters: if I get time, I'll post or PM you a sample selection of rosters here next week - I'm away for the next few days.
Last edited by scroggs; 11th Sep 2004 at 07:45.