keeping the flame burning

[ground effect]

Hello all my first posting,

So here I am almost like the five year old ready for the first day at school but instead of a new school bag full of books I am grasping an old wallet full of money for all my training (as well as moths ).

As gleened from this forum the road to roatary wing nirvana (aka - a job that pays a `living wage`) is long, steep and slippery and litterd with bodies once overflowing with hope.(but no doubt still filled with passion)

I have been involved in two other industries thus far in my 29years and both are also filled with people who have tales of employment woe and horror. And we all know of those jobs/professions that pay very well but leave you hollow at the end of the working week knowing that next week will be exactly the same, without challenge or adventure (like the job I am doing right now).

There must be 10000 reasons for me NOT to embark on this career path but I still want to....so tell my why?

So the challenge to you my fellow rotor heads is explain the MAGIC. Yes! Verbalise just what it is about this industry/career/vocation that makes us all so driven and passionate. Is it slinging loads in the jungles of PNG, captaining a twin enroute to a platform of the east coast of Alaska, dropping skiers into inches of fresh powder in the NZ Southern Alps or knowing you probably just saved a childs life as you land atop a city hospital.

Can you define these two moments

1. When you first thought flying these things for a living is for me - how old were you, what type of machine was it, how did it make you feel and why?

2. When you finally started to get some `runs on the board` was there a moment when you thought `I am so glad I stuck with this` - what were you doing, what country were you in, what were you flying, how did it make you feel, do you get the same excitement when you take the controls today?

Come on folks think back to THAT moment when the flame was lit, I would love to hear about it.

[Whirlygig]

I am not a commercial pilot and there are some who would say I therefore have no worthy opinion (see threads passim) BUT

Many years ago, when I left Uni, I treated myself to a fixed wing trial lesson. I thought it was great fun and that one day, when I could afford, I would learn to fly. However, for whatever reason, although I have been able to afford it for ages now, I never went any further with it. There was obviously not quite enough of a thrill to make me go that final mile.

However, about eighteen months, I had a helicopter ride. Loved it. Couldn't wipe the silly grin off my face. Said to all and sundry "I'm going to do that". Everyone laughed but within the year, I got my PPL(H).

I once asked a very experienced pilot if the novelty ever wore off. He replied that it was a job like another and had its good and bad sides blah, blah, blah - but it still did it for him.

Go for it.

Cheers

Whirlygig

[Devil 49]

I can't really answer your questions- I *always* wanted to be a pilot. Perhaps the helicopter side of it was planted when I was ten, and an Army H-19 (S-55) landed in my grandmothers' pasture in Iowa. If that wasn't sufficient exposure to the bug, the "Green Machine" put a UH-1B down by the side of the road in my home town. Hooked. High school, flight school and Viet Nam...

Your second question- after Viet Nam, I wanted to be a, quote- normal person- unquote. Did the home every night thing for 11 years, and was absolutely miserable. Couldn't drink enough, go through sufficient jobs, or anything else enough, to fill the void. Couldn't begin to tell you how many positions I took in those years, and left. The record was two and a half days.
In '82, I had sufficient cash to return to flying. I'm with my third employer, happily married, asleep by 2200 and largely abstinent, except as appropriate.

Why is this job worthwhile??? It's always challenging. If you don't learn something, today, flying, quit. You're dead and don't know it. When it's unthinking routine, next you'll have stopped thinking, and next, it's loss of license or fatal mishap.
I work outside. I'm not an inside person, and the view is occsionally the best in the world.
It's technical, and as technical as you'd like- from "Redline- stop now" to "I'll be able to lift 'X' at 'Y' altitude and 'Z' temperature in this machine because it's showing 'A' now- but to be in the book, I'll have to 'B'....
It's creative, in a way- of performance art. I'm my own severest critic- I know *exactly* what I was trying to do, where it went wrong, and I'll do it better next time.

Someday, I'll quit. Someday, something will catch my interest for more than 6 months. It happened when I was ten. It could happen again.

[ground effect]

Since you were 10!! Much the same for me, always knew I wanted to but never believed I could until now of course. And whirlygig I bet the naysayers are not laughing now.

Come on out there plenty of visits but only two replys so far. You all seem so vocal on other issues, thought a subject on what you love about this activity would bring an avalance of interest!!!

[belly tank]

1. When you first thought flying these things for a living is for me - how old were you, what type of machine was it, how did it make you feel and why?

"my first flight was in an allouete i was only 5 and me and my folks were going on a trip from gladstone QLD to heron island. i got to sit up front with the pilot!!( my idol) i said what is that thing your holding in your left hand!! ( im only 5 so dont laugh!) he said this thing makes us lift off the ground, well that was it i wanted to be a pilot, man all those funny dials and buttons, heaps more than a tonka truck had, i said to mum and dad i want to fly this one day! ( yeah whatever son )

well i had a break from helicopters for another 14 years or so till i grew up and then started the fascination and addiction, training etc.

2. When you finally started to get some `runs on the board` was there a moment when you thought `I am so glad I stuck with this` -

" every time i hit the starter it sends a chill down your spine as if its too good to be true, the smell of jet a1 burning the spool up of the turbine its awesome, sure there are tough times in business, but its the best feeling in the world. my duties mean i do spend a bit more time now doing paperwork but thats just the job. to put it frankly the money is not the driving force if i wanted money i would have become a lawyer, god help me........i enjoy getting out of bed and going to work.weather its fire fighting or flying tourist around its still a great buzz for me and i hope i feel this way in 30 years.


cheers

[PPRUNE FAN#1]

Like Devil 49 above, what I love about flying is that it is the ultimate left-brain/right-brain activity. It is very technical to be sure, but it also involves a certain amount of artistry to do well.

My father was a (military) helicopter pilot when I was born. One of my earliest memories is of him landing and getting out of a Hiller H-23 as my mom held me in her lap in the car. I must've been...what, three or four? I cannot remember a time when I did not want to be a helicopter pilot. For my thirteenth birthday I got a ride in a Hughes 300 and my fate was sealed.

Flash forward thirty-six years (20+ as a commercial helicopter pilot). I still get the biggest thrill out of pulling up on that lever next to my seat and seeing the earth smoothly drop away. Incomparable! Whether my passengers see it or not, there is always a smile on my face when I get the liftoff to a hover right. That is the yardstick by which I measure the rest of the flight. Yes, we are our own harshest critics (although you will meet some instructors and check airmen who might feel differently).

I've never consciously thought to myself, "Gee, I'm glad I stuck with this." For me, there was never any other choice.

The bottom line is that you cannot define, quantify or explain magic. It's either there or it's not. If it is, enjoy the ride! If not, that's okay too.

[Delta Julliet Golf]

The same for me, I've always wanted to be a pilot. It was and still is a slippery steep hill to climb and you'll never reach the top probably (exams keep on coming).

But last week me and my training captain were flying back from a platform above the clouds with the sun setting..........It just makes you feel great.

At other times when you're solid IMC enroute to a rig at 200 ft radaraltitude it's all very intense and exciting/terrifying.

Every day you learn a new thing and people who are pushing retirement keep on telling you that every day they still learn something new.

Great job, eh! Everyday when you go to work you have a smile on your face!

DJG

[Crashondeck]

It certainly wasn't my first ride in a helicopter - a Lynx from the back of a grey funnel line frigate. The pilot just managed to avoid putting a Mk1 Sh**ehawk through the windshield, air intakes and pitch link rods. Dent in the radome and blood and feathers everywhere.

What did it for me was being the lone passenger in a Dauphin coming home from offshore after 5 weeks. The pilot just dropped it off the edge of the helideck then put it on its side. Good job I was wearing a goon bag. Thats when I decided I wanted to sit in the front and not the back. I was twenty something.

The moment I was glad I had stuck with it was when I got the call to say I had been selected to fly SAR.

[Ascend Charlie]

1. When you first thought flying these things for a living is for me - how old were you, what type of machine was it, how did it make you feel and why?

Seven years old, and my father took me for a ride in a glider - what a hoot! Soaring away from the ground on a winch launch at a crazy angle to the ground, then the cable release and silence! A loop to set my fate in concrete.

First helo ride at 19 in a Huey piloted by my brother, the first wrestle with a hover, the first real scare a few days later, and i was hooked.


2. When you finally started to get some `runs on the board` was there a moment when you thought `I am so glad I stuck with this` - what were you doing, what country were you in, what were you flying, how did it make you feel, do you get the same excitement when you take the controls today?

As others have said, there was no sudden realisation that this was what i wanted, because i have wanted it all along.

Reminders come every flight, and two days ago, breaking out of the overcast into a brilliant sunny late afternoon, with some Cu towers rising above me and the occasional lightning flash off to the side - the feeling of happiness could almost be put in a jar and admired on a shelf.

[ShyTorque]

Crashondeck,

Just be very careful near my relatives, please.

That was my distant cousin, Harry, you hit with the radome. He was never quite the same after that.

Actually, what started it for me was a Lightning, departing from the Farnborough airshow when I was about 5 yrs old. It stood on its tail as soon as the wheels went up and it just kept going vertically up till it disappeared.

[ground effect]

299 views with only 9 responses ....give me strength there must be more of you out there willing to enlighten us on your experiences...think harder please people

[the wizard of auz]

I was 19 years old, working as the ganger on a small rail crew in the middle of the desert. Lots of aircraft stopped where I was stationed for fuel. I needed to get to town in a hurry once, and bummed a lift with a couple of blokes passing through in an old aztec. the idea of covering in one hour, the same distance it took me six hours of bone jarring driving planted the seed.
then one of the employees of the met department across the road shows up with a mooney, and he and a couple of blokes disappeared to Alice springs for the weekend.......unheard of. I was keen as mustard. I asked the bloke with the licence, what was involved in getting a licence, and was told a) I couldn't afford it and b) your not clever enough. I believed this ****** for several years, and although still keen, I was convinced it was beyond me, and did nothing about it.
several years later, I was mustering camels out in the desert. We hired a bloke in a helicopter to help us out. He was a Bonza bloke, and as patiant and helpfull as ever with all my questions. I told this bloke about my desire to pilot an aircraft, and my disappointment at not being clever enough over a few beers and a camp fire in the desert, after work. to my surprise, he declared the "all knowing pilot" that told me all that crap, a ******.Get up early tommorrow and I'll give you a bit of a lesson, Its not rocket science and you'll be right mate he said. So next morning I was up a sparrow fart, all keen and jumpy, ready for my first lesson.
For nearly an hour we battled that little hughes 300 around, gliding through the canyon of Carrawine george and chasing ducks and crows around the desert, wheeling cattle and camels through the spinifex and dropping over the edge of three hundred foot platues to roll nearly inverted and race around foot of the tall breakaway country, all in the still morning air. absolutelly fantastic stuff. he gave me about half an hour instruction on hovering and then we landed. I was so exstatic, the rest of the usually hard day just breezed by. I dreamed of wheeling and gliding around the desert for days after that.
I took meself off to a flight school a few years later and enquired as to the cost of it all, and informed them I had very little schooling so I would require intensive and extensive tutoring. I soloed in a C152 four days later and breezed through the PPL(A) it seems I was a natural and required little help at all, and after battling for money and hours, passed my CPL(A). I managed to scrounge up all sorts of work and eventually I went back to the bush and started my own mustering company. I went and got all the ratings and endorsments you could imagine and eventually got my CPL(H).
A few years back I heard that this bloke that had inspired my future, had caught a wire in Tazzie whilst crop spaying, and died in the ensuing crash.
This morning, I was rolling off a climbing turn and letting the nose of the aircraft fall through, and lining myself up on a mob of goats. The sun was just comming over the horizon and the air was dead still.The aircraft was flying like a homesick angel and the engine was purring sweet. it was one of those mornings when you just yelled, I LOVE MY JOB, to no one in particular and smile like an idiot. on days like these, I cast a quick thought back to that morning in the desert, and shed a little tear of thanks to the memory of a great man, who inspired me to do what I love doing.

[vaqueroaero]

Well according to my mother, I used to sit happily on the washing machine and fly.(Still do!!). One of the first words that I learned was helicopter.
I didn't start flying full time until I was 29 - it took me that long to get enough money together and to realise a change in career was necessary.
What keeps me going? That's hard to say really. I have the opportunity to fly in an area of huge diversity, from the ocean to the desert, so the scenery is fantastic. There's nothing quite like having 100 mile visibility and being over the mountains in the desert, but watching the sun set over the ocean.
I can't really think of a time when I've thought 'Im glad I've stuck with this'. There have been more cases I think where I've done something and thought 'You idiot, what are you doing?'. That's the great thing: every flight is different. You never stop learning, and if you do then that's the time to quit.
I think my biggest satisfaction so far has been teaching others to fly. Especially that moment when you first see a student after they land and are now a certified pilot. The first time I say 'look no hands', so they are hovering.......the first solo.....
I think one of my proudest moments though was having taught someone to fly and he and his wife paid for me to go to Bell School in Texas as a 'graduation gift.' It seemed to make that long uphill struggle worthwhile.
You'll never find me sitting in an office doing nine to five - my office has a tinge of Jet-A to it, and long may it stay so.

[ground effect]

Nice to know I am not far from the average ages mentioned in the responses so far. There is still hope More feedback please

[HueyHerc]

I have always been curious about aviation for as long as I can remember. When I was 10 I picked up a book about military aviators in the Second World War. From that day forward I could not get flying off my mind.

I enlisted in the Army National Guard in 1980, I was 17 and Cobras and Hueys were still the backbone of US Army Aviation. Until then being a pilot had always seemed just out of reach. Now, up close, it suddenly seemed possible. The birds were tough olive green brutes...raw, powerful machines with no frills, and the sound of those blades reverberated right through to your bones. When they were armed, the guns were mounted outside in the wind and they flew wherever they pleased. I thought, “I can do this!” I became a Warrant Officer at age 20 and flew Hueys for 550 hours with combat veteran Army Aviators turned offshore pilots and national guardsmen. Their lessons echo in my ears to this day.

I finished college and transferred into the regular Air Force. I thought I wanted to fly fighters but a few weeks into T-37 training I realized I missed my old UH-1H. Later flying T-38s I missed it even more. Hard to believe but those jets (and the Air Force in general) just had too many limitations, long runways, start carts, never enough gas and radar vectors for everything. None of the freedoms and sense of independence I’d known as a helicopter pilot. After three years as a T-37 instructor I volunteered for AF helicopters but it was too late...they were over manned and underfunded.

So I spent 10 years in C-130s and loved it. Crossed oceans, landed on all types of runways, air dropped all manner of people, equipment and supplies in over 35 countries. But I still have to go outside every time I hear a helicopter.

Now with over 6000 hours, like those writing in above, I still smile every time I ease a ship into the air. While I’ve often thought about separating from the military, I’ve never considered another job outside flying. I rented a H-269 a few months back just to see if I could still hover. As I eased the collective up and rolled in a little throttle I grinned so wide my instructor had to comment! I was a bit wobbly at first but an hour later I was doing touch down autos again and I knew I was home.

I’ll retire soon and my first goal will be to get recurrent in helicopters and get my ATP (H). I’d love to fly offshore or fight fires...or both.

Fly safe...

[ground effect]

Fantastic hueyherc!! ATPL, firefighting, offshore ....should all be a breeze with your the depth of experience so far. Go man go

[Darren999]

Never thought I was cleaver enough..

This thread got me thinking....

Never thought of becoming a Pilot mainly because academically I wasn't very cleaver, so never thought of going down this road, so joined the Fire Service, and stayed there for 17 years. Decided one mad day to do a parachute jump(why I don't know!) But loved it, have all ratings to tandem instructor, then after throwing myself out of a perfectly servicable aircraft for 13 years, thought to myself I really should know how these things work.

I went up with a very good friend of mine and asked him to show me, well to my surprise I sort of enjoyed it. Absolutly dreaded the written exams. Anyway, manged to obtain a PPL to more surpirse!. The same friend then bought a Bell 47 Helicopter and said ' fancy coming to fly this' so now fully confident that flying isn't a huge task at my very low PPL level trundled off to fly the chopper. What A Hoot!!! If I managed to keep the helicopter on the aifield in the hover that was great!!. I was 100% hooked on these now. So took a loan out (OH God) and persued my PPL(H) and got it (FAA). I then went all though my FAA qualifications to CFI, the exams killed me, god it was hard for me, I wish I had a memory like some people who can just read it and remember it. I then had an oppotunity to be a flying instrucor which I absolutly enjoy. So I resigned from my job, sold my house, car, motobike, pararchute everything! Relocated, and now teach for a living. I owe this all to my friend who showed me, and gave me a huge amount of confidence that I could really do this, my flying instructor at EGKB was great!!! he must have had the patience of a saint!
I've looked into the JAA commercial exams, but 14 exams and I have been told that they are some what difficult, so not so sure I could do them, studying always seems harder when your older, especially if it doesn't come naturlly.
I enjoyed reading this thread and wanted to contribute..

Darren

[ground effect]

more stories please

Am up to my eyeballs in theory..... ....please remind me again why I am doing this .....inspirational stories welcome
Keep smiling

[Thomas coupling]

Went into the careers office in Liverpool, came out a helicopter pilot...the end.

[ground effect]

very funny once more with feeling