First officer training program?

[DE727UPS]

I think it's important to note that Key Lime dropped their program and Gulfstream doesn't exist anymore. Amflight's program through Eagle Jet is mostly guys from overseas. What the OP was asking about doesn't exist nearly to the degree it used to.

 

[ComplexHiAv8r]

Chances are the instructor in such a type of aircraft is able to give that experience to you. Overall it may not be a bad idea as a 135 cargo environment can show you what weather really is like on a bad day.

So when are you taking me flying???

 

[ComplexHiAv8r]

You're 32! If you were 45, this may be a different discussion. You have lots and lots of time in front of you to fly 777s, if that's what you so desire. Like I said, flying a heavy jet is pretty boring. Lots of time on autopilot watching the miles tick down on the FMS. Talk on the radio sometimes, eat dinner, take a break. Land sometimes. Hell, I really love flying, but man, like MikeD said, the coolest thing I get to do is shoot an approach every once in a while. Maybe with a crosswind, if I'm lucky.

If you get there at 40, you'll have 25 years left of the above. Lots of time.

What if he was 45, or even 48? Honest question

 

[dasleben]

What if he was 45, or even 48? Honest question

I'd probably recommend not pushing for the airlines, and try to get into a position that would maximize his pay more quickly.

 

[Maurus]

Well, add me to the list that will throw you out of the interview when I learn how you got that time. Even if it's 15 years later, you now have 5000TT, and 250 of it is this crap. GTFO!

So if he rented a Seminole for 250 hours he would be punted as well? I see no difference here. No job taken. No job given at the end. Just a method of time building. You know full well the time is legal.

 

[drunkenbeagle]

So if he rented a Seminole for 250 hours he would be punted as well? I see no difference here. No job taken. No job given at the end.

I think that the major difference is that no one is likely to rent you a seminole without giving you a checkout/adequate training in it. You would also be the acting PIC. In other words, you manage to fly that much time, it was your ADM that kept you from being a smoking hole. Not the guy sitting next to you ultimately getting paid to do that.

 

[Speed Pilot]

Buying time in a Seminole or some other light twin will look much better on a resume than PFT or PFJ. It will show that you were out flying without your hand being held. PFJ just shows you could sit on yours hands while a real pilot did the work.

 

[Treblesum81]

Stopped reading 5 pages in, so sorry if this has been said, but to the OP, your best bet is to network. This is the place to do it. Seriously. Don't want to be a CFI? 99% of the replies here have implied you would be doing. Even though some people out there don't care, many do, so chances are it will hurt more than help. But there is hope, low time jobs do exist. They're just hard to find. How do you find these jobs? You make friends, you get involved in this community and others like it, you develop relationships and make your goals known. Results won't be instant, but eventually, opportunities will start to unfold for you.

I once looked at AMFs pay to play program as something I wanted to do. I was 18, didn't know any better. I came here, I learned the error of my ways very quickly. I'd recommend you do the same. Most of the members on this board love to help out wherever they can, but only if you give them a reason to. Please take advantage of it.

It would seem that the mere mention of PFT is enough to get me ostracized. I understand the networking aspect, but I'm still concerned about what to do in the meantime while I'm building hours enough to satisfy the insurance companies. So many people have ignored my concerns and expressed desire not to instruct that I'm beginning to think many are not even reading what I have to say and just writing me off as a lost cause because I'm not saying "you're right... I've seen the error of my despicable ways." The truth is that I'm leaning away from PFT, if only because I see no reason to piss people off down the line, but that just leaves a gap that I have to find a way to bridge that may not be so easy to do at first. Sure, I'll make some friends and they'll turn me onto a position hopefully, but when all is said and done, its the insurance companies and the regulations which are going to be the deciding factor, and those don't seem to bend as much as a hiring manager might. That's why I've kept up with this thread, so that I could find a viable alternative to the PFT and to instruction, and yes, a few ideas have cropped up, but a lot of them still require a respectable chunk of time more than what I've got now. Worse even than that, I've found that the general sentiment here is that just by asking about the PFT, some people would rather see me hang up my wings now than continue flying, which doesn't bode well for future networking...

With your responses of thinking you won't enjoy corporate because you're going to be treated like a bus driver, and also not enjoying the people, I again think you are going to struggle in any job aviation or not.

News flash - in any pilot job you're being paid and will be treated like a bus driver. That's what you are. You're either mowing the sky (survey) flying a tornado (skydivers) flying from point a to b and back (regional). In all these cases you're the driver, not a glorified astral professor, physicist, Nobel prize winner, or congressman. You move metal. Get over it.

Unless you're the president of a company you're going to be treated like an employee, which means a warm body who can get the work done. Take off your rose glasses but most importantly learn to enjoy people.

The way your posts come across is that you have people issues, that's a problem in this industry.

Hahaha. As a long haul airline pilot, from my understanding, you are usually there in a layover city for minimum rest, or a zombie due to time changes and trying to re-acclimatize, if you actually try to switch time zones every time. Maybe some of the long haul guys can chime in on that.

As for business jets and the "attitude", I fly for some very down to earth people. Yes, there are bad apples out there. There are also a ton of crazy people that fly on airlines.

My last rotation, I had 3 days on the beach in Greece, and 4 days in Nice, France. We are probably heading to Geneva for a few days soon. We go skiing every winter, and in Feb or March spend a full week in the Maldives. I would say our layovers are decent. To each his or her own. Enjoy the pay-to-play scheme you seem very set on.

I keep trying to find jobs back in the US just due to being tired of 5000+ mile commutes, and there are none that will give me as much time off, or pay anywhere close to what I am making. I work 30/30 schedules. Yes, 30 on gets old quick, but 30 uninterrupted days off every other month makes it worth it. Enjoy the 777. I'll take business jets all day long...

I said I had an issue with being a flying limo driver, not being a flying bus driver. I've seen first hand the way some people with money treat the "help," in this case, their private pilots, and I've got very little interest in experiencing that and would probably react fairly negatively if I did. Sure there are good ones, but from what I've heard, for every good one, there is at least one bad one, and I'm not a fan of those odds. Aside from that, corporate flying actually sounds quite nice, but its a balancing act, just like any other profession, and at least from where I'm sitting now, the issues outweigh the benefits.

As for being a bus driver, it seems to be more my type of gig, at least from where I'm sitting now.

It breaks my heart when someone uses this forum for an honest question, and he gets ridicule for asking. So what if you disagree with "pay to play" programs, that's your opinion. Look, the third response to his post was, "I don't like you already"... Of course he's going to be defensive after this, anyone would. Take a look of how you got to where you are. This career is hard and frustrating. Never forget the aviators who went an extra step to give you useful advice or walked in your resume for that "dream" job.

Greg, if want PM me. I will gladly try to help
Ryan

I'll happily take you up on that offer.

I disagree, this thread has been pretty civil with the reasons why/why not to enter into a program like this and it essentially has been a direct answer to his question. Reference:



And I believe that is what the collective JC community is attempting to do - guide the OP to making an informed decision. Regardless if the OP enters into a program at least they will have the perspective of those who have been in the industry longer or have experience in different areas.




FriendlySkies this is really the part which has not been addressed too much and there is a reason people aren't leading the OP in the direction of KeyLime, Gulfstream or other programs that are psuedo expensive and stir up emotions in people - because they're are viable alternates to a pay-to-right-seat program.

I have to agree with Moxie pilot on this one. If the OP did the least bit of searching on this and other forums he would see that these kind of posts are "flame bait". Thats why some of the replies were implying that this had to be a "troll" just to get people riled up.

We are all just trying to help and he has shown that he isn't particularly interested in listening to anyone. And on top of that he seems like a guy who knows/understands very little about his profession of choice. We are all just trying to help. I wish some people had been more harsh/straight-forward to me about things in parts of my life. He should be thankful.

This is the part that many don't seem to grasp in a certain way: If, once you've given said advice to the OP, and he doesn't want to listen, then he should do as he plans (and is probably already set in). If it works for him, fine. If it doesn't, well then.....he was told so.

But continually hammering the guy in the head isnt going to make a difference. He's going to do whatever it is he's going to do.

I tend to try and worry about what's on my own plate of food. If someone asks for suggestions, Ill give them; but after that, they have to make and live with their own decisions.

I would agree that this thread has been quite civil, by internet standards at least, but I would argue that its many of you who aren't listening. I have repeatedly said I'm not set on anything, and given the vitriol that's been spewed forth just for asking, I'm probably leaning away from the idea anyway. I've also repeatedly explained my reasons for not wanting to instruct, yet, rather than accepting them and adapting your advice, the bulk of you just steamroll over what I've said with more "go be a CFI," as if its literally the only way to get to where I want to go. For the record, I did search... here... and outside of what appeared to be an offhand reference to first officer training programs buried somewhere in a much larger thread, there weren't many relevant discussions. Finally, chrisreedrules, I'm not even in the profession yet, so aside from what I've learned in school and in flight training, I wouldn't think to know much of anything about the profession. That's a big part of why I'm trying to collect information here and now, so that I can build a better picture of what I need to do and how I need to do it and if you're faulting me for that, I guess you're forgetting that you, just like everyone else on this board, had to start somewhere...

It hurts everyone else, so in this particular case, I can understand the vocal response. There should probably be a sticky here with rational explanations as to why paying for experience does not help you much, and why paying for a job hurts everyone.

It was a fair question, and deserves a thought out answer.

Here goes:

1) ACTING PIC time is really the only type of flying that most good employers care about. If that's not what your are doing, your are getting something that is not of particular value.

2) Without extremely good knowledge of the systems in the aircraft you are logging time in, even logged time is pretty much less than worthless. It might be great that your buddy let you log 100 hours in a King Air - but in an interview, unless you know the systems in that thing cold, it probably won't help you land a job. You'll definitely get asked about it.

That isn't to say "don't do it" if the opportunity presents itself, but don't think it is going to help you much finding employment.

3) Paying for experience like this is even worse. Not only is the experience not terribly useful for you, you are making it that much harder for someone that is qualified to get that job. Because now they might have to deal with paying for experience too (to compete with you), or in the worst case, you are paying to do a job someone would otherwise be paid for.

4) A simple test. If someone offered you $8/hour to do this flying for the next 10 years - would you? If not, why is it so valuable now?

Thank you for the detailed response. In particular I'd been wondering about #1, since I've never really been sure about how much weight SIC carries on your resume. This also brings up a hypothetical situation that I'd like run by you: IF there is a program which offers acting PIC hours, only requires a single pilot, thus not diminishing anyone, and provides proper instruction in aircraft systems an operations, is the stigma still there, and if so, is it at all balanced by the PIC time and proper training? I'm not sure its even possible to accomplish all those points within the regulations, but if it is, what do you think?

That's actually why I enjoy long-haul. Flying the jet is pretty boring most of the time (though, I really love the airplane, and enjoy turning off the automation and *flying* whenever possible), but I've been to some pretty neat places. Germany, England, Italy, Greece, Japan, and France come to mind. Also included on the list are about 15-16 other not-so-nice countries, but that's just part of the experience in the supplemental segment of the industry (usually flying around people who are keen on taking long walks on the beach with automatic weapons).

That said, if you end up at a major flying the 777, you're probably going to end up going to the same 5-6 airports over and over. Most guys I talk to who fly widebodies at the major carriers do it for the pay/QOL, not for the international travel.

First year was like that for me...I was pretty much a zombie. I've gotten much more used to it now, so I can usually bring myself to go out if I'm with a good crew.

Even with its limitations, this is one of the big draws of aviation for me. Sure I might only be going to the same 5-6 airports around the world, but that isn't necessarily the be-all and end-all of my career, and how many people who don't fly for a living can say they have a favorite pub in 6 countries?

 

[USMCmech]

This also brings up a hypothetical situation that I'd like run by you: IF there is a program which offers acting PIC hours, only requires a single pilot, thus not diminishing anyone, and provides proper instruction in aircraft systems an operations, is the stigma still there, and if so, is it at all balanced by the PIC time and proper training? I'm not sure its even possible to accomplish all those points within the regulations, but if it is, what do you think?

Either you are acting as PIC (you signed for the plane)

You are the SIC of a two crew airplane (you have to be there)

You are recieving Instruction from a qualified CFI

or

You are ballast in the right front seat of a single pilot airplane.

For example,

The Cessna 208 is a single pilot airplane. Some passenger operators require an SIC for either FAA or insurance requirements. While this is leagally logable SIC time, no one will be impressed by your 500 hours of doing nothing but talking on the radio.

If you get the chance to ride along in a 208 and want to log the time to show that you have flown one, either as Dual Recieved or PIC sole manipulator of the controlls, by all means go ahead. However if this accounts for very much of your flight time (say more than 50 hours) it will be dismissed by most potential employeers.


Or even worse, you are a marginally qualified SIC who paid the company money to sit in that seat. This means that somewhere an experianced pilot is out of a job.

 

[drunkenbeagle]

Thank you for the detailed response. In particular I'd been wondering about #1, since I've never really been sure about how much weight SIC carries on your resume. This also brings up a hypothetical situation that I'd like run by you: IF there is a program which offers acting PIC hours, only requires a single pilot, thus not diminishing anyone, and provides proper instruction in aircraft systems an operations, is the stigma still there, and if so, is it at all balanced by the PIC time and proper training? I'm not sure its even possible to accomplish all those points within the regulations, but if it is, what do you think?

For #1 ? I don't know, but I have never worked for an airline. It don't think it is something you would want to pay for. The part of the "ACTing PIC" that I think most employers are looking for is the "ACTed like a good employee" part, that you didn't get fired, had good judgement with someone else's plane, got along well with others, showed up on time. It's easy to do that when you are paying someone.

As for low-time jobs, the concept that insurance is making them unobtainable is kind of a myth. Usually there is some cost X to get someone added to a policy that isn't in the cookie cutter mold that the insurance company likes. This might be a few hours of dual, some other training, some slightly higher fee on the policy. Hell, I've seen it just take a phone call. For someone running a business, they are going to look for someone that causes less of a headache/costs less money. Then again, if they know you (and think you will be a good fit to work with), it is amazing how quickly something gets figured out.

 

[Dphoenix]

Guess what, I don't want to be a flight instructor either, but there just aren't that many low time jobs out there, and pay for training is ridiculous. Even if I don't like it, I am still a good teacher cause I give a crap about my students being successful and I'm passionate about aviation. Suck it up and CFI. Or don't.

 

[Roger Roger]

I'll sell you some right seat time in my TriPacer. You sit there, I'll fly.

 

[ComplexHiAv8r]

Guess what, I don't want to be a flight instructor either, but there just aren't that many low time jobs out there, and pay for training is ridiculous. Even if I don't like it, I am still a good teacher cause I give a crap about my students being successful and I'm passionate about aviation. Suck it up and CFI. Or don't.

What about some if us weight challenged people. Not going to get a CFI gig in the 150/152.

 

[Dphoenix]

What? That's a terrible reason. I'm a fat dude, my flight school has archers. Most schools have something other than 150/152s you can instruct in... Find a different school.

 

[ComplexHiAv8r]

What? That's a terrible reason. I'm a fat dude, my flight school has archers. Most schools have something other than 150/152s you can instruct in... Find a different school.

Choices limit in my area. Even if I went to the devil. That and most want you to be able to instruct in all of their aircraft.

 

[Dphoenix]

Move. I hate it here in Phoenix, but it's where the job was.... Can't wait to go home, but I need my time. If you're not willing to move for aviation, it's going to be pretty hard to get jobs.

 

[z987k]

So if he rented a Seminole for 250 hours he would be punted as well? I see no difference here. No job taken. No job given at the end. Just a method of time building. You know full well the time is legal.

Yep, and I know how utterly worthless it is to.

 

[Zondaracer]

I think it's important to note that Key Lime dropped their program and Gulfstream doesn't exist anymore. Amflight's program through Eagle Jet is mostly guys from overseas. What the OP was asking about doesn't exist nearly to the degree it used to.

Does Alpine Air still have their program? I am glad to see these programs going away.

Let me tell you, things are so much worse in Europe for a beginning pilot. At my flying school, we have a list of former students who want to be a flight instructor with us. Usually, the next guy on the list has about a 2 year wait. It is possible to go straight into an airline with minimum hours, but only about 2 guys from each class find an airline job. I have a couple students right now who just applied for the greencard lottery because they would LOVE to be an instructor in the US. One of them is also in his early 30s, and in Europe, he is viewed as being a bit old to start, whereas I think he has lots of time ahead of him if he were to get to the US.

 

[Treblesum81]

Does Alpine Air still have their program? I am glad to see these programs going away.

Let me tell you, things are so much worse in Europe for a beginning pilot. At my flying school, we have a list of former students who want to be a flight instructor with us. Usually, the next guy on the list has about a 2 year wait. It is possible to go straight into an airline with minimum hours, but only about 2 guys from each class find an airline job. I have a couple students right now who just applied for the greencard lottery because they would LOVE to be an instructor in the US. One of them is also in his early 30s, and in Europe, he is viewed as being a bit old to start, whereas I think he has lots of time ahead of him if he were to get to the US.

Any chance this works the other way too? I've heard rumors about pilot shortages in places like Hungary and some of the nicer 'stans where they hire people to send to America to learn to fly, but more often than not, a rumor is just that...

 

[Stone Cold]

Any chance this works the other way too? I've heard rumors about pilot shortages in places like Hungary and some of the nicer 'stans where they hire people to send to America to learn to fly, but more often than not, a rumor is just that...

I've been to a few 'Stans...where are the "nicer" ones? And to answer the question, to my knowledge, the places that might entertain it eventually, you probably don't want to work there either for QOL, Pay, equipment, or all 3 combined reasons...

I don't want to rain on your parade, but there really is no real easy way to do aviation. In the past few years, people were spoiled with the wet Commercial hiring, and that just will not happen again. That is a good thing.

So, now you have to figure out a way to get jobs with all the other wet Commercials. What differentiates you from all the other aviation people finishing their tickets with less than 500TT, or even less than 1200, or 1500 with the airlines soon? Nothing. Either you know somebody, which it doesn't sound like you do, or you find whatever is available. Guess what that is?

How much do you really want the job? That will be the test for the remainder of your career. Trust me. It has been said many times...this is a marathon, not a sprint. Enjoy the ride up, otherwise you will probably be disappointed.

With that, I'm done with this discussion. Y'all enjoy talking in circles...