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Life of a Helicopter Pilot


rbussma

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Hey Guys,

 

I found this a couple of days ago while looking at a much less used forum, and thought I would pass it along. I am sure something like this has been posted on here before, but I figured we could all use a laugh.

 

The Life of a Helicopter Pilot:

Grand canyon tour:
Get up at 4.30AM, drive 90 miles to the ditch, have 5th cup of coffee, preflight, pee, get in start up, load up the midwestern beefeaters, fly for 30 minutes, fly for 30 minutes, fly for 30 minutes, fly for an hour, fly for 30 minutes, fly for an hour. Can I have a break? No, ok, fly for 30 minutes, fly for 30 minutes, fly for 30 minutes, fly for 30 minutes. fly for 30 minutes, fly for 30 minutes, fly for an hour, get out tie down, PEE, drive 90 miles home,eat, sleep, repeat.

Hawaii tour:
See above but get to wear funky hawaii shirt and shorts...

Offshore Oil:
See above but the tourists smell bad and the river is a lot bigger...

Tuna Boat:
See above, but you get to chant: Where da fish, where da fish...

Powerline patrol:
See above but you get to say: tower one, tower two, tower 3, tower 4, tower 5......tower 496, tower 497, etc...

Pipeline patrol:
See above but you get to say: yup it's a pipeline. yup it's a pipeline, yup it's a pipeline, yup it's a pipeline. yup it's a pipeline,.....Sh#t theres a wire, ok, yup it's a pipeline, yup it's a pipeline, yup it's a pipeline....

EMS:
Get to work, have 7th cup of coffee, preflight, pee,news, eat, sleep,eat, sleep, eat, sleep, eat, sleep, BEEP BEEP BEEP, motorcycle vs a big rig, fly 20 minutes, load patient, "Yuuuuuuko!!! That looks like it hurts!", fly 20 minutes, off-load, debrief, eat, sleep, eat sleep, eat, sleep, go home...

Logging:
Get up at 5, have 3rd cup of coffee, preflight, comin up, log, log, log, log, log, log, log, log, log, log, log,log, Wipe up CP's puke, log, log, log, log, log, log, log, log, log, log, etc.. .Shut down go home drink a massive amounts of beer with hookers.

Fire:
Get up at 4 AM, drive an hour, have 9th cup of coffee, mission plan, you want to me to do WHAT? Put on bucket go to fire. OH! big fire! Up down, turn around, fetch a pail of water, repeat 160 times. Shut down, wait untill 14 hours is over. Out of duty time, find tent, eat at base camp, visit little blue room, sleep up again, at 5am repeat...

CFI:
Get in at 9am, have 10 cups of coffee, 3 cigs,and wait for no shows, Non english speaking student shows up, preflight, flight, SCREAM: I HAVE THE CONTROLS!!, repeat 20 times, After hour flight, clean short, repeat 5 times, go home knowing your the pilot god that saved the R22 from the clutches of the student pilot, get on PC and type resume, yup getting 252.4 hours. look for way to get turbine time job with out flight time, go to sleep thinking how great it would be working as a real pilot!

 

Aerial Photography

Get up at 3:00AM, prep flight plan, program GPS, file flight plan with Flight service, get weather brief, drive 30 miles to hangar, pre-flight helicopter, spend three hours rigging video mount, give driving directions to customer, customer can't find airport and arrives late, tug out helicopter, and have flight cancelled due to "too many clouds"

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Recreational Pilot:

 

Finally saved up $300 bucks, think I'll go fly? Tonight looks good, oh' wait its windy, maybe tomarrow? Tomorrow night; ah' light wind, but wait there's a cloud, maybe tomorrow night? Tomorrow night; light wind, no clouds, reserve chopper, drive 45 min to airport, start preflight, green position light out, no one around to fix it,...sh*t! drive 45 min back home, maybe tomorrow night? Tomorrow night; everything looks good, light fixed, find out there's a ballgame TFR over where you want to fly,...f*cking baseball!, maybe tomorrow night?,...nope rain! A week later you finally find the PERFECT night and go fly,...for an hour!

 

Start saving money again, repeat hopefully in about a month?

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Recreational Pilot:

 

Finally saved up $300 bucks, think I'll go fly? Tonight looks good, oh' wait its windy, maybe tomarrow? Tomorrow night; ah' light wind, but wait there's a cloud, maybe tomorrow night? Tomorrow night; light wind, no clouds, reserve chopper, drive 45 min to airport, start preflight, green position light out, no one around to fix it,...sh*t! drive 45 min back home, maybe tomorrow night? Tomorrow night; everything looks good, light fixed, find out there's a ballgame TFR over where you want to fly,...f*cking baseball!, maybe tomorrow night?,...nope rain! A week later you finally find the PERFECT night and go fly,...for an hour!

 

Start saving money again, repeat hopefully in about a month?

Don't save, use plastic, fly as needed.

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Military pilot: Wake up, get breakfast, drink coffee, check email, go to ready room, bullshit for a half hour. Get another cup of coffee. Check email. Go to meeting. Pretend to make Powerpoint slides while surfing Internet. Eat again. Watch movies. Go to sleep. Repeat for three days. Get told that the Commanding General wants to fly to a FOB in East Asscrackistan. Flight plan for thirty minutes, then spend three hours making briefing slides to explain the scheme of maneuver of a one-hour flight. Man up aircraft and spin two hours prior to pickup. Take CG to FOB. Spend day doing nothing while waiting for CG, then told to have the aircraft ready to lift in five minutes. Fly back to base. Go back to hooch to watch movies. Get yelled at by XO for letting the CG board via the ramp instead of the crew door. Tell everyone you hate this sh*t. Go to sleep. Get woken up because Corporal Binotz dropped a tool box on his toe and a flash report needs to be filled out. Repeat.

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You forgot to mention completing a risk assessment for the mission. Spend one hour trying to find a briefer/approval authority for said assessment and mission. Then the post-mission after action review.

 

Of course you squeeze in 3 more cups of coffee in these phases...

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Military pilot: Wake up, get breakfast, drink coffee, check email, go to ready room, bullshit for a half hour. Get another cup of coffee. Check email. Go to meeting. Pretend to make Powerpoint slides while surfing Internet. Eat again. Watch movies. Go to sleep. Repeat for three days. Get told that the Commanding General wants to fly to a FOB in East Asscrackistan. Flight plan for thirty minutes, then spend three hours making briefing slides to explain the scheme of maneuver of a one-hour flight. Man up aircraft and spin two hours prior to pickup. Take CG to FOB. Spend day doing nothing while waiting for CG, then told to have the aircraft ready to lift in five minutes. Fly back to base. Go back to hooch to watch movies. Get yelled at by XO for letting the CG board via the ramp instead of the crew door. Tell everyone you hate this sh*t. Go to sleep. Get woken up because Corporal Binotz dropped a tool box on his toe and a flash report needs to be filled out. Repeat.

The only thing you forgot was the absolute no concept of day of the week... Monday, Saturday, or Wednesday.... Who cares they are all just Groundhog Day anyway! If you sleep 12 hours a day, does it make the deployment half as long?

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Ag Pilot:

 

Up at 4:30. Drive to helicopter. Wake up when you get there, can't remember how you arrived. Preflight. Stare at driver while he loads the truck way too slow. Get pissed and do it yourself. Send truck down the road with well detailed written driving directions. Light off bird. Fly to first site. Truck is missing. Find truck. spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray. Dodge fixed wing guys with yellow planes who claim to be ag pilots. spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray. Truck is empty. Find a field to idle in while truck reloads. 45 minutes later truck is back. spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray. Its only 2pm. 8 hours to go. Wish you were dead. Check bank account. Remember why you haven't shot yourself. spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray spray. Truck breaks. You can see the problem from the cockpit. Explain over the radio 19 times how to fix it. Still not fixed. Get out and fix it yourself. spray spray spray spray spray spray. spray spray spray spray. Getting very dark out, ready to shut down. Take off sunglasses and realize there is still an hour of useable daylight left. spray spray spray spray spray spray. Dark out. Keep spraying. spray spray spray spray spray. Shut down at 10pm.

 

Repeat 7 days a week for 8 months. Sleep all winter.

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