I work with a woman who is often dropped off at work by her helicopter pilot husband.
He pulls out of the parking lot in their little Honda Civic and waits for traffic at the stop sign. And waits and waits. Ho hum.
And I always wonder: ‘Man, that must make him crazy! He must be thinking, ‘Damn, if I was only in my helicopter I could skip all this crap. The traffic and buildings, gone.’’
I mean, driving is boring for ME, never mind for pilots, I assume.
I’m a helicopter pilot. And I have an extraordinarily long commute. Every day I wish I was flying instead of driving.
In general, driving to me is boring. Now that the MG is up and running, it’s less so. But I’m also a motorcyclist. Riding a sportbike is fun, even if you’re just commuting. Unfortunately, it appears that the State Patrol takes this ‘speed limit’ thing more seriously than do their CHP counterparts. It takes some of the fun out of it when you have to check your six all the time and you can’t split lanes.
But driving rarely makes me crazy. Sure, IRBF; but until I get current and have the resources to commute by air (flying is a little more expensive than driving) I’ll just have to live with it.
While sometimes driving is boring, all too often the people I share the road with makes it more heart-pounding than flight by doing really stupid and dangerous crap.
And sometimes - such as bad weather - I am glad to be on the ground driving rather than wrestling an aircraft through scary stuff.
There’s a lot of that up here. As I drive along wishing I was flying, I remind myself that one thing on the To Do List is to earn an IFR rating. (And when I see the float planes landing in the water near downtown Seattle, I think about a seaplan rating too.)
I used to work with a guy who lived in Big Bear and worked in Orange County. He had a '66 Cherokee that he flew to work almost every day. A friend of his crashed into a radio antenna on approach to Fullerton and died. This spooked the coworker into giving up flying and selling his airplane.
In case anyone is wondering, helicopters operate under slightly different rules from fixed-wings. For example, helicopters may fly at altitudes lower than the altitudes stated in FAR 91.119. I’d generally maintain 400 AGL. In Class G airspace below 1,200 feet AGL a helicopter may be operated clear of clouds (FAR 91.155). Helicopters can operate in SVFR with visibility less than 1 statute mile, operate under SVFR at night when fixed-wing pilots have to be IFR, and can take off or land when the visibility is less than 1 sm (FAR 91.157). IFR fuel reserves for helicopters are 30 minutes instead of 45 (FAR 91.167).
On the other hand, fixed-wings are more practical, less expensive, and faster.
My Dad in the summer time would climb down the cliff, cross the lake in the boat, fly his Cessna 180 to Tulsa, get in his jeep and drive to work. He would reverse the process the in the evening.
I know of may pilots who were in a position to fly to work each day.
They always had a back-up plan, weather can always mess things up …
Back in the day, my Dad was of the opinion that if it was over an hour in the car to get someplace, he would fly or not go. he really hated driving and he was in a position to live by that credo as he worked for himself.
