Thread: Don't be an airline pilot?
View Single Post
Old 12-26-2009 | 01:37 PM
  #35  
Dan64456
Gets Weekends Off
 
Joined: Apr 2007
Posts: 456
Likes: 0
Default
Originally Posted by runge
[Disclaimer: I'm not an airline pilot. Just a lowly grad student with 230 TT working on my commercial]

I don't think being an airline pilot would be that bad of a gig. It's not the best career in terms of how well it rewards vs. what you have to put in to get a job, but that shouldn't be a deal buster if it's all you really want to do in life. I wanted to be an airline pilot for a long time. But for one thing, now that I've got a few hundred hours, I'm realizing that flying the same flight profile on the same routes or similar routes, in the same airplane for the rest of my life wouldn't be that exciting. The reason flight training is so much fun is because you're always doing different things, always advancing to new airplanes, there's always a new procedure to learn or a new level of accuracy to shoot for. I don't really see those same traits in an airline pilot's lifestyle.

Personally, I'm a weekend pilot for now. If the military will have me, then I'll fly apaches for the army or f-16's for the ANG. If not, then I'll be a CFI on the weekends and an aerospace engineer during the week. I'm glad I didn't commit myself 100% to being an airline pilot.

I could still quit my job and go be an airline pilot within a few years if I decided I wanted to, but if I'd gone to ERAU, gotten a degree in aviation science, and was a furloughed RJ pilot, the reverse would not be true. YMMV.
Speaking of monotony, have you ever sat in a cubicle? I've been in one for 5 years now and my life has gone from exciting to horrible. I'd much rather fly the PHL VCN8 every day than stare at the same computer screen with its decade old operating system dealing with ignorant entitlement minded people all day. My job has no real new 'levels of accuracy' to strive for either... No matter what I do, or how good I do it, it's never good enough for the corporate minded. Being a 'cost center' has been a bain on my existence. I don't know your situation nor am I trying to insult you in any way, but I'm just offering a viewpoint from a cubicle dweller... since most jobs that aren't burger flipping or changing oil involve sitting under fluorescent lights getting fatter and dealing with the poster children of nepotism. I'm just hoping things get better for all of us soon... And even though I have my issues with the airline industry and the idiot public (not the smart public) pleasing "security" measures imposed on us by our government, I still hope one day to be in the cockpit seeing the world.
Reply
0