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Old 18th Mar 2014, 08:48
  #10 (permalink)  
Old and Horrified
 
Join Date: Jan 2010
Location: Midlands
Age: 78
Posts: 119
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I speak as one who funded his son to pursue his dream about 5 years ago. He ended up with a CPL(H) and I ended up about £60k poorer. Hoever, I did have a lot of fun with him on hours building trips around the country. There is nothing quite like arriving by helicopter at a hotel landing site for lunch, even in a R22!

Since then he has been able to get bits a pieces of work, thanks to the generosity of the flying school he went to. All other efforts to get work failed.

The result was that he managed to get about 20 to 30 hours paid work a year, enough to cover costs (OPC etc) but little else. Luckily he had another job which paid reasonably well. Last year was the quietest ever for ad hoc flying work, hardly any weddings for example. From my perspective job prospects for a low hours CPL have been getting progressively worse and show little signs of improving in the near future.

My son has now moved overseas working in a completely different field. He will renew his license this year, but only so that he can do pleasure flying at a later date when he becomes rich.

I agree with all those comments above and so my advice to you is the same - don't.
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