TransWorld

I was grateful to have disability insurance when I had a compression fracture of my knee 15 years ago. Unrelated to work, not a car accident. I was unable to do normal work for several months. After major rebuild surgery I had a thigh to ankle immobilizer with crutches. Finally graduated to a cane, knee brace, and intensive physical therapy. One never knows when something like this can suddenly happen. I am back to normal, of course.

Potatoman

Slight change of pace, but I just crossed the magical 1500 hour mark. I'm trying to decide if I want to sell my soul and go to the regionals, or go to a fractional.

I've worked at the same FBO since the beginning of my aviation career. Went from doing line service all the way up to currently flying and managing a couple Cirrus, as well as flying Phenom 100/300's based on the field. There really is no more room for advancement here, unless I want to get my CFI, but I consider that a step back since it would take my time away from the Phenoms. I've fueled 1000's of NetJets aircraft, and their crews always seem to be fairly happy. I also enjoy the customer interaction I get on the smaller aircraft.

1500 TT, 250 MEL, 160 instrument, close to 1k XC, and 200 turbine in the logbook just for reference.

I'm also leaning towards anything that can keep me home based, or keeps moving easy. I have a wedding coming up next year, and after that we are planning on packing up out of the Iowa cold and heading to North Carolina.

Obviously the pay is extremely appealing once you get into the majors, but there lies my issue. ONCE you get to the majors.

I'm planning on spending my next few days firing off applications, so I'm curious as to what y'all would do in my situation.

Thanks in advance!

DontLookDown

Variations of this question are asked frequently. The consensus is:

If you’re young, like under 40, the airline career is very likely your best choice in whatever category that matters to you (QOL, pay, schedule flexibility, benefits, etc)

If you can live in base at your regional, you aren’t selling your soul at all. Entry level wages have about tripled in the last 10 years. This isn’t 2012 anymore where you were going from 20K as a CFI down to 18K when you finally got that first airline job.

You said you want to move to NC. There’s this little airport down there called Charlotte. Try to live near it and apply to a regional that’s based there and you’ll be in good shape.

If it ends up sucking, quit with some valuable experience and go fly for Netjets.

rickair7777

Get on with it. 121 regional time is the fast civilian ticket and you'll be well-positioned to catch the big wave. You can probably be at a major before you have kids. Your career progression will be so fast that you can retire early and go back to 91/135 if that's more fun. Seniority is everything; no pain, no gain.

Don't take this opportunity for granted, it's very rare. Fair to say unprecedented.

reandld

Name one job that does

TransWorld

Traveling salesmen. Often 4 or 5 nights every week. I grew up with kids who’s dads did that.

TransWorld

Corporate CEOs and Presidents with many manufacturing plants around the world. Some I have been told, stay in hotels over 250 nights per year.

DontLookDown

IT techs. My friend works for Microsoft and was on the road Mon-Fri, every week.

Engineers. Often on site at construction projects for weeks or months at a time

rickair7777

Sales
Technical support for high end equipment (big network routers, power gen systems, specialized industrial systems, etc)
Mil HQ staff
Media/marketing production
etc, etc

Some jobs are on the road by definition (oil, construction, consulting, training).

I could go on and on. I actually got interested in airlines while doing white collar biz travel, and noticed that after getting up at 0300 and traveling across the country the flight crew headed to the hotel, while I headed to a long workday. Got me thinking.

In order to make major airline pay in white collar, you will be traveling and/or working very long hours, and in the modern era pretty much available at all hours via email, text, etc. You do typically get holidays off, so there's that.

TiredSoul

No to be a fly in the soup but I’m curious as to how you’ve logged this time.
The 200 “turbine” is obviously part of the 250 MEL with 50 hrs ME piston.
How did you log the 100/300 time?
There are some requirements to be fulfilled prior to logging SIC in either.
Your 1000 hrs XC is that airport to airport (135), > 50NM or airport to fix (ATP)?
When I was a CFI I’ve turned down turboprop time because there was no legal way for me to log it. Hence my question.