What made you want to be a Pilot?

[magyar]

So you are now a pilot. Is it what you expected it to be? Why did you choose to be a pilot in the first place?

Is becomming a pilot simmilar to a hollywod actor fantasy?

[Tango01]

Becoming a pilot is much easier than becoming a Hollywood actor and pays a lot less. I don't know why I wanted to become a pilot. Now that I think about it, porn star would have been a much wiser choice.

[C-GGGQ]

For the life of me i can't remember anymore, what the hell was i thinking

[kiloindiapapa]

I always have loved planes. They have facinated me from as long back as I can remember. I used to sit outside Nait when I was at hockey school and watch the old Pacific Western and the Canadian 733's go in and out of Edmonton City Center. I could watch all those planes for hours. Still love the 737 today.

I like wathcing planes, land, takeoff, fly, I love how they look on the tarmac, and just generally think everything about them is really cool. I knew as a kid that I had to be a pilot and learn how to fly. Getting my pilots licenses has been the best thing I have ever done.

[C-GGGQ]

My actual answer is my Grandfather was/ is a pilot. I've been flying with him since I was 3 or 4. I didn't stand a chance even when he told me that I should forget about it cause aviation blows

[. ._]

In my psychological studies, we have discussed addiction.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Addiction

I'm pretty sure flying is in there. There is NO reason anyone should subject themselves to such an expensive, dangerous pastime- but we do!

Flight schools are pushers of this drug, and their behaviour is just like a dealer. Fam flights- the first one's cheap. Then you start selling your possessions to keep up. Eventually you destroy your relationships and bank account because of this DISEASE called flying.

Here are how a couple of pilots stopped flying:

1. We admitted we were powerless over the urge to fly—that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings, and forgive all of our bad landings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or crew or passengers.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it, and documented it in the No Flying Logbook.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to pilots, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

If you're not ready to do all of that, just have fun up there in the sky!

I started flying because it's fun as hell and the view is great! Now where's that VISA bill I gotta pay?

-istp

[loopa]

I'd like to nominate you for my big fat plus 1 award istp.

[toelessjoe]

I couldn't get into college/university, my marks were too sh1tty. Sadly, this is a true story.

I did, however, meet my wife while I was....a furniture mover. She understood that as a pilot I was clearly destined to be a millionaire by the time I was 37 and I can happily say that I am half way there.... I am indeed 37.

[YO_MAMMA]

B/C of the $$$....After being in the industry for 7 years and realzing I was only taking home under $40K a year i realized that I cud take home over $12,000 a month with my professional painting business...clearly money is a wrong motivating factor for becoming a pilot

[Navajo-dude]

To impress women (Boy, was I wrong!!!)

[foxmoth]

Biggles

[Koizie1]

I can honestly say watching topgun planted the seed in my head. I've loved planes ever since. I still love flying.

[planett]

Watching the movie "Airplane" planted the seed in my head.

[seniorpumpkin]

I just like being up high, even when I'm talking to people I find myself standing on steps, rocks, logs, whatever to get on high ground. The view from an airplane is impossible to beat!!
I also like being on the move, going places, maybe I'm running from deep internal conflict? Anyways, I love what I do.

[ywgflyboy]

I like the idea of having extramarital affairs and am smarter than a certain professional golfer and know to have them in different countries.....

Totally joking.

Flew with my grandpa back when I was 6 or so. Never set my mind on another career goal after that. Best view in the world. Times are tough, do not even have my first job, but never stray from the dream.

[planett]

What?....Peter Graves and Leslie Nielsen never inspired anyone else?

[B-rad]

The idea of having travel be a part of my life in a career that could take me around the world all while never having to work a day in my life because of being in a job that isn't a job and I wouldn't have to put in years of university so I could spend my younger years being free and have people think its unique and play into a fantasy life of being a pilot with lots of time off and meet girls in every town with the ability to up and start a new life whenever I wanted and be whoever I wanted to be. Flying has not let me down.

[MUSICMAAN]

I grew up in the industry.. I never pictured myself doing anything else (well, other than rally car driver), and I still can't picture myself doing anything else!..... (other than rally car driver)

[Nark]

Chasing tail and making money.

[The Old Fogducker]

My Grandfather was a pilot .. started flying just after WW1 with the money he got from the Army ... he became a Barnstormer in true Waldo Pepper style and flew until the mid-30's. After that, he wrote a great many magazine articles and had a regular monthly column called "Tales Of A Barnstormer" which was a humour based series of stories ... sort of like Ace McCool.

My dad medicalled out, but was a very avid model airplane builder all this life, so I grew up with balsa dust in my hair, dried glue on my fingers, and sniffed nitrate dope a lot while covering wings. I still fly models, although not as much the last 3 or 4 years.

I started PPL lessons about 6 times and had to quit because I ran out of money, but kept going back and picking up where I had left off. Then it was carry on through ATPL and flew about 70 different types. That describes almost 40 years of my career.

Here's something to think about. In one of the last conversations I had with my dad before he died, he said "You've never worked a day in your life..."

For a few seconds, I jumped down his throat for saying that. Then he answered "no, you took it the wrong way, I had to go out and get a job only because I had bills to pay and a family to provide for. You've been lucky enough to do what you've liked to do since you were a kid, and make it pay."

He was right.

Regards to all,
The Old Fogducker

[av8tor_assrope]

Sure beats having a real job!

A guy I flew with not too long ago put it right. It’s nice to not have to bring your work home with you….or worry about how much work you have to do when you’re not in the office. You go in, go fly, come home, have a beer, have sex and repeat!

[North Shore]

By way of Paul Brickhill: Douglas Bader, Guy Gibson, Leonard Cheshire, Bob Tuck, Sailor Malan et al...

[felix0315]

My aunt used to work as a ground agent for BA and Korean Airlines.
She brought home die-cast airplanes
I grew up playing with them, and fell in love with aviation
Even though I had motion sickness problems
And the doctors told me not to fly because they thought it wasnt gonna go away
I still insisted on flying
There were times when I fell
But I always stood back up
And now, I'm used to the environment

I fly, for love, for passion, and for PIE!

[Indanao]

Following grade 12, I went to work for the summer in Hinton for the Alberta Forest Service on a, " Surpression Crew". Four man crew of Standbye Firefighters. We had to become certified, so part of our training at that time was to go up in a Helicopter and slide down a, " Skyjeanie" ( 100ft rope ). It was a Bell 47J, the A.F.S. owned three of them nicknamed, "Greentails" cause they were green and white and had Bertie the Beaver on the tail. It was an easy course.

Then for the next three years I worked as Radio Operator, and relief Towerman, travelling to Forest Look Out Towers to give the operator a week or two off, or to train a new operator when they quit. I did that in Slave Lake Forest, and Peace River Forest. ( Alberta used to be divided into 12 forest districts complete with superintendents. ) I rode in those greentails a lot and always wondered IF i could do it.

So, I went back to Edmonton got a job, learned how to fly, went crop spraying, Instructing, got my Helicopter add on, flew C185, and went to work for a company that had both C185 and Bell47s. That got me a chance to fly the Bell47J. And, they gave me the Jet Ranger endorsement after the first summer on the 47. Then I went and got the Multi IFR.. ALL, because i wondered IF I could do it - that's all. Not for a higher spot on the Social Economic Ladder, just out of interest. Wrong attitude if you want to make money at this. It's a GREAT job if you don't starve getting started. It's a Career if you focus on the dollars, only Airline Pilots actually get paid. I spent 1 & 1/2 years as a rampie for Gateway Aviation for $2hr.

[Teeg]

my parents conditioned me by taking me to buttonville on my first couple of birthdays.

then i saw Top Gun.

then i actually got my licenses and endorsements, and now im in a puppy mill.

However, there is absolutely nothing better than when its shite on the ground and you pop through the layer to see the sun going down and moon rising. THAT, makes it worth it.