The thing I enjoy the most about flying..
 

The thing I enjoy the most about flying..

You forgot: Wearing My Cool Hat

If you get into the profession knowing how it's going to be, you won't be disappointed. If you get in with unrealistic views, it's going to suck.

Expectations
 

How is it going to be? What is an accurate set of expectations to have? Should pilots expect to be able to make a living? Will they ever be able to earn the value of their investment back?

And if it is so dire then why should any rational person pursue such a masochistic path in the first place?

Skyhigh

Number 3 is a contradiction. A house? on 30000?

I would imagine Fedex CA by age of 30.:)

Keep imagining.

Yea I think the old Fedex CA thing has become more of a joke. Don't say it if you are interviewing, that's for sure.

How bout the Aiways Express crewroom in LGA.

Yeah, thats the best...NOT. LOL

When the cockpit door is closed and the engines are turning, that's when I enjoy my job. Everything leading up to that...

How about:

working weekends AND holidays
working 16 hour days
getting paid less than the senior f/a working on my plane (not anymore thank God)
spending 6 nights per week in a hotel (if commuting)

But all is temporarily forgotten if a new young hot f/a or two show up on a 4-day with long layovers eager to learn.........operating procedures, of course. What did you think I meant?

I love flying. Just sitting up there taking in all the beauty of the world is amazing. Skyhigh, I think you're a very sad person. When ever I've been done with a thing, it's always been easy to turn my back and move on. You clearly have deep issues with your decision to leave. Sincerely, good luck with finding some peace.

Flying the plane is truly the only part of being a pilot I like.:eek:

Very true...the poll must be talking about your parents house that you're forced to move back into.

I love being able to find ways to eat... like Ketchup and water makes a pretty good soup if done correctly. Oh, umm I have figured out 300 ways to cook spam and about 50 variations of Top Ramen...
All this on 3yr FO pay and who said 100K in college and flight loans wouldnt pay off Pffffttt........
Just when you think you have enough to splurge on the Mcdonalds Value Meal "super size" you get the furlough notice..... I love the airlines!

To answer a previous comment, here's what I feel an accurate view of what the industry should be. Before you enter the profession, you should expect to work long hours and spent quite a few nights away from home. You should expect to make far less money than you deserve. You should expect to work with people who rarely seem happy. That's more or less life at regional carriers these days.

If you go in knowing how it is, at least you're likely not to be surprised to the downside. Of course if you make the experience work, then there's a chance for better things at larger carriers. Given today's world, that may not be so anymore, but at least you know the lay of the land.

The crews and layovers.

I miss my family but I have fun at work on occasion.

Travel benefits!

Oh, was I supposed to be negative? :rolleyes:

The slim and atractive FA's!

You must've avoided JS on NWA.... They have some real tundra sows and they lack charisma

I always seem to be at work flying all the time but my friends that are not pilots make more than I do...............I LOOOVE IT!

Ya know we could push for "Food Court" positions.... I mean when you have 4-5hrs waiting for the next flight, might as well make some extra coin and earn a free lunch!!! Heck, we could start a rotating shift and crew scheduling can add this into our trips!!! :D

There are plenty of instances in which a plumber should earn more that a regional FO. The line is somewhere between pilot mill SJS wonderboy FO and a senior FO......sometimes even a Captain.

Right now?
Flying with students and looking at the Florida sunrise as we fly up the Daytona shoreline.
Seeing my students grow, looking at their faces when they succeed, and help them when they fail.
Knowing that I earn practically nothing, but still love what I do

edit: I see this is the regional forum, but I always just use the "new posts link" :p.
I am without boundaries

Other than pay.... none of the rest of that should be a surprise.

you've burned so many bridges you'd be lucky to be a janitor at FexEx by age 55 :rolleyes:

You must be a very good instructor. Keep at it because it is difficult to find good instructors. I wish I had an instructor as good as you are when I was starting out.

What I like about flying is the sensation of freedom and speed.

Two leg, 7.5 hours of pay on 9 hours of duty time, a real hourly wage, good work rules, with my retirement plan still intact, and being home with the wife and kids every night works pretty well for me....
Taking the family on short day trips in the C172 isn't bad either....

One is fun, the other is work... people need to stop trying to mix the two....

or accept less than prevailing wage because they have SJS....

That is what we have now.... so many with SJS have accepted less than prevailing wage,
that they created a new sub-standard prevailing wage and called it regional...

How do you get there?
 

How are new pilots supposed to get the experience needed to get to a major airline without climbing the ladder? Maybe the major airlines should offer a lottery when hiring pilots? Everyone with a brand new commercial license could put their name in the hat and magically get on with legacy without having to produce a fat logbook. Then they could stick to wage standards that would preserve the industry.

Skyhigh

They do it like everybody else did. You don't get it by accepting the top level jobs for bargain basement prices.... since the eventual result will be the loss of all top level pay at those jobs. You have some personal pride and fly CFI, military, 135, pipeline, whatever... There are tons of ways to fill a logbook without undercutting the profession because they want to play Airline Pilot for free.

What these kids are doing is like walking into the executive boardroom, addressing the Board of Directors, showing them their MBA from xyz school and then offering to do their job for 1/5 the total costs.... in hopes that fifty thousand more like them don't ruin the higher paying jobs that they want to apply for once they get their "experience."

great co-workers who are great friends and the funny moments we have,

hand flying about 20 feet above a overcast at 425 mph,

hand flying an approach down to mins :)


nothing else equals those moments

Walking through the front door and not thinking about flying until the next trip.

oh crakey! i want to throw up. clearly, you are in the first 200 hours of CFI'ing... Pretty soon you will come to realize, that not everybody can succeed at flying airplanes. And the more you let wash out and dont spoon feed them everything, the more you help out our industry. Then of course wait until your letting them try Vmc demo for the first time, and watch how they fail miserably, damn near putting you into a flat spin, just because they didn't want to study the maneuvers because American Idol was on last night. i can only vividly remember about 5 out of 100 of students that I enjoyed flying with. good luck and keep drinking that kool-aid

Well?
 

I understand how it undercuts the industry however in most cases you still have to go through a regional to become 121 competitive. How are you suppose to get to a legacy as a CFI?

Legacy pilots should petition their HR departments to hire away from the most part 121 qualified and favor the hard working random flight instructor, pipeline pilot or night piston cargo pilot. I mean it is your HR department that rewards undercutting SJS pilots in the first place isn't it? Hire a bush pilot why don't you? I put my time in but the legacy airlines want young regional prodigies.

You can't get there without selling out. If I am missing something then please enlighten me.

Skyhigh

OK Old Man....I'll add to Photon's list:

1) Flying with students and walking to the airplane in the cool CA morning and flying over the Sierras during the sunrise!
2) Seeing my students grasp the material and the satisfaction of their faces and then seeing them graduate and move onto the next step where they may do some GOOD WORK!
3) Knowing that I could have gotten out of my job a long time ago and be making a lot more money at a variety of jobs, yet still dreading the day that I have to leave my job.

And I'm NOT in my first 200 hours of instructing.

It sounds to me like Photon is enjoying his job. It sounds like he might actually enjoy instructing right now. Maybe that will last for a a month longer or it might last for years - who knows; but you coming down on him for no reason comes across as just a bad attitude or sour grapes on your part.
Where in his post did he mention letting students get by without being prepared? Where do you get the idea that he passes everybody?
It certainly sounds like YOU had a tough time instructing and believe that everyone should have the same experience; well...that just isn't the case.

USMCFLYR

Bitter much?
I'm not in my first 200 hours, and yes, I do know that all students are different.
Some students have better aptitudes than others, some learn faster, some don't want to learn, some get money directly from their parents and don't care, some use an eternity to "get" things, but that's how it is, everyone is different.
Sure I've had some students frustrate me to no end, but for the most part they are the exception. Try and find any other job where everything is a rose garden 24/7.
All in all, the ups of working as a flight instructor, that means working with the students, not management, has way more positives than it has negatives.
I feel bad that you really had such a bad experience with flight instructing, but then maybe you weren't really good at it, or it wasn't for you, or a mix of the two.
I just know that I really enjoy working with students, I'm able to get most of them through their courses in due time, and some of them after quite an extensive time.
I still look forward to every flight, it's not like any other teaching job out there, that's for sure

In what world do you live in where, when the majors hire again, they will take cfis, pipeline pilots, and 135 pilots over experienced 121 regional pics who have already instructed and flown pipelines and 135 to boot?