Ok, deep breath, here goes.....
(First a quick aside.....funny how some posters seem to think their opinions are actually facts while ours remain simply opinions! But anyway, that's for another day).
AWACS, great you replied. Still don't quite understand your figures - under £14 an hour for your hour building - wow! And with hindsight, that £33000 would have gone a long way to getting you an fATPL and very near your dream already. There you go.
But hey, you've still got £20000 - at your age this is such a leg up into professional flying. A little work in something that you don't have to sign your life away for and you'll be qualified at a very young age. This means a huge advantage in experience and seniority down the line.
I'll be blunt though. You're so well placed to make your flying dream come true and yet you seem reluctant to make it happen. In my book that means you don't want it enough. Simple as that.
By the time you're forty you could have thousands of hours on jet aircraft, be a Captain, perhaps a training Captain even (all dependant on aptitude and a good dose of luck of course). Or........you could be coming out of the RAF and starting to look for a job. If you get one, a lot of the Captains you fly with will be younger than you and have far more experience than you could dream of...........
In summary, it's your choice, as it should be. But for anyone who loves flying, one dream seems so out of balance with the other. No harm to fighter controllers or anything, but it's not like you're saying your other dream is to be in the Royal Marines or SAS..................now that I could understand more.
Only you can tell..............
(I still have a problem understanding your finances, but that's another thing).
Last edited by Maximum; 5th May 2008 at 19:20.