The 250 to 1000 hour leap

[wowie_kazowie]

Hello Gents!
An honest question here. As everyone here knows the market for a guy with 250 hours is almost nonexistent, but some how every pilot with an ATPL has made it through this grind. My question is how did YOU do it? Obviously flight instructing is a big one, flying up north (although it seems like they like more 1000h PIC guys and for obvious reasons), as well as maybe some tier II entry programs like CMA and other regionals offer, maybe even some small skydiving ops. I'm curious how you made that jump from 250 to 1000? Please don't say you moped floors or cleaned toilets or alike... you may have, and unfortunately for all it seems to be part of the business.
Thanks for the honest answers!

[cdnpilot77]

Sometimes people are lucky too...I got a job flying a 180 on floats with 307hrs in the book and did 320hrs in just over 3 months. This was of course after working parts of 2 summers on the dock at another place and picking up an hour wherever and whenever I could.

Don't want to hear about the mopping floors and cleaning a years worth of grease off of stoves or freshly regurgitated northern pike breakfast off the floor of the airplane? Better be ready to do it or the opportunities to get that 1000 hrs will be very few and far between. Even Seneca grads have to do it!

[Hedley]

First thing is to NOT quit your day job. Use it to finance your flight training. After you get your CPL, buy a 150/152 with a good engine, a working comm radio and middling paint and interior. It's metal, so you can tie it down outside. Run mogas in it to save money. Fly the *ss off it, every chance you get. After a year and 500 hrs, sell it for what you paid for it to the next time builder.

Don't quit your day job! Avoid going into debt at all costs.

A lot of people here will surely disagree with me, but ...

[wallypilot]

Hello Gents!
An honest question here. As everyone here knows the market for a guy with 250 hours is almost nonexistent, but some how every pilot with an ATPL has made it through this grind. My question is how did YOU do it? .... I'm curious how you made that jump from 250 to 1000? Please don't say you moped floors or cleaned toilets or alike... you may have, and unfortunately for all it seems to be part of the business.
Thanks for the honest answers!

Honestly, more than anything, it's about who you know for the first 1000 hours or so. People I have met along the way got me into my first and second jobs, then after that, the experience speaks for itself, and it's mostly about whether they like you in the interview. Now I am always happy to help out other friends, or people I have met that seem like great people. There's nothing worse than having a dumb-ass working beside you, so it's always nice to hire people that have an internal reccommend. The company I work for now, if possible, only hires pilots with internal reccommends. Not that this strategy doesn't backfire sometimes!

[Beefitarian]

150/152, what's wrong with you Hedley? Show him that pitts, man!

[Hedley]

Yeah, I know. But I'm trying to suggest how to do it on the cheap, and you can't tie a Pitts down outside. Well, you could, but I would hunt you down and you would die a slow and painful death as I ritually tortured you to death with a dull potato peeler. It's an unpleasant way to go, trust me.

[Beefitarian]

True enough you`ll want your mom to rent you a hanger at the closest small town if it`s outside your budjet to avoid Hedley`s second worst fate scenario.

[Rowdy]

There have been a couple of good ideas posted so far. Here are some good things to keep in mind as well #1 network, make good friends and NEVER make an enemy.. you never know who will end up where. #2 You sound like the sort that already knows this but I'll say it again anyways.. you are entitled to nothing with that pretty little booklet you now have.. so lose the ego and sense of entitlement #3 Pick a direction and stick to it, I've seen a ton of people bounce through ok entry level jobs and directions and get nowhere because of it and then end up pissed off, jaded and broke. If you think the bush is the way to go, dont get an instructors rating or MIFR, get your float rating and work the dock at a half decent spot. if you're going to instruct, expect to be paid very little and be at the airport a lot and put some effort into shaping the next generation behind you until you've got 1000hrs. dont give up. #4 STAY OUT OF DEBT!!! I cannot stress this enough. You dont need to finance a new car, you dont need that fancy DSLR, or big student loans or a mortgage... be free of all those commitments and expenditures until you've got a decent job and a couple thousand hours. Carrying a load of debt and working a shit job will just make you feel terrible. #5 Research the shit out of who you want to work for.. make sure you know all the details and understand the operation before going to work for them.. it'll save the both of you a lot of hassle.

Now.. My own path led me this way.. float rating.. a few extra hours here and there with friends.. and I hit the docks.. that quickly led to a spot in a 180 for a season( I had 25hrs PIC in a 180 from beforehand).. which led to a checkout in the beav and then to an actual job the next season in a beav.. from there I was over the 1k hump and took a seat in the right side of a king air.. eventually going back to floats via the twin otter and now back to my favorite.. the beav. Go figure. BUT, Im crazy and want nothing more than to fly floats on the coast and maybe some day drop water on fires from a pretty little amphibious birdy.

[cdnpilot77]

All very good points Rowdy...I like many people did not listen to the people on #4. I thought I would be able to live frugally and all would be peachy keen. In actuality, that made life so stressful in those first couple of years especially during layoff. With a wife, a mortgage and line of credit debt, life is very difficult with a single income. Fortunately I have a very understanding and supportive wife that helped and encouraged me through the most difficult days.

[x-wind]

Flight instructing and skydiving. Got the skydiving gig at 200 hours. They said no to the interview and I showed up anyway.

I treated all of my flight training as a long interview process- which it was.

[Northern Flyer]

I don't know pal, I started about 15 years ago. I was lucky enough to find a job flying a 185 on floats the first sumer. That winter I went and got a multi ifr. Flew a 185 again the second sumer and did a bit of right seat on a light turbine. By that time I was up to about 1000 hrs. Things progressed from there, have around 10,000hrs now and do what Rowdy would like to do in the sumer, and fly my bag off in the winters because I like too..

Good Luck

[North Shore]

I had a decent union job which financed most of my flight training, so that helped with Rowdy's #4. Back in those days, you needed a certain amount of PIC before you could get your IFR, so I ended up with ~ 250 hours at my MIFR and then opted to do my Class 4 instructor. I had a great relationship with the CFI at my school (similar parental background and pastimes, etc...) and, while I can't remember the exact chronology of my job offer, my recollection of events was that I started my Class 4 with the understanding that he'd give me a job as long as I did a competent job on the rating. I did so (I think ) and he did so. It also helped that many of the higher-time instructors were moving on then, so there were spaces available. I managed to find a job-share partner at my other job, also, so I had a guaranteed income for my first year, which made things financially easier. The instructing gig took me up to ~750 hours, when I managed to get a job on the dock in Pickle Lake, with the promise of a checkout on a 185. After about a month throwing bags, drums, outboards, etc.. a guy left, and I was off to the races in my 'own' 185...

Many thanks to Mark D. and Dave T. for the two initial jobs.

[wowie_kazowie]

Rowdy

Thanks!
Really good points, similar to the ones iv'e gotten face to face with some Pilots that I have talked to! I'll keep them in mind.

Don't want to hear about the mopping floors and cleaning a years worth of grease off of stoves or freshly regurgitated northern pike breakfast off the floor of the airplane? Better be ready to do it or the opportunities to get that 1000 hrs will be very few and far between. Even Seneca grads have to do it!

Sorry if I came off snobby.
It was more of a matter of I know that to make it to 1000+ you have to work hard and probably going to get some jobs that may seem 'below' you but it's how it works. So I am prepared to have to do these things but I was curious what type of flying everyone did in this time and assumed everyone got their fair share of 'undesirable duties'

Thanks again for the help all

[Joe Blow Schmo]

Hello Gents!
An honest question here. As everyone here knows the market for a guy with 250 hours is almost nonexistent, but some how every pilot with an ATPL has made it through this grind. My question is how did YOU do it? Obviously flight instructing is a big one, flying up north (although it seems like they like more 1000h PIC guys and for obvious reasons), as well as maybe some tier II entry programs like CMA and other regionals offer, maybe even some small skydiving ops. I'm curious how you made that jump from 250 to 1000? Please don't say you moped floors or cleaned toilets or alike... you may have, and unfortunately for all it seems to be part of the business.
Thanks for the honest answers!

Go up north. And I don't mean the big northern operators where you'll have to work on the ramp for long periods of time. I'm talking about the small 1 or 2 plane bush operations based in the middle of nowhere that actually will hire you to fly with 250 hours if you show up there at the right time with the right attitude. Don't follow everybody else to the same places and the same operators. Go out of your way to visit the small ones, the ones that are hard to get to. Go back several times. When they need somebody, they'll remember you.

[mattedfred]

I spent my time between 250 and 1000 hours doing the following:

Completing my diploma from an aviation college
Getting my float rating
Networking
Volunteering
Landing my first job on floats over the phone
Getting laid off for the winter from my first job
Unemployed for a few months
Landing my second job as an FO on a multi turbine after being invited to sit in on a recurrent groundschool

Despite what some think there is a market for 250 hour pilots. You just need to do your research, network and think outside the box.

[pez]

Sounds like an awful lot of good information on this thread. I'll enthusiastically second point #4 above - I ended up incurring altogether too much debt after deciding to go back to flying (started at 16, then went off to the IT world in a bid to finance the rest of my licenses and ratings, and ended up staying far too long).

For a first job, I was lucky enough to reply to a post on here for a tow pilot/glider pilot this past summer...and stayed in touch with that potential employer as I embarked on a cross country road trip. Met quite a few people, shook quite a few hands... most were very friendly, decent guys, some were not. If you're doing the road trip, as others have said, don't shy away from the long back roads. Get a CFS (and/or WAS), and cross reference with a road map and PCC, and any tips you may have heard from friends in the industry. Some of the nicest folks I met were at the more remote operators, and took more time out of their busy days to talk with, and in one case, formally interview me.

At the start of the road trip, I had 250 hrs in airplanes, CPL, w/Multi, Grp 1 IFR, Seaplane ratings, and IATRA written. Also 10 hrs on a taildragger, and a Glider Pilot Licence. A number of CPs and Ops Mgrs commented on the IATRA being a positive thing (if the company has aircraft that require an IATRA or frozen ATPL for the RH seat).

Eventually, after about the 6th or 7th time we spoke, the potential employer with the tow/glider job sent me insurance forms with the offer that I had the job if I was approved on his insurance (below minimums, and with only 10 hrs in a taildragger).

I was approved, and had a great deal of fun and learned a lot flying for him, both a little Pawnee and a glider this summer - top notch guy, and in business for the love of flying.

About a month into the summer, I got a call from the small northern operator that had interviewed me with an offer of a job; dispatch / King Air 100 FO on day medevacs. I shouldn't have walked out on that first employer, and still feel bad for doing so - a mistake, in retrospect. Asked for as late a start date as possible at the new place and was able to give 3 1/2 weeks notice.


I lasted 2 months at the company, without touching an airplane, before being fired by the company owner.

Maintain a positive can-do attitude no matter what. Also, if you're looking for a first flying job, especially after working in other industries, be VERY careful of the expectations of your position.... Ie, working dispatch where I was, I should have done exactly what I was told and not a thing more. And that is very different from past environments in which I've been successful, where initiative and thinking outside of the box, diligence with problem solving and very careful consideration of details was important... Also, asking questions if you're not 100% clear on the reasons for something, to gain a thorough understanding of how and why something is... These things don't go well everywhere. Know your place and your employer's expectations and stay within them. Had I done that, I'd likely be flying at that company now. But that's a lesson learned.

Final thought on this particular matter is that it can often be a very fine line - I was hired by the Ops Mgr at that company, I think largely because when I visited, and he interviewed me, I'd helped him with a computer problem.... And we'd discussed his plans for a new flight planning tool...We'd bandied about options and things that could be done in Excel to maintain the existing paper OFP format but add a whole lot of automation and streamline and speed up flight planning for the capts (it's actually a pretty nifty tool, if anyone is interested in playing with it). When I was hired, this was the special project I was tasked with - and completed the day before being fired, after long nights and weekends working at home. He was happy.... But he wasn't the one I should have focused on keeping happy - as a matter of fact, he left the company this fall.

Know your place and the expectations of the position, and stay positive no matter what.



Enough of my ramblings though! The jobs for low time guys ARE out there, there are a number of ways to go about finding them, a road trip is only one.


Cheers,
Colin

[CPLMike89]

2 years on the ramp led to nothing. Came home and within a week a friend of mine called me up to do some pipeline patrol, right place right time. This put me above 300 hours so another friend gave me a great reccomendation for a skydive gig again right place right time. So far I owe everything in my post flight school career to people I've met while training and and hanging around the airport now at 620 hours it looks like ill be flying a navajo this summer. Lesson 1 dont burn any bridges ever.

Mike W

[Hedley]

One last comment:

jump from 250 to 1000

It's not a jump - it's not a pesky obstacle to overcome. It's an important journey you need to take.

A CPL with 1,000 hrs is a horse of an entirely different colour than a CPL of 200/250 hrs. There's an awful lot of difference in their skill level, experience, knowledge and judgement.

Just because they have the same piece of paper, (Canuck CPL), don't confuse the two. Everyone is obsessed with paper, paper, paper. Sigh.

And even if someone had a magical legal wand and let you magically add a zero to your 250 hours, turning you overnight into a 2500 hr CPL, you still wouldn't be.

I'm probably not explaining this very well, but your first few thousand hours are an important learning experience for you. Don't try to gloss over it, and miss what you should be learning.

I feel really sorry for the kids who get out of flight school and go right into Jazz (or some other airline cadet program). Yes, as the years go by they will no doubt learn to be fine pilots, but they will have shortchanged themselves an awful lot, even though they probably think they have the inside track.

[Turbofan]

I bought a plane....went from 250 to 970 in a few yrs and loved every minute of it...and the learning curve was excellent!

I recommend it to anyone who can do it....

D

[172pilot]

Turbofan, check your PM's.