Originally Posted by
Plantation Air
13.3 Hours in the air yesterday. If you want time, give aerial survey a try. I never realized how many operations are out there. Seems that the major players don't really advertise but anyone looking might contact, keystone. They run a fleet of 14 310s and Navajos. Pay is much better than the regionals (although most of the time is piston) and as it's contract, schedules are more flexible. Regardless, just a suggestion. I never considered it until someone from this forum was kind enough to enlighten me. Certainly not a glamorous gig, but it's paid flying and it provides ever changing venues. I flew into Missouri yesterday and ended up in Alabama this morning. That was my first day. Definately OTJT. Cheers and good luck. Also feel free to e-mail me as I can come up with some other company names.
Thought I would post up since I worked for Keystone for 2 years. It was a great company to fly for with outstanding people. Anything wrong with a plane, it went to our MX hangar where 4 full time mechanics would fix it before it flew again. I can not say enough good things about them.
Now to correct the contract statement. Unless things have changed in the two years since I left, Keystone pretty much only hired full time employees. We had contract pilots for the summer, but these were people who had been with the company for 20+ years. Every pilot employed there when I flew had started with a ton of previous survey time, or had started as a photographer and then upgraded when a pilot quit. I was a photographer for 8 months before I started flying.
Also, they do require you to live in base. Even as a pilot, you were required at the office M-F, 7-345. If the weather was good and there were photo jobs that needed to get done, people went flying. If the weather sucked (i.e. it was cloudy or worse) you did office work. This included labeling film, inputting jobs into our navigation software, WASHING THE PLANES, etc. Basically busy work so if you aren't interested in that, don't bother. If that sounds appealing then by all means, please do look into them.
I will also add that the last I heard, they had laid off at least one pilot and one photographer. Times are tough in the survey world seeing as how no one is really building anything right now.
Good luck to those interested. It is a very rewarding type of flying. It will challenge you every day you go up, and you will be compensated appropriately. Feel free to post up any questions you have. You can PM me if you would like, but I would prefer to put the info out for all to see.
Oh, my avatar is one of Keystone's Cessna 320's. The Skyknight is a great airplane and this picture was taken of me banking off over North Dakato or Montana. I really miss having fun while flying.