milonke

hello all,

So here's my deal. i recently earned a bachelors degree in professional flight/aviation mngt. i've got all my ratings up through CFII, with just a few hours over 400TT (with essentially zero instruction given). like many of you, i am having a very, very difficult and discouraging job search. so here i am, broke and unemployed. Im just looking for some advice from all you out there who have maybe been/are in my shoes. do i get a job outside aviation, look even harder, throw in the towel....???? this job market is confusing the hell out of me

edznaz

Add on to your management degree, and get out while you are ahead. Unless you are willing to head to India, this is a shrinking industry, and there is a glut of 5k plus hour pilots on the market.

Look at the medical field for growth and stability.

Spoilers

It sucks right now! I feel bad for all the guys just coming out of college or flight school with no job opportunities. It is even hard for a non-aviation graduates to get a job these days right out of college. I've been furloughed for 6 months now, I've had a couple of aviation job interviews, but no job offers. It is really competitive right now, and employers can be very picky as to who they want to hire. There are flying jobs out there, but you have to look hard and most likely need to know someone to get in. It will turn around eventually, it is only a matter of time, but nobody knows for sure when it will happen. According to the President of FltOps.com, he said by 2011, every major airline will be hiring pilots of the street. Do I believe that? I don't know.

My advice to you. If you want to stay in aviation, I'd say get a non-flying aviation job, such as a dispatcher, flight control, sales etc. It'll allow you to remain in aviation and stay around planes, but most importantly, it will help you network and possibly get a job in the future.

Luv2Rotate

This is probably the best advice you'll get... I totally agree.

TPROP4ever

Things are extremely tough right now, but I think somday those that really hang in will still be around....so keep working hard and keep the faith, I have to believe the issues in the industry will pass someday too..

Climbto450

My recomendation is to stay in school and get a masters degree in something and flight instruct. When things turn around you will have one more degree to seperate you from the pack. Things will turn around just give it time. When I graduated college in 1996 things where about as bad as they are now maybe even worse and then things were great for a while, aviation like life has to seek balance things were great for quite a few years no they have to be bad for a while, it is natures equallibrium. The one thing I regrest was not getting my masters, I am getting it now but it is hard to go back to school later in life.

UCLAbruins

"hello all,

So here's my deal. i recently earned a bachelors degree in professional flight/aviation mngt. i've got all my ratings up through CFII, with just a few hours over 400TT (with essentially zero instruction given). like many of you, i am having a very, very difficult and discouraging job search. so here i am, broke and unemployed. Im just looking for some advice from all you out there who have maybe been/are in my shoes. do i get a job outside aviation, look even harder, throw in the towel....???? this job market is confusing the hell out of me"

Oh brother, that limits your options a bit (degree in aviation)

The best advice we can give young guys is that times have changed... many of them look into the future and see themselves landing a 777 in london or Rome.. they don't understand the odds of ever getting there in this day and age... This is a whole different animal...

My advice, if you're young, stay in school and a degree in some other field...that way you give the market some time to recover and you give yourself a plan B.. which you might need

AtlCSIP

You need to be very careful about how you find gainful employment if hour ultimate goal is to fly for a living. Unfortunately, qualifications don't mean much without internal recommendations. You need contacts when the airlines do start hiring again. If you get a job outside aviation, those contacts will become increasingly difficult to get. You might look at the possibility of going to work for your carrier of choice in a capacity other than pilot. This could help you get your foot in the door and start to develop those relationships. Then, you need to instruct part time, or find some other way to build a lot of time. You have at least 6 months, and maybe as long as 4 years, before hiring begins again. Be patient, keep flying, make contacts, and don't give up!

LastTraintoMEM

I was you back in 91 during that economic downturn. Here I am almost 20 years later with a couple of flying jobs in my past, a lot more flight time and working a job in my "Plan B". It is NOT in aviation. Maybe this will give you a glimpse into the future a little. I have wasted a lot of time and money flying for a living and in the end getting nowhere financially. Every time my flying career would get rolling, there would be another economic down turn, 9/11 or whatever. A very up and down career field. I wish that I would have gone straight to "Plan B" back in '91, and I would probably have been a lot better off. Not trying to discourage you, but you really need to LOOK at the career, and make sure you are prepared for the turbulence you will encounter. I like to compare aviation to being a baseball player; there are a lot of minor league players who want to play for the majors. Very few ever make it into the Major leagues. Same with aviation.

dimondan

Here is a job I turned down. Be aware that they promise King Air 90 right seat time but you can only long 90 time dual received or pic. Not SIC. Best of all, they do mile high club flights in the King Air 90.

Job description at Air Reldan, Inc.

Air Reldan is a small operator located at the Greater St Tammany Regional Airport, located 35 miles north of New Orleans. The operation has been in business for over 27 years, the first 22 years at the New Orleans Lakefront Airport, and at its current location since then. We still do operations from Lakefront, and at New Orleans International Airport.

We currently have 5 aircraft, 2 Cessna 172’s, 2 Piper Seneca II’s and a King Air 90. The largest part of the operation is air charter in which we use 4 of the 5 aircraft. We do aerial buoy drops 1-2 times a month our over the Gulf of Mexico, generally a 4 to 5 hour sortee (done under part 91), and have been doing them for about 18 years. We also do aerial banner towing, flight training, photo flights and aerial tours.

Our aerial banner towing operation is not a large operation, but LSU games in Baton Rouge, Mardi Gras and JazzFest are the heaviest banner times of the year. Other than that, operations are somewhat sporatic. We currently use one of the Cessna 172’s equipped with a 180 hp engine for the banner towing. We train our own pilots for banner towing including the pickups of the banner, and the art of slow flying with the banner at 45-55 knots. Not all pilots can handle the slow speeds for a few hours, and picking up the banner requires a fairly steep pullup prior to picking up the banner at a fairly slow airspeed, so if this is not something within your demeaner, please do not apply for the job as banner towing will be required in this position, as well as putting the banner together and groundcrewing the setup.

The flight training was the largest part of the operation, but since we moved to St Tammany, the flight training has become very light. We train under part 61 using the Cessna 172’s. We do a fair amount of siteseeing flights including romantic champagne flights, wine and cheese flights, and mile high club flights. We also do photo flights and survey flights over land and over the gulf (in the twins).

The buoy drops over the Gulf generally consists of dropping 8-10 floating buoys into the loop currents, positions are defined by the customer. Buoys are attached to a 150 foot tether with a small parachute which acts as a droge once in the water. We use the Piper Seneca’s for these flights, which vary from 525 miles to close to 700 miles.

The air taxi flights utilize the Cessna, the Seneca’s and the King Air. A lot of these flights are organ transplant teams (you will generally be copiloting on these flights) or hotshotting human organs to various locations. Lately we have begun hotshotting blood to Birmingham on a fairly regular bases, using the Cessna and sometimes the Seneca. Much of the time, there is very little notice, and a lot of night flying.

When things get slow, as they invariably do from time to time, helping out around the office will be expected. At times you will be expected to clean up the aircraft (washing or cleaning up the interior, although we do have part time help doing this some of the time). Of course, when things get busy, you may have students or other flying going on during the day, and that night a popup flight comes up and it turns into a very long day (and night). However, after any such event, you will always be given time off to “recover”. We do not make demands of pilots that they can not safely handle, do to weather or fatigue factors or whatever.

Time off will generally be one weekend a month, and a weekday during the other weeks, and when things are light, there will be additional time off. When things are heavy, I will probably push you to the extent you think you can go.

You will need to be able to survive on $2000/month. I may be able tohelp out with a place to stay for a month or 2, and we currently have a rental home vacant, but once it rents you will have to have a place to live near the airport.

If you are looking to jump start you career in aviation, build time and can work a lot of strange hours, this job will work for you. But it is paramount that flying is a passion for you. If you can take it or leave it, this job is not for you, don’t waste your time and mine by applying. On a desire to fly scale of 1-10, if you are 5 to 9, it won’t work (I won’t even mention the 1-4 part of the scale).

If I haven’t chased you away at this point, and you feel you can handle the night flying charter (a lot of which will be single engine) and the banner towing, then let me know and we can set up an interview. I do need to hire someone soon.

Neil Nadler
Air Reldan, Inc.
Email: [email protected]