employed / unemployed
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Join Date: May 2003
Location: Leeds
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employed / unemployed
hello ppruners!
I was just wondering how many unemployed pilots there were next to employed ones.
If anybody would like to start by stating what licenses they hold and whether or not they are in work, and if poss where you work.
You can also add when you started training and how long it took before first job.
I am fairly new to pprune and would like to put this to poll but do not know how, so if this can be arranged I think it may be interesting to find out.
I am at the start of my flight training so I can not take part in this experiment.
Good luck.
Andy.
I was just wondering how many unemployed pilots there were next to employed ones.
If anybody would like to start by stating what licenses they hold and whether or not they are in work, and if poss where you work.
You can also add when you started training and how long it took before first job.
I am fairly new to pprune and would like to put this to poll but do not know how, so if this can be arranged I think it may be interesting to find out.
I am at the start of my flight training so I can not take part in this experiment.
Good luck.
Andy.
Join Date: Mar 1999
Location: Domaine de la Romanee-Conti
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This poll has been done loads of times before, read some of the older posts and you might have to trawl around the different wannabes forums, I can't recall seeing one in the last few months since they broke up 'wannabes' into the 4 different sections. Whenever this gets done though, the polls always end up hopelessly skewed in favour of unemployed & trainee pilots, I guess because the ones who've already got airline jobs don't read this section of the forum any more.
FWIW
Employed
UK FATPL, 2000 hours
Air ambulance
Trained in 1995-96 and got 'employed' as a flying instructor straight afterwards but didn't actually start earning a living from flying until I got this current job in early '02.
FWIW
Employed
UK FATPL, 2000 hours
Air ambulance
Trained in 1995-96 and got 'employed' as a flying instructor straight afterwards but didn't actually start earning a living from flying until I got this current job in early '02.
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Thanx alot for the info sky. I couldn't find any previous posts on this, but maybe I missed it.
Interested in what u said about working as an air ambulance pilot. Very rewarding I presume. Could u give me some more details on that...how u got the job, where u looked, are u enjoying it, etc??
Thank you in advance.
Andy.
Interested in what u said about working as an air ambulance pilot. Very rewarding I presume. Could u give me some more details on that...how u got the job, where u looked, are u enjoying it, etc??
Thank you in advance.
Andy.
Join Date: Mar 1999
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Ah well it's just one of those classic right-place-right-time stories actually Andreas ...
My wife's a fellow wannabe (and yes, a former student of mine ... go on roll your eyes in disgust all you hardened flying instructors out there
)
Anyway, the long and short of it is, she was doing her hour building early last year, we were down country on a holiday and felt like doing a spot of PA28 flying, we popped into the local airfield to rent an aircraft for the afternoon, got chatting to the CFI, turned out he was short of a Navajo pilot because one of the other guys had broken his leg playing basketball a couple of days previously, and the rest as they say is history.
I love the flying, it's a superb aircraft with some very good kit in it. The money isn't quite up there with the airlines but it beats the sh!t out of instructing, and there's nothing like a couple of hard core winters of single pilot IFR in a hot piston twin, to make you feel well and truly over prepared for that airline sim ride when it comes.
The down side of the business is getting no weekends, working 9 to 5 plus carrying a pager 2 or 3 nights a week and it going off at all hours - it really is a 24 hour operation. Doesn't make it any easier to have a family life. And while the majority of our patient transfers are routine intra - hospital stuff, I really haven't got the stomach for some of the trauma stuff. I have seen people with pretty much every kind of horrific injury, like the other week, two little toddlers - twin brothers - who had both been pretty much burned beyond recognition after somehow getting into the bathtub unattended and one of them turned on the hot tap ... they just sat there while it filled up apparently ... you can imagine what that looked (and smelled) like. Or a couple of days ago, I had to take a young lad on a rush job who had learned a hard lesson about playing with his dad's chainsaw ... he had his fingers in a little ice box beside him
It pretty much all washes over me now, but it's really hard to stay emotionally detached sometimes when it's dying kids you're dealing with ... that kind of thing I won't miss.
Probably more info than you wanted there come to think of it. Wish I could advise you on how to go find a first job but basically all I did was take the tried and true path of least resistance for new CPL holders : go get an instructor rating, work for peanuts, bend over and take it with a smile for your first 1000 hours, and eventually you'll get lucky
My wife's a fellow wannabe (and yes, a former student of mine ... go on roll your eyes in disgust all you hardened flying instructors out there
)Anyway, the long and short of it is, she was doing her hour building early last year, we were down country on a holiday and felt like doing a spot of PA28 flying, we popped into the local airfield to rent an aircraft for the afternoon, got chatting to the CFI, turned out he was short of a Navajo pilot because one of the other guys had broken his leg playing basketball a couple of days previously, and the rest as they say is history.
I love the flying, it's a superb aircraft with some very good kit in it. The money isn't quite up there with the airlines but it beats the sh!t out of instructing, and there's nothing like a couple of hard core winters of single pilot IFR in a hot piston twin, to make you feel well and truly over prepared for that airline sim ride when it comes.
The down side of the business is getting no weekends, working 9 to 5 plus carrying a pager 2 or 3 nights a week and it going off at all hours - it really is a 24 hour operation. Doesn't make it any easier to have a family life. And while the majority of our patient transfers are routine intra - hospital stuff, I really haven't got the stomach for some of the trauma stuff. I have seen people with pretty much every kind of horrific injury, like the other week, two little toddlers - twin brothers - who had both been pretty much burned beyond recognition after somehow getting into the bathtub unattended and one of them turned on the hot tap ... they just sat there while it filled up apparently ... you can imagine what that looked (and smelled) like. Or a couple of days ago, I had to take a young lad on a rush job who had learned a hard lesson about playing with his dad's chainsaw ... he had his fingers in a little ice box beside him
It pretty much all washes over me now, but it's really hard to stay emotionally detached sometimes when it's dying kids you're dealing with ... that kind of thing I won't miss.Probably more info than you wanted there come to think of it. Wish I could advise you on how to go find a first job but basically all I did was take the tried and true path of least resistance for new CPL holders : go get an instructor rating, work for peanuts, bend over and take it with a smile for your first 1000 hours, and eventually you'll get lucky
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right place right time and its who you know ! the rest is irrelevant thats how i got my job.
LST - i always get the dogs. The best yet was a woman who was so large and had such short legs she couldn't get the lap strap done up 'cause she had to sit so close. All that is another story.
LST - i always get the dogs. The best yet was a woman who was so large and had such short legs she couldn't get the lap strap done up 'cause she had to sit so close. All that is another story.
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Hey sky, that was a great story. Talk about telling the kids and grandkids stories of ur past, they'll love it. Exciting memories, and your getting alot of 'soul-food' out of the job. If u ask me that's what it's all about, you are saving lives. Not many people can say that.
Keep it up mate, and best of luck.
Keep it up mate, and best of luck.
hey there andy,
just to contribute to your poll...........
trained at Coventry (ground school) then oxford for the flying stuff.
finished mid 2002, started flying Dash 8 with an airline jan 2003.
frozen ATPL, 400 hours.
fairly happy, if a little hungover at the moment.........
good luck with the training.
BPM
just to contribute to your poll...........
trained at Coventry (ground school) then oxford for the flying stuff.
finished mid 2002, started flying Dash 8 with an airline jan 2003.
frozen ATPL, 400 hours.
fairly happy, if a little hungover at the moment.........
good luck with the training.
BPM
Join Date: Mar 1999
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Hey there snigs
Well that is a blast from the past ... I'd forgotten all about that idiot!
Yeah I am 99.9999% sure I know who he was, but there's no point naming names ... suffice to say that he was a scandinavian guy, who I met in South Africa while I was wannabe-ing around the world in 96-97 looking for flying work - he latched onto me and a mate of mine at Victoria Falls, and travelled with us for a few days but we gave him the slip in Botswana after it became clear that he had some psychological issues. He was certainly right into his pprune, and was posting on the forums using two or three other nom de plumes around that time. Anyway the last I heard, his past had caught up with him in the form of some sex-related criminal charges, and I am sure he's no longer involved in aviation, hence why he hasn't made a nuisance of himself on the board these last couple of years.
How about yourself, gonna take part in Andreas's poll here, are you filling the coveted right hand seat yet?
Well that is a blast from the past ... I'd forgotten all about that idiot!
Yeah I am 99.9999% sure I know who he was, but there's no point naming names ... suffice to say that he was a scandinavian guy, who I met in South Africa while I was wannabe-ing around the world in 96-97 looking for flying work - he latched onto me and a mate of mine at Victoria Falls, and travelled with us for a few days but we gave him the slip in Botswana after it became clear that he had some psychological issues. He was certainly right into his pprune, and was posting on the forums using two or three other nom de plumes around that time. Anyway the last I heard, his past had caught up with him in the form of some sex-related criminal charges, and I am sure he's no longer involved in aviation, hence why he hasn't made a nuisance of himself on the board these last couple of years.
How about yourself, gonna take part in Andreas's poll here, are you filling the coveted right hand seat yet?
I say there boy
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Hokay, here goes then,
JAA fATPL (modular)
350 hours
IR issued September 12th 2001 (ouch!)
Employed outside aviation, marshalling resources and looking for improvement before leaping back in. Have share in own aircraft and really enjoying flying that at the moment. Also have a final board interview for NATS ATCO sponsorship pending (best of both worlds maybe?)
Nearly completed an FI rating, but had to keep stopping and starting for a variety of cash, leave and health reasons.
Contemplating finishing the FI and/or doing a TR next year, if the ATC application fails.
JAA fATPL (modular)
350 hours
IR issued September 12th 2001 (ouch!)
Employed outside aviation, marshalling resources and looking for improvement before leaping back in. Have share in own aircraft and really enjoying flying that at the moment. Also have a final board interview for NATS ATCO sponsorship pending (best of both worlds maybe?)
Nearly completed an FI rating, but had to keep stopping and starting for a variety of cash, leave and health reasons.
Contemplating finishing the FI and/or doing a TR next year, if the ATC application fails.
PPRuNe Handmaiden
Australian ATPL
JAR ATPL
4700 hours (1500 turboprop)
Employed Shed FO in the UK.
JAR ATPL
4700 hours (1500 turboprop)
Employed Shed FO in the UK.
PPRuNe Knight in Shining Armour
Join Date: Feb 2000
Location: Everywhere in the UK, but not home!
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UK JAA fATPL (modular)
310 hours
IR issued September 10th 2001 (another ouch!)
5 days a week employed in an aviation related job (design & stress engineer on gas turbines and airframes),
Working at weekends as an FI.
I'm still working at being in the right place at the right time.
310 hours
IR issued September 10th 2001 (another ouch!)
5 days a week employed in an aviation related job (design & stress engineer on gas turbines and airframes),
Working at weekends as an FI.
I'm still working at being in the right place at the right time.
Join Date: Apr 2001
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Started in BHX a few years back, took a 4yr break and restarted 3 yrs ago.
Flew ATR's for 2000hrs, made PIC, got snatched out of left seat on Sept 12th....now fly a EMB145, as a test pilot (feels like it, with all the problems we have - and if your company tells you things like to ignore a shattered windshield at FL370...tell them bollocks!)
ATPL 4000hrs
love the fun of flying and moments of stark terror!!!!!! as you get hit by lightning time after time, find severe turbulence (yes, autopilot can't even fly) and your radar tells you there's no wx for at least another 50 miles.........that's when you know a pilots job is still secure!!!!
Flew ATR's for 2000hrs, made PIC, got snatched out of left seat on Sept 12th....now fly a EMB145, as a test pilot (feels like it, with all the problems we have - and if your company tells you things like to ignore a shattered windshield at FL370...tell them bollocks!)
ATPL 4000hrs
love the fun of flying and moments of stark terror!!!!!! as you get hit by lightning time after time, find severe turbulence (yes, autopilot can't even fly) and your radar tells you there's no wx for at least another 50 miles.........that's when you know a pilots job is still secure!!!!
Started in Oz in 1983, CPL gained in early '85. First flying job in '89. Since then I've added US & UK ATPLs to my Oz one.
4,400 hrs & I seem unable to escape the curse of pistons...
4,400 hrs & I seem unable to escape the curse of pistons...
