How many passengers would a pilot convey in a career?
 

With some friends we were discussing how many people a pilot might be responsible for, as passengers, over their career. A rough calculation shows that it could run into millions, which is impressive. Has anyone counted this, or estimated?
Thanks

G’day Cooper,

I retired a little over two years ago with a total of around 22,500 hours mostly as an airline pilot but with an Aussie Airforce career before that though all on transport aircraft.

I reckon around 20,000,000 kilometres travelled and somewhere around 2,000,000 passengers carried safely. No passengers harmed and no scratched aircraft in over 40 years of flying.

Cheers,
BH.

Hi BH,

that's pretty amazing: 2,000,000 people safely carried, a wonderful achievement. Obviously it's not just the pilot, it's the whole system, including excellent aircraft. It would be interesting to know if there's a record for the number of people carried by a pilot.

2,000,000 lives in your hands for no loss. Not bad!

Just done a back-of-fag-packet calculation and recon I manage that in 2 months - the thankless world of ATC.

During my ATCO training I did my Area Radar field training at JATCRU Lindholme. One sunday after a busy session, I realised I had had 16 airliners of various sizes under my control, some on crossing routes, some climbing and descending, between 52 30N and 55N (in the 'old' Preston FIR) so assuming an average of 200 pax on each one (from BAC 1-11s up to 747s) , I had been responsible for (roughly) 3,200 human lives for about 30 min.

Hi DD,
Also v impressive. Like I said, it's not just the pilots, it''s the system.

Surely there's someone out there who says thank you to ATC?

If not, let me be the first: thank you to all the ATC boys and girls.

Absolutely agree with thanks to our ATC friends. Carried a few of them on 'Look-See' trips on the 747 on one sector trips out of LHR and enjoyed their input to the 'flying community.' Always a pleasure to meet 'Fellows' of the same industry and share experiences with each other. Long may it be so.