how do the guys commute to work in YVR from YYZ 15 days a month? Not on the ferry I hope!

YYZ?

Maybe he means YYJ?

Hello . Don,t agree with good old chuckie ,all pilots ifr or float should make a good wage period. I am tired of hearing u need this u need that to make more money we have earned the right to demand more wether ifr or vfr.Done both no matter u can ask for more just don,t need some newbie settling for less and don,t give me the bs that a vfr float guy earns it more than Ifr guy cause it it aint so. Period!Started as a very excited vfr pilot myself and I am tired of people telling me I need to take a pay cut to move on .....well F**k that I make good money flying 704 so tell me what is the advantage ? yeh I can sit sideways or even better right seat 737 never been a copilot before.Awesome and can do all this for less than someone working at Macdonalds.I only have to cut my pay in at the very least half but I guess it can be worse my family will only have to support me another 5 or 6 yrs .
Cheers a Accomplished float and Ifr Pilot.

Onfinal, you ever spent a float season on the Coast???

ooooohh, once again I have manager to ruffle the feathers of another pilot.

It's a slow day again for me sooo I'll respond to this.

Hello . Don,t agree with good old chuckie ,all pilots ifr or float should make a good wage period.

True, but I feel that if you are doing a much more difficult type of flying it should pay more.

Flying a Goose for Pasco out of Port Hardy is definitely more demanding than flying their IFR aircraft. Therefore should pay more.

I am tired of hearing u need this u need that to make more money we have earned the right to demand more wether ifr or vfr.

Suck it up Princess you get paid what your employer feels you are worth and what you accept. Demand all you want because unless your employer is willing to pay you what you " THINK " you are worth your demands are useless.

Done both no matter u can ask for more just don,t need some newbie settling for less and don,t give me the bs that a vfr float guy earns it more than Ifr guy cause it it aint so. Period!

Depends on what the pilots are flying.

Started as a very excited vfr pilot myself and I am tired of people telling me I need to take a pay cut to move on .....well F**k that I make good money flying 704 so tell me what is the advantage ? yeh I can sit sideways or even better right seat 737 never been a copilot before.Awesome and can do all this for less than someone working at Macdonalds.I only have to cut my pay in at the very least half but I guess it can be worse my family will only have to support me another 5 or 6 yrs .
.

That is not my fault onfinal, I don't make the rules in aviation.

Cheers a Accomplished float and Ifr Pilot.

Good on you, that makes you one of tens of thousands in the business and that might be why the wages are so low.

Come on Cat! I'm normally on your side, but to suggest that float pilots are better than IFR guys and worth more is just your personal arrogance.

We actually have a Goose guy that has decided to fly the 1900 for the winter to remain employed, and he CAN'T do it. Can't handle it, can't even understand it! I am definitely not going to say that he is not a good pilot, because he is. Very valuable as a Goose pilot, but he's not worth more than the rest of us.

Flying floats is very different than flying IFR. Very different skill sets and both should pay well. The float guys get paid more because there are less of them and they are in more demand. NOT because they are better pilots doing a harder job.

How much Goose time do you have flying out of port Hardy 1900?

In these discussions we only give our own opinions on these issues. I am only giving my opinion and it does not mean it is correct. Having done both types of flying I found flying amphibious aircraft on the west coast to be far more demanding than flying twin engine turbines IFR, so why should that make me arrogant?

My opinion is based on having done both types of flying....just because one individual finds IFR hard to adjust to means nothing in the grand scheme of things.

"Can't do it"... Geez, pretty harsh judgement... Let's see, he's probably been at it for about an entire 2 months now with no previous ifr experience.

What about the other goose-1900 guy you forgot to mention, who did have a little more ifr experience??

I'm sure there's a lot of f/o's at a lot of different companies who take a while to fully comprehend the "big picture".

The VFR pilots aren't "better"... they do often have a tougher job though... not to say the IFR people have it easy all the time... just a general comparison.

Cat is right on this one.

I'd like to hear from pilots on here who do both & not just one or the other. Which is "easier"?

Cat Driver wrote:

Yes, they do.

Good to hear, they earn it and deserve more.

Never flying floats, I can't comment on who's right. However, making a post just to say that is picking a fight I figure.

I do think that if float drivers were as abundant as IFR drivers, the payscale would probably be about the same.

I would love to fly a Goose - I have no tail-dragger time except for a DC3 a million years ago. Do you guys think (even if I were to be given the chance) that if I were to set foot in a Goose it would be suicidal or could you train an old fart to drive one?

I have coastal float time and lots of multi time... how unforgiving is a Goose? Ground handling, water handling....

Never flying floats, I can't comment on who's right. However, making a post just to say that is picking a fight I figure.

Picking a fight??? WTF are you talking about?

Are you saying that if flying a Goose on the west coast is more difficult and more work that the position should not be paid accordingly?

Maybe there are pilots reading this who would like to make more money and are willing to fly a Goose for Pasco.

Xsbank, there are some Goose drivers here who can answer your question.....that way I won't be pissing off some of these guys who think I'm a prick. ( Of course you could do it, in fact you would love it. )

Are you saying that if flying a Goose on the west coast is more difficult and more work that the position should not be paid accordingly?

No, do you think being Paris Hilton is tougher then being a float driver? cause she banks far more then me (an ifr guy) and you (presumably a float guy) put together. I'm just talking about supply and demand.

Picking a fight??? WTF are you talking about?

It just seems like a post like that was designed to pick a fight with IFR drivers.

I've done (do) both and I think that except for the &%^$#&^% 6-month rides, IFR is way easier than floats, especially if you follow the rules!

Face it, though, the pay sucks in all aspects of this industry unless you're a 777 or a Global Express driver. Try getting benefits and holidays and a shift that's normal like any other working stiff instead of 15 hour days when you can do nothing else except down a beer as you shuffle off to bed. Or stay in rat-bag hotels in a room over the bar before the o-dark thirty departure.

No, do you think being Paris Hilton is tougher then being a float driver? cause she banks far more then me (an ifr guy) and you (presumably a float guy) put together. I'm just talking about supply and demand.

I was not discussing supply and demand I was discussing the relative difficulty of two specific jobs at Pasco.....flying the Grumman Goose out of Hardy or flying the twin engine turbines IFR.

It is my opinion from having done both flying the Goose on the west coast is by far the more difficult job.

How can you and I seriously discuss this if you have only done one job...by the way I started flying IFR in 1957 and have flown in more countries IFR than I can even remember....I also have over fifty years flying sea planes including the Goose ( although my Goose time was in the Turbine Goose not the piston engine Goose.
)

It just seems like a post like that was designed to pick a fight with IFR drivers.

Why would I want to do that, to me flying is a job, nothing more nothing less.

Fair enough, I wasn't talking about which one was tougher, I was just talking about the pay.



One of my regrets in my career is that I haven't flown floats and it doesn't look like I will, commercially at least. I can imagine it would be challenging and fun. Still, we've now hijacked the thread, which looked to be about how the working conditions were on the IFR side @ Pasco. My friends that are there seem to enjoy it. Not to sure when the story is with the new payscale though.

If you are ever in Nanaimo give me a call and I'll give you a go at the Husky.

Glad to see this thread stayed on topic I was worried id pick up on some information about a company I would like to know more about....

Funny float pilots, Gooses are for kids.

Funny float pilots, Gooses are for kids.

So tell us, oh great one, what do real men fly?

Any plane with a red maple leaf on the tail silly.

Comparing float flying to IFR is like comparing apples to oranges. Sure, a plane is a plane but it's not the same game. Takes a totally different way of thinking and operating.

I've done both and enjoy all types of aviation. IFR is more of a structured environment were the rules are written in stone and the grey area is slimmer. Floats is ''seat of your pants'' flying were you make your own rules and if you mess up, there's nobody there to save your sorry ass except whetever you got between you ears (and your legs, I guess)

I now fly IFR for a living and floats for fun. Which do I enjoy more? Obviously what I do on my time off because I go were I want when I want. Floats for a living? No thanks. To much hard work and long days in shit wx.

Both deserve good wages and good working conditions. If a guy is away from home for 6 months out of the year, pay him well so he'll go back. If he's flying IFR, give him a good schedule so he won't jump to another company.

We're all on the same team working in various different jobs but we have to stick together to get the salaries and cworking conditions up.

bandit1 wrote: We're all on the same team working in various different jobs but we have to stick together to get the salaries and cworking conditions up.

Well Said!

Another hijacked post that was once for informtation on Pasco and is now a thread on VFR -vs- IFR.

Let's get to the real dirt, and talk about the Union forming soon! (Or so goes the rumour that has been circulating for the last couple days)

talk about the Union forming soon

Do tell, seeing as you seem to work there...
I kinda subscribe to the dictum that: 'companies get the union they deserve.' But was always of the opinion that Pasco was a good place to work, and that everyone, generally, was happy there, and thus, no union... What's changed?