I know there is a few active members on here with interesting Jobs. I think Patrol guy is a full timer patrol pilot. I am seeking any leads and info that may eventually lead to an entry level flying job. I will be attending a pro pilot program at a college in Michigan starting this fall. I already have 500+ hours. I expect that after my Instrument and commercial I will have 650-700 total hours. I want to position myself so that by next summer I can get a decent paying job without the need for instructing. I have a wife who lives in the Philippines and I am going to need to get a decent job in order to sponsor her immigration visa. I am hoping between 21 - 25 K at least. I see a lot of chatter about banner towing on other web forums, but mostly negative. I saw one posting for Barr aviation pipeline patrol, but they want 1500 hours total time at a minimum.

Any leads or advice would be helpful! Thanks Guys.

First thing, what kind of work are you looking for?
What do you fly and where do you fly?
What kind of things and airstrips are you landing in?
By next summer you should be good as far as some jobs go.

What he said (akflyer2001) 1st of all. 2nd You have to make your "bones" somewhere. By that I mean an entry level job like pipeline patrol, skydive pilot, banner pilot, Co-pilot slinging pop and potato chips etc. Most companies out there have insurance requirements that are very difficult for NEW commercial pilots, not to mention contract minimums for pilots. My first job was a co-pilot in a caravan on the north slope making $66/day and happy to be getting paid to fly vs.paying to fly. I do not want to sound critical but $21to $25K/ year is a long stretch for starting out. First officers for regional airlines are not making that much, and most of them are 2-3 thousand hour pilots with minimum twin time and of that 3 thousand hours, 2500 of that is as a CFI. Good luck

Banner Ops and Pipeline can be good intro's into commercial aviation but it comes with certain limits. Plan on building anywhere around 400-1000 hours a year, but it will all be SEL.

If you're wanting to go Charter, 135, or 121 eventually; dragging rags will get your TT and PIC numbers up but shallow on Multi. Best bet is look into the small freighters; Cape Air, or Flight Express.

nkh

Just saw an ad for Air Wisconsin, co-pilots for some east coast base. 800 hours TT, comm. multi. inst. etc. I can't imagine they will pay much more than 2 bags of dog food a month and a tent to share with 38 other "Airline Pilots".

Lownslow -

I am a farmer and just a part time pilot, but I have ranged from 550 up to 875 hours per year. I was complaining and am back to around 550-600/yr now.

I am unique as I am a contractor, but the guy I work for has 17-20 planes and requires his pilots to have 1500 minimum too. Probably an insurance thing??

Good luck to you. PG

Hi lownslow79,

I searched for banner and pipe work extensively during 2009/2010 and was also looking towards dropping meat bombs as this is something I once had received training for.
Hard fact was that the potential employers (90%) of the time looked at whatever time I had (+1000) and I found that quite a few high time jockeys had snagged all the decent jobs with thousands of hours to boot. You can test it: When the employer asks for your total time, make up some number. You'll find that what they've been getting resume's from is much higher than that. Besides lousy pay, the attitude towards the pilot populace was mainly focused on three things:

1. You're a time builder no matter how much time you have. It's an entry level job, and people actually race to do it for free.
2. Training & employment contracts and in many cases training was not only not free, it was charged for, healthily, which helps to understand why some of the banner tow operations keep advertising open positions but when you call it's $3000+ whatever time they "think you need" with no actual guaranteed minimum afterwards. If they actually had work and banner tow contracts they would not need to hire new pilots in every circulation of trade a plane.
3. Jobs go to whoever has their resume walked into the place by someone who's been in that company for a while or personally knows the owner.

Many of these companies adjusted to this bottomless pool of fresh bodies in the pilot world after the 300 hour copilot wonder bubble burst, when flight schools and regular operations could not hold on to a pilot whenever someone mentioned the word flying, jets, multi engine or airline. A student I knew gained attention from 6 different instructors within 3 months, before the owner took the student on himself. CFI's were dropping out to go hunt bigger game every week. No loyalty and certainly do dedication towards anything. How eager would you be to pay someone well, who might leave tomorrow with no notice, just because some fly by night shady operation next door is looking to fill a seat? Not easy to run a business that flies for a living if your pilots are job hunting constantly. Even if you point out to your prospective employer that you are dedicated and plan to stick around, there may just be someone else sitting in the next state over, willing to do the work for less or free. For dropzones you often need the magic 25 hours in type (182 or 206) and if the operation asks you to just pencil whip the time in your logbook for insurance satisfaction, it's time to RUN, not walk from the operation. Instead, offer to come to an agreement to build the time with them. Depending on your complex and high performance time, every insurance company WILL work with the operation. It can be done, with the benefit of them training you to what exactly they want you to do.

The employment contracts and training contracts usually do no good to the losing operation, because they will dig into a naked mans pockets when that person leaves prematurely. Naked man knows that and happily signs the contract. A very good friend of mine recently applied for and interviewed with a turbine timeshare outfit. 5 digits with tons of multi PIC time even in 121 and they turned him down cold. I had told him to look for interview gauges, but it seems as if he wasn't to excited about it. He is dead on convinced that he was turned down for less than stellar reasons, one of which was that he did not beg for the amazing opportunity to fly a single turbine tube. The interviewer rattled off questions from a sheet of paper and probably never realized that the pilot he was interviewing had been around the bush before. The pay was meager enough not to jump through hoops to get the job, though.

I used to have FAAST Master Wings on my resume until a friend told me to take any and all references to the FAA O.F.F. anything used to apply for any job.
"People think you are a mule for the FAA the second you show any reference to them and that may help land your resume in the trashcan." Funnily DPE's are often great resources if you take the time to get to know them and they had an opportunity to fly with you.

This is long, but I don't want to look like I am just venting, and give you my perspective of around 650 hours and 150+ multi but no CFI.
Depending on your location the CFI is the only way to go. Amazingly there is no lower limit with which you can gain employment to teach others how to fly, but you'd also have to consider a potentially quite pricey relocation to some place where there is some vibrant aviation going on, if it's not in your neck of the woods.

If you're looking to clear money quick in aviation, you're trying to nail a raw egg to a railroad track without breaking it.
The last and final tip, I've met more people who have made it well in aviation at the marina when they're putting their boat in the water, compared to the airport.

Had I taken the advise from some 3 years ago, I'd still be traveling the country, knocking on doors in AK or the plains to be "on location" when someone decides to hire.
A kid on jetcareers recently asked about dropping chutes on tips (no pay) and despite the outcry of selling his soul to the devil landed a well paying job in a decent operation.

Other than that, I'd go into sales, automotive service in any dealership, or consider shift work at a nearby factory. I was able to clear 25K in 6 months working nights at a clothing distributor and days at a gas station. 19 hours a day, 6 days a week will do wonders in the bank, because you actually can't stay awake to do stupid stuff with your money when you're not working. Selling Toyota's and Honda's always pays well, too. If need be, you could make and clear that money as an assistant manager at McDonalds with another side job and never leave the area.

Good luck!

Baker -
Thanks for the advice. I am not a newbie or just decided to become a pro pilot over night. I have somewhat of a few plans in place, that I can execute. I am pretty upbeat on things, even though there is a lot of negativity coming from so many ate up pilot's. I'm not looking to make a quick buck. Just need to find employment for the summer or seasonal, so that I can build time and at the same time bring my wife over. When my wife gets her Visa, then I can return to school, get my CFI and multi-time at the school. All paid for by the GI Bill. However i am not going to be able to live on the meager wages of a entry level job unless i get my wife here, and put her to work.

I think I will try the dragging rags in South Florida or try to get in on a ground crew with an Ag operation. lots of opportunity if you know people. That's why I was putting the question out, for exploration purposes. I am pretty mobile. I have a class C motorhome and can pick up camp and motor pretty much anywhere and live from a parking lot.

Eventually when i finish the program at school, I should have some CFI time in multi's and some Frasca 242 time with the King air. I think i am going to take a King air initial course with the rest of my GI Bill entitlement. I'm shooting to land a King air 90 part 91 flying job eventually. Then work my way into a flight department through networking and get checked out on bigger equipment.

that's the route I am shooting for.

As I said, I wasn't trying to sound too negative or to demotivate you from lofty goals. I saw that you're trying to raise money to immigrate wifey to the U.S. and tried to share with you that the amount to clear seemed rather high, considering that young airline gear swinger's are living on far less than $21K and work other jobs on the side, while renting couch space from friends. Your class C RV wasn't mentioned in your post and your perfect setup and plan including GI bill wasn't clear from your post. Not many people are independently set to shoot for any location they wish to pursue, so you may have advantages the average "ate up" pilot does not have. What would I know, anyways.

Best of luck!
Jason

Well Jason. I don't think i needed to provide a full scale detailed profile of myself or my plans and qualifications. I was simply looking for some direction to leads of companies or operations that anyone might throw my way. Not full blown career and portfolio analysis. I find most people here pretty outgoing and friendly.

I am enjoying the rest of my beer(s), watching the sun set over the Marina of this tropical Island with a grin on my face. Not to rub it in or brag, but it's hard to cop a negative attitude when you see the world and all the opportunity it has for those willing to work hard. This former airport fence kid started networking and bumming airplane rides before he even knew what networking was. All because of his enthusiasm and hard work. Anything is possible. Not always practical, but possible! - Cheers and no worries mate.

That's a cool pic!

Don't let us old farts discourage you, there are jobs out there.

I agree the CFI is the only way to go. It will open up so much for you later, plus you will learn ton's.
As far as pipeline flying some of what has been said is flat out wrong.

It's not an entry level job, I had to have over 1500 hours just to get hired and flew for a regional before that. I made over 40k flying 3-4 day's a week. I never paid for my training there, I even got a 3 day course at Flight Safety. It was the first flying job where I could make a mortgage payment. It is work fighting maintenance and the weather all the time, but it's a rewarding job and some day's I really miss it.
There are lower, scummier operators out there, just do some homework and avoid them.
It's a long road but worth it in the end.

Lowandslow79,I'm in a similar situation my wife is from Bulgaria.It's a bit of a long story but it has really put a damper on my flying due to me having to work in the US to meet the min income requirements.The worst part is she just wants to be here with me while i have to be in the US,not too work or immigrate.They denied her last visa on the grounds that we didnt apply for her to immigrate here.They couldn't have cared less that I own property and spend the majority of my time there.It's a frustrating process for sure but it'll be worth it in the end.

One thing you can do on the uscis end of your problem is someone else can sponsor if need be(feel free to pm me on this).You may want to look into this option as it'll free up some room for your flying/career.I had to because for some reason or another I haven't had a whole lot of income in the US over the last few years for some odd reason

I see your in SC,as far as leads go if you want to fly banners.Do you have your tail wheel endorsement?Sorry if I missed it being mentioned earlier,I only skimmed through most of the thread.If not give Shannon a call at Sierra Tango Aviation he's based out of Wallace NC,had great rates and seamed like a great guy and came highly recommended by a friend.Last time I talked to him the rates for his little Aeronca L-3 where a bargain and his cub was reasonable if not a bargain by whats available here in NJ...................anyway I know you said you had 500 hours or so already,considering the forum this is on I'd assume by that chances are you do.But Take a look at his web site anyways and shoot me a pm afterwords,especially if you decide to take a ride up there

I towed banners for a while. Got a lot of good tailwheel time...didn't get paid much. It is fun for the first 40 hours or so (this is also the part where you are likely to get killed) but after a while it is just the fun part of picking up the banner and then droning around. In other words it is just like most time building jobs. These jobs are regularly advertised and as long as you have some tailwheel time you should be able to get one.

A word of caution. There are several pitfalls in banner towing and they can and do kill. 1) When you are picking up a banner you're doing a fairly aggressive pull up at about 15' altitude. If you stall it here you will hit the ground hard. 2) at the top of your pick up pull you are at about 100'-120' altitude very close to stall speed with full power. Loose power here and you will have almost zero time to get the nose down and release the banner simultaneously if you want to live. At this same point in the pick up if you break a tow line (not uncommon) you will become very uncoordinated for a bit (the strain on the line is holding the aircraft in a coordinated condition) and if you simultaneously stall it at this point you will probably spin and die. 3) You will be towing around at about 800'-900' AGL, often in very congested areas in old, beat up aircraft. An engine out with no suitable landing spot is highly likely. 4) it is not uncommon for the tow hook cable to get tangled in the elevator. Not good. You can cover the first 8' or so with a piece of garden hose and that makes it much less likely.

Good luck.

D

Look under "Banner Tow Pick-Up" in you tube and you will a video of me picking up a banner in a Piper Pawnee.