Hey! I'm southern too! South Carolina here. LOL! But I live in SoCal for the time being. Wife's going to Grad school here. I miss the good ole south. I actually want to apply to ASA and X-Jet but I know for a fact they would want more hours than Mesa. LOL! It's easy for me to say that I understand the hardship because of how much my dad hates the industry now, but I've never wanted something so bad in my life. Ever since I was age three, I knew what I wanted to do and would do whatever it takes to get there. My whole career was planned out around Pan Am since my dad was a training captain there. But that's done with....I at least have to get in, experience it, then make a decision. But I just might play it conservatively and get more hours and fly for a better outfit. Maybe for Bankair, a little mom and pops operation out of Coulmbia, SC. Very nice people! Glad to hear your not an inverterate detractor from the RJ's. LOL! Where in the south do you reside?

 

Well they call this corner of the US the deep south but I would consider a job at any regional with a second year pay of $40k with a base somewhere the annual mean outside temperature isn't too low. Since that pay is not to be had my plan is to try for the flight department of the corporation I work for as an FO Learjet. $80k starting, sounds like a cool job. Anything to get out of the office!

 

[quote=Cubdriver;136546]Blast-


6) If one is over 35 years old then starting a flying career at a regional is considered risky. There is not enough time to get a decent payback on a typical training investment and there's no guarantee you are going to make it to a major airline. As Skyhigh and others point out, the odds are rather against making it to a major as he likes to say "2000 jobs for 60,000 applicants" or something like that. Getting to a major is plan that starts early and carries numerous prerequisites many of which are not equilaterally available.

[quote=Cubdriver;136546]Blast-

 

6) If one is over 35 years old then starting a flying career at a regional is considered risky. There is not enough time to get a decent payback on a typical training investment and there's no guarantee you are going to make it to a major airline. As Skyhigh and others point out, the odds are rather against making it to a major as he likes to say "2000 jobs for 60,000 applicants" or something like that. Getting to a major is plan that starts early and carries numerous prerequisites many of which are not equilaterally available.


How discouraging,

Ok, honest opinions guys, I am about to retire from the Military and will be attending the ATP fast track Airline Transport Pilot program. I am debt free except for a house payment that my retirement will cover. My main concern is by the time I finish my training I will be just about 40. Will an airline even touch me? Will I be able to make a decent living on the pay of a regional, EVER? Basically I am asking am I wasting my time? I will be of course obtaining a loan for the training minus about 25k.

Thanks in advance guys. I am a zero flight time guy btw, I have taken a couple of lessons and fell in love with flying, and am willing to live a humble life for a few years if theres a payoff in the end.

Thanks in advance.

 

I don't think your age will be a problem. What you consider an "acceptable payback" for your trouble, may be.

I think you could easily be at 100K when you retire.

It could take you 3 or 4 years to break 50K.

 

I actually worked out a comparison of what how long it would take to equal the pay at a typical office job if you went into flying for a regional airline (I picked ASA) as of tomorrow. I do not have my spreadsheet with me, but in column A there was a starting salary of $48k which increased by cost of living (3%) every year for a series of years. In column B I put starting FO pay at ASA flying the CRJ, followed by another two years of that with corresponding pay raises, and in the third year our hypothesis includes we make captain of CRJ and continue for another few years. My calculation found that after the seventh year at ASA one would just about break even over a desk job. He/she would make more flying the jet from then on.

Now you could say well after 7 years at a desk job you could jump into an entry management position, and be at a much higher salary. This is only true if you happen to have a masters and they need a manager. And the comparison does not include flight training costs which are substantial, and it does not account for what happens if you do not upgrade very fast for some reason, or if the airline goes out of business which I think is a risk more commonly associated with airlines than desk jobs.

My conclusion was unless you like flying a lot you would do better playing the corporate/desk game. You can get raises better than just cost of living in all likelihood, and many desk jobs offer bonuses on top of normal raises for hard work. But you would have to like doing that a lot, toiling endlessly in a cubicle, and be willing to get a masters while working the job which could be pretty taxing. In the end, you would have a better life going that way and I think most people would agree, especially the family people.

What's hard to put a number on, is how good getting to fly every day is. I wanted to do this from about the age of 17 and never had chance. I would be willing to try regional airline life for a while just to get it out of my system. If I liked it, I may be able to do alright paywise. But I would have to decide that giving it a try was the only way I thought I would be happy with myself, something I would not really ask if I only engineered airplanes which is what I presently do.

My father is long since retired, and he said to me once that he thinks he had a deep need for adventure that he never recognized during his working years, and that it made him restless during his career. He thought if he had addressed the restlessness as an innate need in and of itself, he would have made better choices in life.

 

For what it's worth.......



ASA

New lowered minimums: 500TT/50ME or 400TT/50ME for those with advanced jet training, which would include experience in/with:
Level C/D Jet Simulator
Level 5/6 jet FTD
FMS Training
Glass cockpit
Crew resource management (CRM) training
Accelerated jet ground school.

 

Age is not a problem for regionals. Almost half my class at Eagle was 40+ (7 of 16), and the oldest 2 were 50+.

Make a decent living is a personal judgement. Since you're military you've probably had long deployments before & your family is accustomed to seperation. Are you willing to be away from home for two months for initial training? Then be gone 5 or 6 days in a row, home for only 48 to 72 hours, for the next year (or three, or more). All for only $20,000? Yeah, you'll gross low to mid 30's 2nd year on till upgrade. Which can range from 2 1/2 years to 10 years, depending entirely upon luck. After five years of so you'll have the opportunity to move to a major. Which means probie pay, displacement, sitting reserve, being last on the seniority list, and potentally being furloghed in the next econiomic downturn.

Is this a big enough payoff for you?

 

Well all this is possible. The problem is, it's hard also to report to a desk every day. Lack of adventure, sense of not having tried other options, the endless 50 hour workweeks, the stuffy corporate culture, and so on. My thought is why not try flying for a year and see if it's any better than the desk job. If it is, the money will come later. I proved this to my own satisfaction by working out the numbers. The first 7 years will be slim, but money has never been much of a thing to live for if you ask me, and if you persist it will be there eventually in flying.

 

Very well put. I agree. If you enjoy what you are doing, and are good at it, the money will follow.