Training in US vs. UK (British citizen)
 

Hi everyone,

I'm a 26 year old British guy living currently in France and have been doing quite a bit of research into becoming a helicopter pilot. My personal professional history has nothing to do with flying (I was a journalist in London and Lyon in France) but I enjoy being in the air as I'm a hang glider pilot.

Two routes (both integrated) have been suggested to me so far by helicopter pilot friends:

1.) head to the US where training is cheaper (on an F1 visa) and start working as an instructor somewhere stateside, aiming to get 1000 hrs by the time I leave and maybe an IR. Hillsboro academy in Portland seems to have good reviews and also offers an intergrated FAA/EASA course too
2.) Train in the UK and start working either as an instructor or fork out some money for an IR rating immediately to go the oil and gas route (I've heard there's quite a shortage there).

My question: how easy is it to convert an FAA license to an CAA one (or an EASA to CAA). I eventually want to end up living in a mountainous region, I've always thought that would be the Alps, but really anywhere with mountains is good! Getting up hours seems to be a lot easier in the UK (oil and gas) or the states (as an instructor, although pay seems less good), than it is in the EU.

Any other pointers on where I should study/what route I should take would be much appreciated!

Cheers

The way I would do this now, three decades later.

-Get US PPL with 100 hour total. 50 to 60 of that in PPL training, rest training towards IFR
-Fly back to Europe convert FAA PPL to UK and EASA , get full UK and EASA IR (about 50 to 55 hours) on your PPL.
-Back to the US do the IR, train for commercial and CFI.
-Work as a CFI.
-Work on a Tuna Boat.
-Get UK and EASA CPL. which is a ****E load of work

Going integrated will cost a lot more.

https://www.caa.co.uk/commercial-ind...-january-2023/

1. Don't train in the UK.
2. Don't go integrated.
3. Don't train for a UK/EASA licence in the US.
That will cut your costs in half straight away. Going to the US is a great idea, but get an FAA certificate - you can convert to UK/EASA in a few flights at a later date.

Personally if I was going to do it all again and spend 2-3 years in the US as a flight instructor I would make the most of every exemption and add-on available to me under part 61.129. For example it's cheaper to learn to fly Airplanes and helicopters than it is to learn to fly just helicopters.

A big part of the EASA CPL/ATPL is the 14 theory exams, if you have a job now, and you have time (being 26) I would do those modular, from home, with a bit of traveling to the test centers as needed.
took me a year to get those while managing other duties (work/family) at next to no cost relatively speaking.

The practical training can be done in 2 months of flying (was expensive for 2 reasons: the flight time and the lodging)
but by that time you have your certificate of passing the EASA theory exams so the risks of not finishing in time, having discontinued training and spending stupid money is lower.

As always get the EASA medical first (it is more rigorous than the FAA one) to reduce another risk factor of your endeavor. FAA PPL was only usefull as it allowed me to enter the EASA training with a few hundred hours of experience (that costed less than EASA flight time), that makes the process easier assuming you did not pickup any bad habits in the FAA world.

F1 visa, only through certain acredited flight schools, have been harder to come by, a Trump thing that will not go away.

Regarding the conversion of an International License to UK/EASA, can one acquire a combined UK/EASA License with relevant experience and just one sitting of the 14 Exams or is it more complicated as GG stated?

One thing first. Since you mentioned that you are living in France right now, I suppose you have a work visa. The UK is a third country now. If you leave your job in France and move elsewhere you will not be coming back easily. The visa will be gone and you will not get a work visa as a helicopter pilot in the EU. They have enough. No mountain flying in the Alps for you. Even a digital nomad visa will not help you. If you keep your job and do a mondular course in France, you have a much bigger job market. Keep that in mind.
And don't blame the EU, that was the Brits decision. They knew the rules before they left, because they helped writing them.

I have heard good things about Hillsboro. That is really a good way, not the cheapest one, but Hillsboro has a good reputation in industry. If you can get an instructor job in the US, good for you. Always better to come home with a 1000 hours than 150.
EASA has a list of approved flight schools outside the EU and I can not find Hillsboro, therefore ask them who's licences you will get. They claim they are the only helicopter flight school with an F1 visa. Since Trump and Brexit, things got harder for training in the US.
You can always try to do something more complicated like Agile suggests, but things have probably changed quite a lot since he did his licences.

You need to sit the exams twice. Once in the UK and once in EASA land. But they are literally identical. ATPLQuestions dot comm has a great database to study with.

EASA in the US is a bit unregulated, I think it works that way, (somebody correct me if I am wrong).
1/ EASA does not care the aircraft you train or pass the test on (ie. it can be a N registered based in the US, that cost less to use)
2/ a US based EASA training school is always delivering training as a branch of a EU/UK based training organization and borrow the training certificate number.
In other words it needs an established EU/UK flight school to lend its credential to the foreign US entity, so most time it does not show on the list, under its US name.
3/ An EASA examiner will have to pass your check ride. (not so many EASA examiner that are current and resident in the US)
So the school will often fly one into the US for a couple of days, when needed. I have paid for the examiner airfare and a good meal a few times to get my type rating renewed.
4/ An EASA flight instructor will have to administer the training. (not so many EASA flight instructors that are current and resident in the US, unless the school is making enought of them)

The EASA examiner cannot do the check ride if he instructed more than 25% of your training.
So you need at least 2 rated and current person holding EASA credential to have the capability to deliver EASA license in the US.
Note: Bristow in Florida was the main EASA flight school, they had enough critical mass to hold EASA (CFI and examiner) on staff
when they closed out these EASA program in the US have become quite marginal, school claiming to deliver EASA program do it base on the above go arrounds.

A lot of the threads might seem quite old now but lots of the info still applies to your situation:

https://www.pprune.org/rotorheads/25...ter-pilot.html

Well Agile, there are a few flight schools that are US-only and have their own EASA ATO number. Like Flight Safety or the NTPS. Most of them are for special training or type ratings, but there are a few fixed wing schools. No helicopter though. Therefore Hillsboro must do as you mentioned and borrow a European number ... and I found it finally. It is RotorSky from Austria. Therefore you get an EASA license and no UK license. I don't know if rhal96 wants that.

What bad habits are these Capt Happy?

Thanks Good grief for that link, quite detail heavy but I'll chug through it.

Why do you say that it'll be cheaper to follow a modular approach? For example at Hillsoboro in the US they gave me costings of around $86,000 for the full FAA program (inc. CFI), with an extra 16,000 euros or so for the EASA bit (frozen ATPL). It seemed pretty good compared to the prices I'm getting in the UK or France

Thanks for that rude stuff. Sorry, newbie here, what exactly do you mean by part 61.129 and the fact that it's cheaper to learn both at the same time?

Cheers

Join the Military. Get paid! Instead of having to pay…. Fly the most interesting helicopters and missions, and after 15-20 years in, look for a civil job 👍

Interesting, so you just studied for your exams by finding resources online? Ie. you effectively self-taught?

Yes you're right Rotorbee, I'm living in France on a work visa (mine expires in Feb 2027) and yes if I leave coming back will be tricky. I was hoping that if, some years down the line, I had 1000/2000 hours on an EASA license I could easily find someone to sponsor a visa, either in France or elsewhere... are you super sure that basically no one does that in Europe?

As you say yes Hillsboro are affiliated with Rotorsky in Aus (they even said I'd need to get my medical specifically in Austria too). Not having a UK license (assuming I had FAA and EASA) doesn't bug me too much as in the long term I don't want to live in the UK. However given the fact that I don't have the right to work in the EU, it may be the only option open to me...

Go to the US, do the FAA stuff, gett married and stay in the US. More career choices, better progression, much more jobs, much bigger industry. Europe is way overregulated, very expensive and all the good jobs require experience, the right contacts and EASA-IR (crazy expensive). Just my 0.02

If you've made your money and are financially independent and you want to fly helicopters as your dream job, then go for it. Otherwise the reality is, helicopters for the most part is a poverty existence. You'll never make any money to be comfortable compared to your fixed wing cousins. This is the pragmatic advice that most people never took and ten years down the line learned this the hard way.

you know when your FAA instructor has about 150hrs and has just one objective getting to 1000hrs accident free. Then you just pick one, bad positioning of the feet on the pedals, not keeping the aircraft perfectly in trim, kind of bad at maintaining a precise heading,
These are litte things but you have to get these early. then you hit EASA, you have to practice a downwind quick stop, it will go well only if you are good at keeping in trim the whole time as you turn the aircraft arround.

FAA instruction is also more disconnected from the theory of the aircraft for example:
FAA CFI instructing autorotation: ok... follow me on the controls... lower the colective aft cyclic (he means compensate for the reduction in flapback in EASA)... baby flare...(he means a two step flare technique that is not taugh in EASA) ... bump it... (he means raise the collective 1/2 an inch to compensate for coning) ... flare flare flare.. level.

It’s a tricky route getting a license no matter what way you do it,,, The hardest part is finding a job, most want experience and a lot of pilots are ex military​​​​​ who have a lot of experience. Also it seems you’ve set your heart on flying in the mountains. Another huge hurdle, or even a brick wall. These jobs are about who you know and stacks of experience.
Good Luck anyhow