Originally Posted by
Hacker15e
"Literally" nothing to do? Or nothing to do that you can think of in the limited stovepipe of the CFI-to-regional-to-career-airline pipeline?
There are many interesting things you can go find to do in aviation that don't require an ATP but will still be interesting work and will continue to advance your airmanship and development as a professional aviator. This is an opportunity to go off and explore those things without worrying that you're squandering away that precious seniority number that drives young pilots to take the shortest course possible to a regional right seat.
Tow banners, live on the beach, and get a bunch of taildragger time. Go up to Alaska and learn bush flying. Find an air tours operator and give rides to tourists in a biplane. USFS air-tanker or lead-in pilot. Plus all the "normal" time building gigs like hauling jumpers, aerial survey, night freight dog, etc. If you are willing to stay a CFI either keep what you have or find a different one, but as long as you're putting food on the table you can always learn something new on the side: go get an A&P or go get a seaplane or glider rating.
The options are only limited by your willingness to get out of your comfort zone and your imagination, which you'll have to open up to both seek out and find interesting and different flying jobs.
I agree with everything that you are saying, however not everyone can just uproot their lives. The job market is hyper competitive right now, in most fields, but especially aviation. When two companies close and toss ~2500 qualified pilots onto the street, the pickings get slim.
Originally Posted by
HotDogSonicBoom
100% agree with you. I was telling all my buddies that are looking at furlough or are reaching ATP mins but have no regional to go to to look into applying for a cargo job up in the Dakotas with me.
All of them said, “hmm. I don’t think I can handle living like that. I’m gonna try my luck elsewhere.”
A lot had the impression that the furlough would be short and they would get the call back soon.
None of them are flying now and all of them are gonna be sitting for a while with no flying ahead of them. I mean, our place is shutting down once UAL gets the green light to push the 145s to C5.
It may feel like pure luck that I got a SA227 pic seat, but it really wasn’t. I was willing to move and pick up everything for it. I did the same thing when choosing a flight school and I did the same thing with goin up to Alaska and flying 135 ops.
I’d suggest to the OP the same thing as above: try something creative. Go look for a 135 gig in western Alaska. It is dangerous but it’s PIC time, and I’m not talking CFI PIC time. A lot of the guys I flew with up north respected that type of flying cause it’s still pretty pure. Not flashy, but necessary.
I really wish you some luck man. Good luck.
I have a CFI friend I’m trying to tell to take a 135 SIC SE Caravan gig right now... his response? I’m gonna wait until 1500 and I am not gonna leave my hometown to pursue it. Wow. Just absolute wow. So it’s still out there man.
Again, I agree with what you are saying, however again, not everyone can just up and move.
Originally Posted by
njd1
As someone who had his aviation career ripped from him when I was your age and waited several decades to get back in, I have to say, welcome to the club.
Your "literally nothing to do" comment reflects a myopic vision of the world and your own abilities. You dreamed of being a pilot and nothing else. Tunnel vision like this is quite typical of the young, unfortunately, but you need to snap out of it and this will likely be the impetus that forces you to do exactly that.
For what it's worth, I wound up leveraging my abilities in technical work and went into engineering. From this perch I watched the aviation industry for the last 30 years endure one black swan event after another. All the while I made good money and stayed involved in aviation in my own way, owning and wrenching on my own airplanes, doing competition aerobatics, instructing, towing gliders and throwing perfectly sane people out of perfectly good airplanes on the weekends. In other words, I lived the dream...which, if it's not obvious by now, does not by default require two jets strapped to your back.
My advice is to go back to school for a useful (i.e. STEM) degree. That will eat up four years, by which time I'm confident the industry will be back, the pilot shortage will be even worse because of all the people who bailed on the industry in frustration, and you'll be able to command a reasonable salary. Best of all, should you choose to come back (and you may not, when you realize the money and satisfaction that can be gained doing challenging work in other industries) when the next black swan event occurs in 10-15 years like clockwork, you'll be better prepared to walk away....perhaps into that side business you were developing over that time in full realization that aviation is better viewed as a part time job vs a full-time career.
This is the best advice. I have a current regional job and I should be safe from any furlough talk, but I am actively working on degree plus several other career options.
Best of luck to the OP, I suppose you can take some comfort in knowing you are not alone. In addition, if you can manage to stick it out, the demand for pilots should be fairly high here in 5 years.