Expert: Heiko Hanusch - 3/2/2008

Question
could i raise a family and hold a constant decent salary flying helicopters

Answer
Hi Chris,


Thanks for your question.

In general the answer is yes!
But like a lot of things in life it all depends on your experience, the competitive landscape at the time you are looking for a job and ultimately how much money you can afford to spend to get all your ratings and the minimum time required to be of interest to prospective employers! The biggest challenge is, if you are going the civilian way, getting Helicopter time, especially Turbine Helicopter, without having to pay for it. There is a lot of competition for very few jobs from ex-military pilots who already have tons of Helicopter time before they apply for a job. And hereby lies the problem for a civilian pilot (unless you are wealthy and can buy yourself 1000 hrs of Turbine Helicopter, your chances are small of landing a good job that pays enough).
Paying for 1000 hrs. of turbine time, after you get your ratings, will exceed $400,000.00 !!! (not a misprint)and as you can tell is out of reach for most aspiring pilots.
That leaves you with the old fashioned way of instructing and then hopefully making some connection to move on to maybe a traffic flying job or pipeline control and then hopefully to a bigger helicopter so you can start building time for that coveted executive flying job that actually pays some money.
The timeline you are looking at is about 8-14 years before you'll find a job that pays well. As you can see, commitment, money, some luck and endless connections will get you to where you want to go.

Good Luck,

H2