Corporate and Military Reserves

[Candide]

Do you guys know of anyone who has successfully reconciled a corporate career with flying in the Reserves for Uncle Sam? If so, how difficult is it?

Thanks in advance.

 

[El Cid Av8or]

I've often thought about this myself and have come to the conclusion that it depends on how big the company's flight department is and/or how often they need you to fly. I believe it would work well with a fractional company since they have a lot of pilots that can fill the seat when you are serving the country. A small corporate flight department that requires the pilots to be very active (i.e. flying on short notice with only two or three pilots in the flight dept.) would be hard since they may not be able to live without you when the military calls. I am in the Air National Guard and would love to fly corporate planes (that's my career goal) so I am looking for the same info. Hopefully some folks who have had first-hand experience at it will chime in.

 

[gear_guy]

We have one pilot who is a reservist. He has very little issues getting to do both. We have 7 pilots. We usually don't have a problem accomadating him, but occassionally we hire a contract pilot to fill in. Of course, all of the pilots support him and are behind it 100%. It does take a little compromise from both sides though. This is because of the schedule of most corporate outfits is somewhat unscheduled.

 

[Thunderguppy]

I'm a corporate pilot and a member of the Air National Guard. My flight department has four pilots and does lots of 135. Long story short, it's a pain to reconcile the two, not to mention I got recall orders for five months next year. I will probably lose my job even though it's illegal.

I agree with earlier replies that the bigger the dept the better, with four pilots it puts a strain on things.
PM me and I'll give you more info.

 

[GVFlyer]

Guard and Reserve

My department has a F-18 pilot in it successfully maintaining complex qualifications, the former chief pilot was a Navy Reserve Captain, the Proctor and Gamble chief pilot is a National Guard one star General and Ford had a Captain who was a Major General in the Air Force Reserve with an active duty mobilization billet...

GV