endlessnight

I flew Medevac for 9 years, and quite enjoyed it. Hope to go back to it in 6 months or so.

JohnBurke

I've flown air ambulance and medevac in piston, turboprop, and turbojet equipment, from dirt runways to busy international locations. Quality of equipment and quality of life runs the gamut from excellent to substandard and anywhere in between.

I have done jobs that are nothing but administrative transports, and I've had patients put on the aircraft that are spraying bodily fluids, badly burned, axe and gunshot wounds to the face, and all kinds of infectious conditions. I've had to take a series of shots after transporting a patient. I've transported children dying of cancer, and dead children. Some transports have been rewarding, some heartbreaking, some in unfavorable conditions.

The one absolute in any ambulance operation is that decisions are made based on safety of flight and nothing else. I have turned around and gone home, cancelling harvest of a heart, because of safety of flight circumstances. I have turned flights down for safety of flight, when the pressure was on to make the flight by nurses, general managers, owners, chief pilots, etc. I have taken airplanes off the line and grounded them due to maintenance at busy ambulance operations, making them unavailable. No one will help you there, and often won't back you...but as a professional you need to know what you can and cannot do, what's safe and what is not, and you need to be able to draw a line when no one else will.

I worked at a particular operation that took all comers; that is, any call for a patient, we went, regardless of the patient's ability to pay. We didn't ask. We got stiffed on about 50% of our lifts; patients refused, insurance wasn't there, whatever. We also got a lot more calls from hospitals and clinics, because they knew we'd come.

By comparison, every one of our competitors had earned the reputation of only flying when the patient could pay. If the flight was being dispatched and the company learned that the patient didn't have good insurance, the aircraft mysteriously broke down, but was available five minutes later for a different call. Not legal Not ethical. Very common.

I refuse to work for operations like that. It's always been an important element of my employment that I find the work rewarding. I don't feel that way with a shady operation, and there are many. Use caution, and don't ever take a job that you're not willing to drop in a heartbeat. The life you save won't only be your own.

JohnBoote

Life Flight Network, based in Oregon, has been consistently hiring pilots for their PC-12s and CJ4. Their pay is reasonable and they claim to be one the best non-profits to work for in Oregon. That said, their turnover for fixed wing pilots seems high (I’m basing this on their rate of hiring for the same positions at the same domiciles).

I’ve received recruiting calls from them, but I haven’t been ready to start the hiring process with them. That may change in the near future and I was wondering if anyone has any inside information on working for them…

Thanks,

JB

Gundriver64

Anybody here working for Guardian Flight?

dfrenchbk

I start in a couple of weeks, can let you know how it is.

Gundriver64

PM sent!!!

AK15T

I've been flying medevac here in AK for 7 months now, love it! From what I hear, the airmed field used to be a lot of small companies competing against each other, now it's a couple bigger conglomerates. This is good for all involved, as the bigger groups have more financial depth, better pay and bennies, less pressure to take every flight, etc.

As a KA200 captain, I'm making about $100k a year, with the ability to work more at a substantially higher rate, occasionally. I'm away from home for 16-17 days a month, but it's a very easy schedule, and sometimes I time out at my home base , so I sleep in my own bed 2-3 nights per shift. The company expects you to do the right thing, so I have only turned down flights when the weather was truly atrocious, or we just couldn't make it work with duty day, etc. This is night and day different from flying 135 cargo in a beech 1900, that job was brutal. So far, I'd say this is the best balance of work/pay/quality of life that I have found in aviation.

Gundriver64

Cool, thanks for sharing your experiences!

sf340b

ATP has zero to hero programs for $80K. Full time and 9 months. Another year for building time.

You could put together a local PT SKD and keep your day job for a similar amount of time.

havick206

You want to take a pay cut to be up front?