Thread: I want to fly!
View Single Post
Old 01-13-2010, 06:40 PM
  #2  
rickair7777
Prime Minister/Moderator
 
rickair7777's Avatar
 
Joined APC: Jan 2006
Position: Engines Turn Or People Swim
Posts: 39,100
Default

First, the age cutoff is usually age 28 (maybe out to thirty depending on need) and it takes a year or two to get the ball rolling so you need to decide quickly.

The Air National Guard, Air Force Reserve, Army National Guard, and Army Reserve(?) all hire applicants off the street for pilot training. You do a couple of years on active duty for flight training, then return to your unit as a traditional (part-time) reservist. You can have a civilian job, and most do.

Navy, USMC, and USCG only hire previously rated military aviators for their reserve units.

Full-time regular active duty is becoming less popular, for a lot of reasons, but it may be easier to get an AD pilot slot than a guard/reserve slot. You will be committed to active duty for about ten years, and I would only recommend that as a first choice if your goal is to be a senior military leader someday (Colonel, General). You can do your active duty and then transition to guard/reserves after your commitment is up.

The big drawback of active duty: you do not know what airplane you will be flying until you are already in training. Nowdays this a REALLY big drawback, because some folks are getting assigned to fly UAV's instead of real airplanes. It's one thing to dream of F-16's and get assigned to cargo planes, it's another thing entirely to get assigned to play a video game.

Check out baseops.net, plenty of good gouge there on how to start applying.
rickair7777 is offline