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3 Answers

Want to get back in the Helicopter saddle again.

Asked by: 3529 views Commercial Pilot, Helicopter

Hello all.

I have decided, after 20 years of flying a desk to try getting back to flying. I am somewhat of an strange situation. I went to Army flight school in 1992, completed primary in UH-1 and transition to UH-60 then went back to my reserve unit. Do to a lot of reasons, (one of which the unit was eventually closed) I never flew an army helo again. Flying helicopters is an expensive hobby and I was unmarketable as a pilot so thus ended my flying career. I have often wanted to get back into it, but life happens and you get a job have kids and etc...but now I am ready. So, I am throwing this out to get some advice about how you would go about it and what course would you take to potentially starting doing some CFI work as my profieceny improves. It is still too expensive for me to do as a hobby so I would love to be able to fly on someone elses dime when I can. More specifically, realistically what amount of flight hours should I expect to put in to get from commercial helo to CFI. Thanks for any advice.

John

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3 Answers



  1. Bob Watson on Sep 30, 2012

    I can’t offer specific advice (as an airplane pilot with only 4 hours of rotary wing time), but (and I say this with only a twinge of envy) you’re starting off with more rotary wing time than most, and turbine time, to boot! In any case, I wish you the best of luck in your career change!

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  2. Sam Dawson on Oct 01, 2012

    What about changing over to the fixed wing side? May be a more cost effective way to get back into flying.

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  3. Ron on Oct 04, 2012

    You’ve already logged enough hours for your Commercial, so it would probably be completely up to your flying proficiency for the CFI to sign you off, take the Commercial Written, prep for the oral, and then the flight test. After that move on to CFI rating wich is mostly book and oral, except full down auto’s. Call your local helicopter school for specifics, I’d go with a S-300 school as apposed to a Robbie school.

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