Whats up with Flight Options

[Cappytan]

I was wondering if it's going to be as bad as I thought it looked. I'm in the pool, currently waiting for my secret clearance to come through, with a spot down at ZHU. OKC may be giving me the bird for medical reasons (mentioned in other posts), and for that reason, I am actually pursuing other career avenues. Don Brown of AVWEB fame keeps telling me the job ain't all that it's cracked up to be.

The more I think about it (and plan for plan B) the more hesitant I am to take the job. Why? First of all, my current job is pretty darn good for the job that it is, allowing me to save some good money and is paying for a very large chunk of a Masters degree.

If I leave this, I probably won't be able to come back to it, in its current form and wage. I'm going to OKC, making $8.85/hr for three friggin' months (presuming I pass the medical THIS time around). Then I have to slave away at ZHU making whatever it is the bottom tier guys make. I can do that and put away some emergency funds if I'm making $50k+ per year. I figure my medical will hold up long enough for me to put away enough money to go back to school if I have to. However, if I'm only making $40k, it might be a different story. If I lose my medical after the first year or two, I'm kinda stuck. IMHO, her proposed pay scale isn't a high enough reward for the risk involved. Because of the whole medical thing (and then coupled with that B scale) I'm really tempted to be done with the whole thing now while it's easier to get plan B done instead of later when I lose my medical in my 40's... or sooner. The B scale just gives me more of an excuse.

Yo smelly.....hehehe....sorry, just slipped. Sounds like you have a valid gripe or two about the pay scale, but it sounds more like your medical is the big issue here and maybe you should channel that anger and just take care of yourself....than your "health" won't be the REAL ISSUE here.

Take it easy and good luck....

 

[smellthejeta]

Yo smelly.....hehehe....sorry, just slipped. Sounds like you have a valid gripe or two about the pay scale, but it sounds more like your medical is the big issue here and maybe you should channel that anger and just take care of yourself....than your "health" won't be the REAL ISSUE here.

Take it easy and good luck....

Nuthin *I* can do about the medical. $110k+/yr and I lose my medical, fine, I got money in the bank and I can ride it out. $60k/yr and I lose my medical, I got a lot less money set aside. One thing most pilots don't understand is that ATC guys aren't just "dying" to work traffic, like you guys would do to fly planes. She don't want to pay me what WAS "advertised," then fine, I'll go work somewhere else, no big deal. Trouble is, if all my bros take the same attitude (the medical thing just made me more aware of my options), then who WILL work the traffic? Everybody else is going to retire, and those that are left haven't really been around long enough to have anything to lose.

 

[sky37d]

Nuthin *I* can do about the medical. $110k+/yr and I lose my medical, fine, I got money in the bank and I can ride it out. $60k/yr and I lose my medical, I got a lot less money set aside. One thing most pilots don't understand is that ATC guys aren't just "dying" to work traffic, like you guys would do to fly planes. She don't want to pay me what WAS "advertised," then fine, I'll go work somewhere else, no big deal. Trouble is, if all my bros take the same attitude (the medical thing just made me more aware of my options), then who WILL work the traffic? Everybody else is going to retire, and those that are left haven't really been around long enough to have anything to lose.

??
Since I'm a no nothing private pilot, here's my question.
Do you have to go to the FAA thing to become a certified controller. Assuming you do, can you then bolt from the FAA and go work a private tower? Do private towers have advantages over working for the FAA?? Or, is the pay so crummy and QOL so bad that people just work them until they can get a good slot with the FAA??

 

[smellthejeta]

??
Since I'm a no nothing private pilot, here's my question.
Do you have to go to the FAA thing to become a certified controller. Assuming you do, can you then bolt from the FAA and go work a private tower? Do private towers have advantages over working for the FAA?? Or, is the pay so crummy and QOL so bad that people just work them until they can get a good slot with the FAA??

When it comes right down to it, I'm not exactly sure what ya "hafta" do to get hired. I can tell you how *most* people are doing it *today*, but that could change tommorrow if the FAA feels like it.

1. Gotta take the AT-SAT. This test is administered to "select" candidates off the street (there are "walk-ins" but it's very poorly publicized). It's also administered to anybody attending a college training program (most common civilian way of getting hired). The CTI program gives you "preferential" off the street hiring.

2. There are military ways of doing it. I don't know anything about that.

3. The civillian route -- once you get done with CTI or get lucky enough to take the AT-SAT outside of it, and score well enough, sooner or later (it's been at least a year for my classmates of May '05) you go to OKC to train at the FAA Academy. For enroute (my assignment) it's 56 days of training. Terminal guys go for less.

At the Enroute facility, I think there are three more training grades you have to go through before you get your full pay as CPC/FPL controllers. All of those pay scales are less than the "published" minimum for a CPC.

As far as the contract towers go, they've pretty much fallen off the PR radar AFAIK. I've heard enough stories to know that QOL sucks. I think I saw a website for one company once, and IIRC, they start off at $40k/yr. Half of me belives she's killing the new payscale so she can make ATC look bad and explain why we should privatize that.

 

[learflyer]

90% of the Options flights have had attitudes. I used one example that really pissed me off. I can only run planes in IFR weather as fast as the 7110.65 lets me, this guy has to go go go. Screw that.


Why don't you be a man and tell us which airport you work at and maybe we can discuss? I'd hate to have an emegency at your airport. You probably wouldn't even call CFR for us. Now that scares me.