USMCFLYR

Being gone on a particular job is only one part of what he said he didn't want to do in relation to a potential career. You know well that success in aviation often requires moving to a job or moving with a job. His stated requirements for 'staying close to home and not being gone much' are often incompatible with an aviation career, or at least a hindering notion to over come.

PotatoChip

Sorry for trying to be fair. I should've have known not to reply to a moderator.
Of course you are competely right and being gone for a month at a time as an aerial surveyor had nothing to with his reservations....

PotatoChip

OP, you should consider another career field since you apparently never want to be away from home.

galaxy flyer

How do you expect F/Os to learn the day-to-day craft of being an airline pilot or captain? From 25 hours of IOE, YGBSM. I flew at an airline, the military and 16 years of corporate, in all of them captains were expected to coach, lead and evaluate their crews. I had evaluation sheets each captain I flew with at EAL, some cappyy's were better than others, but all made comments and gave some words of advice that have shaped my career after they shutdown.

If you're not "instructing", you're shirking part of the job.

GF

El Pilot

There is nothing wrong with being away on a 4 day or even 2 week trip and I would actually enjoy it. Just trying to see what my options are for building good time without the usual CFI.

USMCFLYR

My response is fair and offered with realism.
Aerial survey is not the only part of this career that takes you away from home or expects you to move where opportunities exist.

If you disagree with this then just say so. No need to play petty in the sandbox PC.

PRS Guitars

You've answered your own question. Seriously, suck it up, and do what is required to progress. You are often going to find yourself out of your comfort zone in this industry. You might as well start tackling that now.

You could build the required hours in two years. Trust me, two years is NOTHING. One could stand on their head in a bucket of excrement for two years. You need to be looking five and ten years down the road. Decide where you want to be and figure out how to get there. Have some deferred gratification, you need it in this business big time.

With that said, there are a variety of CFI jobs out there. Find a job that...

pays for all ground and air time.
Pays at least $25/hr to start
The school should not be making money off you, but rather the planes. (Ie charging $50 an hour for your services and paying you $10)

Whatever job you are in, focus on being the best at it and being a complete professional. This will open other doors. At the same time, every job should serve towards hitting your five and ten year goals.

Off my Dad soapbox...

Mistek89

I've been away from home since October , but can't complain about the hours I'm getting , in 5 months I got as many hours as I did in a year of instructing .

JohnBurke

No, nobody else has ever had difficulty "building" flight hours. You're the only one. Why do you ask?

Getting the requisite experience (notice that word: I didn't say hours) is your responsibility. It may require some sacrifice on your part, which may very likely include moving somewhere to do the flying, as well as working a second job to survive while you're doing your flying job.

You say you're not good at communicating (and imply that you wouldn't make a good teacher). Do you think that flight instructors simply come that way? It's learned, just like flying. Did you reject flying because you didn't know how to fly? Of course not. Why would you reject instructing because you don't know how to teach?

Learn.

Banner towing seems "wild and dangerous" to you? Slow flight is wild and dangerous?

You can't commit to being on the road for extended periods of time? You're in the wrong business. You really are.

You understand that airplanes go places, right? That's one of the chief functions. You understand that there are a lot of pilots; a dime a dozen. The work doesn't come to you. You go to it. Where ever it is. Whenever it is.

As an inexperienced aviator, you're a beggar Not a chooser. Have you forgotten that?

The more qualified you make yourself, the more capable you will become of having choice.

I didn't have 500 hours when I flew jumpers. I know jump pilots flying multi engine turboprop aircraft with barely 500 hours, and less. Most of them don't have any jump experience, but it's not a bad thing to have. If you're flying jumpers, knowing how to exit the aircraft and deploy your parachute, as well as how to fly and land the canopy might just save your life one day.

Sounds like you're "splitting time" and doing "safety pilot time" to gain experience. That's not the experience you need.

You say that you only want to fly freight, or fly for Part 91 operations. How do you propose to get qualified?

The more you exclude options, the fewer you have. Start saying you won't do this, you wont' do that...pretty soon you won't have anywhere to go or anything to do, because you've refused to do it. Good luck with that narrow view.

Vital Signs

I have worked for a few bosses who would only hire current/former flight instructors because they understood how much a pilot LEARNS when he/she teaches.

Getting it was tough, the pay was not good, but i would not change the CFI path I took.