You think flying freight is risky, flying at night is risky, or flying a Lear is risky? Do you have experience doing any of those things that might qualify you to make such as assumption beyond a wild, uneducated guess?
Ive done a lot of things in Lears, including night freight. I have also flown special missions lears with modifications and external equipment, at night, under unusual conditions, including weather research...I can tell you as a career professional, I'd certainly not have done it if I considered it a risk. Not in the least. Flying a learjet is not a risky endevor. It's a well designed, safe aircraft...all of the various models. Flying a lear at night isn't a risk; the aircraft has ample performance on one engine, full systems capability on either engine with respect to electrical and accessories, and doesn't care a whit if it's day or night.
The presence of cargo in the aircraft vs. passengers makes absolutely no difference and is entirely irrelevant. If night freight in a Learjet is a risky endevor, then that's the pilots fault; he or she isn't doing it right.
So you say, never the less, you responded again anyway.
Does flying aircraft overseas make one a dangerous "crazy" pilot? No. Is it irresponsible? No. Can one be a professional ferry pilot who offers a legitimate, safe service to a client? Absolutely. This doesn't describe NW Pilot, however, who brags about being a crazy pilot, who acts irresponsibly, and who is far from professional in his comments and actions, and who lectures about others taking ferry flights on the cheap, but who at the same time undercuts proper rates to get the jobs done himself...on the cheap.
I've known others like NW Pilot. Most of them are dead now, none by natural causes.
Perhaps more significant than the poor decision making which NW Pilot not only admits to, but openly brags about and holds up as a badge of honor, is his level of immaturity. This is not an appropriate trait in a pilot, certainly not in a professional. He acts and speaks as a teenage kid, not an adult. Most would at a minimum be discreet about acts and events that NW Pilot brags about; sadly he's not only no ashamed of them, but thrilled to show them off, and somehow is too dense to figure out how stupid it makes him look.
Ferry pilots frequently move aircraft which they haven't flown before. This isn't unusual. Ferry pilots frequently make trips over water and areas where others prefer not...that's what they do, deliver airplanes. This can be done safely, and is one safely, all the time. NW Pilot made wise decisions in electing to return to Hayward with the problems that he encountered, yet the matter remains that he probably shouldn't have been there to begin with.
Can a low time, low experience pilot safely do a demanding job? Yes. I was flying ag and spraying fields when I had quarter of the time that NW Pilot has now, and that was many years ago as a teenager. I also did it under close supervision, after some very involved, dedicated training in every single aspect of what I did. One must walk before one runs, and NW Pilot's posts make it clear that he never learned to properly crawl; his running appears to be that of an impaired drunkard without any particular direction or sense of balance.
I'm all for one taking the proverbial bull by the horns and making something of one's self. That's far cry from stepping into places where one shouldn't be, in over one's head and experience, beyond one's depth, and attempting to teach one's self what one doesn't know and hasn't the experience to teach. Be careful of scars earned in battles in which you should never have fought.
