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The outlook for pilots starting their training now is excellent! The airlines will be needing more and more new pilots each year as the Vietnam era military pilots retire. Since the military is supplying fewer and fewer pilots, the civilian pilot has a good chance of landing an airline job. If you are finishing high school, think about getting your college degree (see below) and starting your flight training now.
The purpose of this page is to tell you about what you'll need to do to pursue a flying career. It will cover the requirements for becoming an employable pilot, try to give you an idea of the time and costs you'll be looking at, and some idea as to your salary as you progress through your career.
First let me say that I feel that those of you who pursue a career in aviation now are getting started at one of the best times since 1980! The airlines are hiring as more pilots retire, general aviation manufactures are starting to produce light planes again and the future looks very good.
If your goal is to eventually be a captain for a major airline, you'll need to be able to pass a first class aviation medical exam. Most other commercial flying jobs require a second class medical. If you have any medical problems, you should discuss them with an aviation medical examiner to see if you can get a waiver for them or if they are disqualifying.
The order of licenses and ratings that you'll need to get as you go through an aviation career are the private pilot license, the instrument rating, the commercial license and the multi engine rating. If you intend to teach flying in order to build your flight time, which is done by many pilots, you'll need a certified flight instructor's license and instrument instructors rating . If a multiengine airplane is available at the school where you're instructing, the multiengine rating on your instructors license is valuable for building twin engine time. The airline transport pilot license (ATP) is required for you to be a captain on an airline and recommended for any flight position with the airlines. You'll have to take a written exam for each license and rating (the CFI requires two) and you'll have to pass the Flight Engineer written exam and possibly the ATP written before you apply to the airlines. Your pilot training can take place at a local flight school and you can attend college elsewhere, or you can attend an aeronautical school such as Embry Riddle where you can get a college degree as well as your flight training. The military is still doing some flight training, but not as much as in the past.
You need to be 16 years old to fly an airplane by yourself , under an instructor's supervision (called "soloing") and 17 to get a private pilot's license . You'll need to have at least a third class medical to fly as a private pilot. It takes about 55 hours of flight time and three to four months to get the private license for the average student. At that point, you can take other people on flights with you in Visual Flight Rules (VFR) weather where you need at least 3 miles visibility and only flying where you're not too close to clouds. You cannot be paid for flying as a private pilot.
The next step is to get your instrument rating . You'll need about 40 hours of instrument time and when you have the instrument rating, you'll be able to fly under Instrument Flight Rules (IFR) with reduced visibility and in the clouds.
The next license, the commercial license , requires 200-250 hours of flight time (depending on where you get your training) and a second class medical.
The cumulative cost for obtaining the private license, instrument rating and commercial license is about $25,000. When you have the commercial license, you could legally be hired to fly for money, but your flight time is too low.
Many pilots get their instructor's license at this point, a $2,500 additional training cost, and fly for two or three years with a flight school to build their time to between 1000 and 1500 hours. You are paid as an instructor, but the average pay is about $10 per hour, so you may need to have another job to pay for your living expenses. Instead of, or in addition to instructing, you may build flight time as a crop duster, by towing banners, flying patrol over pipelines or telephone lines, carrying people on short sightseeing flights, doing aerial photography or flying traffic watch for the local TV or radio stations. As you build time, you'll be making contacts with other pilots who may fly for corporations, charter companies (FAR 135), also known as "air taxi" operators, regional air lines (flying propeller or turbo prop aircraft and occasionally turbo jets) or the major airlines and you'll also be sending in applications for flying jobs.
To obtain you airline transport pilot's license , you'll need to be 23 years old with a minimum of 1500 flight hours, 500 cross country hours (to airports other than your airport of departure), 100 hours of night flying and 75 hours of instrument flying with 50 of these in actual instrument conditions. You will also need a first class aviation medical.
The pay for pilots flying charter (air taxi for flights from Sacramento to Tahoe or Santa Barbara, for example) is varied depending on the type of airplane they are flying , the length of the trip, etc. Many are paid hourly, with typical salaries between $15 and $20 an hour.
Corporate jobs start around $20,000 to $25,000 per year and go as high as $100,000 for a captain who flys a large corporate jet and has been with the company for several years. The regional airlines pay their starting pilots from $12,000 to $26,000 per year. A high time captain with the regional could expect to earn about $60,000 per year. Some people spend their career with a corporation, charter or a regional airline and others use these positions to build multi engine or turbine (jet) time in order to apply to the major airlines.
An entry level pilot in the major airlines should have a four year college degree , at least 1500 hours of flight time including 500 hours of multiengine time, with as much of that in turbine aircraft as possible, 500 hours of cross country time, and 100 hours of night flying. You can expect a starting salary of between $25,000 and $35,000 per year. Major airline captains earn from $130,000 to better than $190,000. The major airlines have many benefits such as health, dental and retirement and the flight time and schedules are less erratic than corporate or regional flying.
This has been a rapid overview of the aviation career pathway. Please see the other information on the Executive Flyers home page dealing with student pilots and careers. Good luck with your career!
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