Flying for a private owner...
 

Hello everyone,

I would be interested to fly for a private owner on a single turbine or single pilot jet as a safety pilot. (eg. M registered SET, C525, non AOC operation, etc...)

Is there any agency in Europe who recruits for private owners?

Many thanks

No agency. You need to somehow meet /chat with the pilot that flies the owner, or if he flies himself, you need to meet him/her. Start hanging out at the airfield where these planed are based, no easy, but can be done.

Fresh Flyer

I agree with the other post in that networking is vitally important, get yourself noticed and liked

You are unlikely to get much if anything in pay and cannot log the hours in a meaning full way so it would be purely for experience.

You have not detailed your licences, hours flown and types?

Pace

If you want some experience there is no better way than sitting RHS in a single crew airplane. As Pace quite rightly points out, you won't be able to log the time because you won't be a required crew member.

If I were in your shoes I would look at the IOM register which is available on their web site to identify the single crew types, then drop the owners (shell companies mostly) a letter to say you are keen to build some experience and would love to help them out.

Even if you do get a few hours that you cannot count, it will be a great learning opportunity and a way to start the most important thing, which is networking.

Good luck!

Great advice.
Thank you for sharing.

Unless your experience level is such that you cannot be hired in the right seat of an aircraft that REQUIRES two pilots or you can work in a single pilot operation yourself I would NOT recommend this.


How will you obtain valid and useful experience if you cannot legally log the time ? This seems like a waste of it.


You are much better off flying the most modest light aircraft and gaining your OWN loggable experience you can then use to move up to the next bigger / more sophisticated aircraft and so on / so forth.


It worked for me.

Nope, you can log anything you like. You can and should log safety pilot time. When you are applying for a rating / endorsement / renewal, the authorities may disregard it, or it may make a difference.

@Booglebox
no, you can't log anything.
Clearly it's against the regs for me to watch a plane fly overhead and for me to log the time.
Clearly it's against the regs for me to log time while sitting in the back seat of a 4-seater.
And clearly, it's against the regs for me to log time when I am NOT a required member of the flight crew.

If, however, the pilot is flying "under the hood" AND I am qualified and rated and have current medical and all of that for the plane, and I'm in the front seat, and I have access to the controls, then I can log the time as a "safety" pilot.

Franz Ferdinand and Sparks have joined forces.