Frozen Ronin

I just answered a PM from somebody with the same question, I'll post it here:

The usual suspects for new alaska pilots searching:

Era/Hageland/Frontier (all the same group, now):
Employment | Era Alaska

Grant Aviation:
Grant Aviation AK

Bering Air:
Bering Air

Bering Air is usually where a guy can pick up a right seat in the Casa, 1900 in hopes of coming into the left on a Caravan or Navajo. They are a better paying, long term job for those looking to stay in Alaska.

ACE Air Cargo - Anchorage to and from Rural Alaska

I've worked for many, and they will all work you hard, pay you more than you'll get in the States, give you a great run in terms of experience.

Just because they list no openings doesn't mean they're not hiring at the drop of a hat. If you can, go to anchorage for a few days and visit, most of them have offices there at Stevens International. A handshake with facetime is worth more than a bunch of hours on the resume. Trust me. It's how I got most of my work up here. In the winter time, rental cars are cheap and you can stay at the youth hostel a few miles from the airport. Your airfare will be the most expensive part of the deal, and right now is off season, it will be the lowest you'll find the rest of the year.

Don't forget about Fairbanks: More remote, more beautiful, more interesting flying, yet an international airport that gives you access to the rest of the world. Up there, I would look at Evertts Air Cargo:

Everts Air Cargo

Good luck!

Ronin

Frozen Ronin

Oh, one last thing, and I've said it a number of times on the board: Right seat in an airplane certified for one pilot doesn't do you any good. Take the right seat in the 1900, the Casa 212 or the lear (if you go medivac, forgot about Guardian Air). Loggable time, a rated seat. I can't say enough how right seat in a Caravan is only a place holder for the next opening the company puts up. An opening, I might add, that goes outside of the company, many times. I'd stay a CFI before taking a non-rated seat.

Also, be careful and do your homework with any company up here: There are many operators that have had multiple pilot fatalities due to maintenance or company management culture. Do your homework, and listen to the advice on the board. If you toss out a job offer to the board here, and you are showered with advice to stay away, then my advice to you is to stay away. I have no trouble telling you who was working where when they lost their life.

Good luck. It's like anything: use common sense, do your homework and do what's right, you'll be fine. Oh, and have fun. There's plenty of that up here!!!

Good luck!

Ronin

Panzon

In case you are wondering about QOL, Grant, Era, Yute, and Ryan provide pilot housing. Typically it's like living in a fraternity house. Some charge rent, other do not. You can rent your own place if you don't like communal living, but expect to pay a big chunk of you salary.

Most of the bases for the companies above are in the bush. That means little night life, few restaurants, limited social opportunities unless you are a girl (in which case you'll be beating back suitors with a club). On the other hand, you will have plenty of opportunities for fishing, hunting, photography, boating, etc.

The flying is great, so if it's flying you enjoy this may be the right thing for you. If you're looking for high pay, buttoned-down operations, and tip-top management you might be frustrated here.

SkyHigh

In case if I or anyone else has not mentioned it yet; if your eventual goal is to fly for an airline then most Alaska flying does not help much at all. Alaska flying is largely single engine VFR in a high risk environment. Single engine piston does little to help with much of anything and an accident or incident does not either. The only thing the airlines, or anyone else for that matter, cares about is multi-engine jet PIC. Nothing else matters.

In addition Alaska flying leads to more Alaska flying. Corporate pilots and airline executives do not usually venture in the bush. AK is not the best place to build contacts for jet stuff. Also Alaska flying is extremely fun and satisfying. In reflection any flying that you do in the lower 48 will seem hollow and boring in comparison, that too will only serve to seal your fate in the cold north.

As others here have said life in the north is cold, lonely and full of alcoholics. Get stuck up there in the sirens call of fun flying and you will wake up one day 42 years old, living in a rented ATCO trailer somewhere on the tundra with a scar on your forehead and pin in your leg from a former accident and wonder what happened to your life.

If your goal is to fly a learjet or 767 someday I would avoid Alaska like the plague and stay with flight instructing until a regional calls.

Skyhigh

Panzon

Our pilots have gone on to Alaska, UPS, Polar, USAirways, United, etc. I know pilots who have left for GoJet, PenAir, and SkyWest in the last six months. These were C-207 PICs and CASA SICs. I will be sure to tell them that their time flying the bush was a waste of time.

I have no idea where you are getting your "facts," but they are wrong.

SkyHigh

I too was a Cessna C-207 guy and CASA 212 FO in Alaska for most of a decade. I eventually moved on to the regionals in spite of my wasted time in Alaska. In my case I was stuck there because the regionals were not hiring low time guys at the time. Now it is better to go straight to a regional. Years wasted in a C-207 only serves as an obstacle. It does not assure preference during an interview with an airline and usually is something that has to be explained away.

Sometimes guys can hit a sweet spot and get the kind of turbine PIC time that helps them to move on. Most however only get thousands of hours in a piston single engine, or useless right seat time in a turbine twin, and end up having to start over at a regional anyways in class with guys who are many years younger and only have a few hundred hours as a flight instructor.

The unasked question is: Why did you waste so much time in Alaska if your true career objective was to fly for an airline? It suggests that your true interests lie elsewhere. Alaska flying is an unnecessary and risky diversion. Do it and you most likely will find yourself in line behind guys who are much younger then yourself and have the years left to sit waiting to upgrade.

If one wants to fly for an airline then get a job as an airline pilot. If you want to fly the bush then fly the bush.

Skyhigh

Airhoss

Yet another major airline pilot checking in here who had an Alaska flying background. I started off in 207's up in Kotzebue, Nome and Aniak. Finished in Casa 212's I've been at UAL for just on 15 years and was at America West and ATI prior to that.

Sorry to rain on your downer, self pity, parade there sky high..

HueyHerc

Just how much does a C-207 or C-208 Captain make first year and afterwards?

HH

USMCFLYR

One of SH's many faults is believing that only his views count.
You are often the target of his posts when he says that you (and others long in the airline game) are out of touch and don't know what it is like any more 'in the trenches', yet notice that he purports to still be in the know about how Alaskan flying is either helpful or not even when confronted with a current pilot with current information.
It is his way or no way.

USMCFLYR

JamesNoBrakes

Why didn't you go straight from "alaska flying" to a major if it's so great??

Playing the devil's advocate here..., and the next paragraph is NOT directed at you or anything.

Is the goal to start flying for major airlines when you are 45-50 years old?
I don't think ANY overall rules or generalities can be made here. What about mountain-flying in some of the parts of the US? What about the decisions you have to make in both places and the aircraft performance you have to deal with at times? What about the fact that airlines care only about "turbine PIC"? You gotta weigh all of this stuff. I'll say this: if all of these jobs are just "stepping stones", they are pretty hard to take seriously by themselves, and you can convince yourself up and down of how important it is to do them well and that one day you may be able to "move on", but with the realities of aviation, things gotta change. We can't keep saying "pay your dues at some POS place in a POS plane making POS pay" and one day you may "make it". People need to start taking these jobs seriously, that means from all angles, and it means rejecting the jobs sometimes. The whole "you'll get experience" thing is the most overblown BS I've ever heard in my years spanning multiple careers and industries. It's like boasting about how you'll get carpenting experience as a carpenter, or medical experience as a EMT.

Based on my own experience, I'd say get turbine PIC at any cost, but just realize that this is the life you are following and you make some pretty severe sacrifices to do so.