Is It possible to have a life in the ANG - flying your 8 sorties a month then - flying for an airline as a day job - and have a family life as well. It would seem that airline guys are already tired / overworked / and away from home enough to try and complete some ANG requirement a month, not to mention all the traveling to/from the ANG base and back home. On top of that to try and have any sort of family would seem out of the question. Is this type of career path for the dedicated bachelor only??

 

I was told by a friend who flies F-15s for the ANG <paraphrasing>:

"You've got your airline job, your Guard job, and your family. Pick two that you want to do well, because you don't have enough time for all three."

 

The above is true if you commute to Reserve Duty.

Here are the scenarios:
1. Live where Guard/Res is, commute to Airline.
Excellent QOL if you are a line holder at your airline, less so if you can only hold reserve. Also, how is the commute? One leg on line = minimal pain, (still commuting tho), 2 legs off line = suck

This is usually the best option on 1-2 year pay.

2. Live in Airline Base, Commute to Guard Reserve.
QOL is very high for reserve line holders. Less pressure to get out to Guard reserve duty, however, you really start to min run the mil stuff after a while.

3. The Valhalla , colocated Airline/ Mil stuff. This is very hard to do, but if can somehow do this, you have achieved the best possible solution.

 

You definately want to live at either your airline domicile or your reserve base.

I live near a large concentration of naval forces, and commute to the airline. This ensures that I can always find a reserve job near home. Also it turns drill days into bonus days for my family...I'm home in the evening when I would often otherwise be on an airline trip.

I also try to do military admin and training while on the road with the airline...not working out so well right now since my current job involves a lot SCI level stuff.

 

Rick, do you get your drill days off the same way you would AT? I was planning to make up drills that fell on my airline schedule - does the military duty clause work for drills, too? Thanx.

 

8 sorties per month? Not sure about that one. What type of airframe are you talking about> You'll only get 48 FTP's for tankers as a part timer. Not sure what the other airframes are given. Divide that by 12 months and that's 4 sorties per month, not to include ground training, which you can use up to 4 FTP's per quarter for. There are voluntary TDY's, alert and of course, your drill weekends. If you can do two double FTP sorties, drill weekend and maybe a Charlie alert, you're only looking at 4 days at the unit per month, unless your alert gets tasked to an Alpha. Get 15 days off a month with the airline and you're looking at working 19-20 days a month. If you're the type that needs more time off than that, it may be tough.

 

Inexperienced fighter guys(read young wingman) need 8 sorties a month to make RAP. It's 6 for experienced guys...it has an big impact on your life. I don't know how guys with a wife and kids do it(sts). And it seems to be getting more difficult with all the new system updates that keep happening constantly. 4 days a month would seem like a vacation. You're looking at 6-8 days/month min average on the fighter side.

 

My understanding was that guard/reserve guys can drop one trip each month with mil leave to do their guard/reserve flying. Works out to the be same work days, but in the early years the guard/reserve pay is more per work day, in later years, you're losing money dropping the trip to fly guard/reserve.

 

Yes, any mil duty (regardless of how it is funded) makes you eligible for leave. This includes volunteer non-pay for those senior officers who are running the clock out. I usually take 4 days off for a 2 day DWE, or 6 days off for a 4-day drill. That gives me a day on either end to commute.

If you work the day before drill, the crew schedulers think they own you until 2359...even if your trip was scheduled to end at 10 AM. Obviously if you get reflowed and finish in ORD at 2330, you're not going to make a 0630 drill in california. You employer is required to give you time to:

a) Travel to/from drill and
b) Rest before/after drill

They cannot legally deny you the extra days on either end. At their option they could possibly cut you lose a half-day early, but their scheduling systems often don't handle that well, so I've always got the full day.

 

You can drop as much as you need or want to...no limits (except for the 5 year voluntary thing which is essentially impossible to reach). Federal law is crystal clear on that, and any employer who tries to impose their own more restrictive limits is going to get a spanking.

You are correct about the pay value, but drill days also increase your retirement points. I calculated that for a typical O-5 (who lives to age 90) each point is worth $150 ($300 per drill day) so that's worth taking into consideration too.