Min Req.

[4Rvibes]

What are the minimum requirements in the company you presently work for, for Police and/or EMS pilots. Has it gone down or up recently considering the lack of pilots gained from the military.
Do the ex-mil guys see civil trained pilots as inferior, or is that another topic...

[Out of Balance]

Let's not start an 'us and them' topic again please. If you are refering to the mainly military backgrounds of pilots flying Police and EMS it is because they quite often have relevant prior experience of these tasks. Employers in any industry would look for relevant prior experience in prospective employees.

There are civil trained pilots flying Police and EMS in the UK. They are equally capable and have put just as much effort into gaining that relevant prior experience.

[ravenx]

Lets ignore the us / them aspect. I would be interested to know if people think its realistic to get one of these jobs withut military experience. I once called medical aviation services (who supply a large proportion of the EMS geezers in the UK) to be told they employ 82 pilots of which 80 were ex-military. Apparently most of the customers insist the pilots are ex-military.

Anyone out there not ex-mil and doing this job. If so I think we'd be interested to hear how you did it and what hoops you had to jump through in process.

[212man]

Well, one of my colleagues has just resigned to go to a large EMS and police operator (Bo 105s and EC135s) with no military experience (though admitedly SAR and Falklands) and another joined them a couple of months ago, again with no prior military background. Two others I know left a while ago and went to the Manchester ASU.

So it can happen. I still think it naiive though be suprised by the number of ex military guys doing the job. Of course an operator wants someone who can jump straight into the job with the minimum amount of line training and liability. There is no suggestion that no prior experience suggests inferiority, it is a simple operational reality. Similarly someone with N,000 hours onshore in a B206 would not jump into an offshore command.

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Another day in paradise

[Droopy]

Right, here goes, deep intake of breath:- It's difficult to give hard and fast requirements; you will find that the contracting companies have subtly different requirements from the forces that employ direct, for example;-

>A direct force will be looking at personality and commitment as much as background because training and employment requirements mean you need to get a good run for your money.

>The directly employed pilot can't be easily changed once hired so the employer needs to be confident that in addition to ability they'll be easy to work with; this isn't always so easy to achieve - we interviewed some years back and had two chaps with exemplary qualifications, but there were aspects of their personalities which clearly ruled them out of doing long shifts as part of a small crew, often day in day out.

>The typical contract employer is looking for low training requirements and especially flexibility, as new pilots are commonly used as leave relief "floaters" [CAA term not mine]. The latter may well result in a leaning towards ex-military as they are often used to moving around, though of course many of them leave the military to try and establish a more settled lifestyle. This in turn can lead to a common experience of a high turnover of pilots which I'd suggest has been a problem with all the contract employers. At a guess I'd say that the average ASU sees between 1 and 2 new pilots a year on a 3 or 4 crew unit. We've had 2 changes in 6 years.

I would question how many clients actually specify ex-military; the truth is perhaps more along the lines of those are the people who've been supplied and generally they've been pretty good.

>It's undoubtedly true that an ex-mil pilot is more likely to have the relevant low level night experience but that's only part of the package and can be trained for.

Finally - if you're still awake - don't forget that qualifications apart, someone who comes into this game should be happy with the prospect of flying perhaps only 20 hours a month in often challenging conditions.

[ravenx]

you've all mentioned the "right sort of experience". What exactly do you thnk they are looking for as a minimum for EMS work, and how do you get the low level experience without being in a job that requires low level flying and more than likely (and here comes the catch 22) low level experience

[Droopy]

ravenx
We specify absolute minima of 2000hrs total with 1500hrs P1 of which 500hrs VMC low level, 500hrs twin; most operators will have very similar requirements. What seems to be becoming apparent is that as the numbers of available experienced pilots reduces, there seems to be a push from the contracting companies to persuade the clients to accept slightly lower experience levels. The problem with this is establishing just how far down the experience ladder one can go; breadth and variety are just as important as quantity but one needs an outstanding applicant to go beyond a certain level.

Yes, it is a catch-22; there is no substitute for going out and doing your time in as many roles as you can and without belittling emergency services work remember that it is a relatively small niche in the bigger aviation world. Not everyone takes to it; lots and lots of time spent just waiting.

[ravenx]

So if I told you I had just pased my PPL and due to finances have only managed to fly 1.5 hours, but I promise I'll be really good at it - would that persuade you to give me a job - I'll work really really hard - Honest