Aerial application aka Crop Dusting?

Your still young enough to go into flying something other than a crop duster for a career. I would suggest spending the money on training for a direct entry commuter job where you have steady income. Unless you like breathing chemicals and flying close to the ground trying to avoid power lines? If thats your thing than go for it.

Cheers

 

Having been involved in that business and having known and flown with pilots from it I don't think that you would enjoy it at age 45 unless you have been doing it for 20 years. Dodging fence posts and power wires isn't the only dangerous aspect of it, engine and prop failures are not nice and the life is tough and debilitating. I agree with Turbo that you should try to find something more suitable.
Switches

 

Most applicators are using turboprops, which are a lot more reliable and don't beat up props like round motors do.

Funny, but I tend to look at a airline job as being more like a bus driver. Other than landing, it's just turning knobs, not much real flying. The bad side of working your way to an airline seat is that the commuters only pay coolie wages and you will be starving until you can get enough time to get a seat with the majors. It might be a regular paycheck, but it isn't much of one unless you apply for food stamps along with it... If you are single and can live on a pittance then it migh be a thing to do, but if you have to provide for more than yourself it isn't going to be nice.

 

A friend of mine (now deceased) used to say that if the flying didn't kill you, the chemicals would.

 

I bummed around with crop dusters when I was a kid. hanging around, row flagging, and occasionally riding in the front cockpit / hopper. In the thirty's they used arsenic dust (I wonder if that's what's wrong with me now) and other things unknown to me to dust celery and lettuce. Travel Airs and Waco's were the tools and the guys were living outside the norm of the rest of the human race. They flew seven days a week and when they weren't flying they were talking about it...and women. Once in a while on a Sunday I would see them land on the beach near us to have a barbeque with their wives or girl friends, drink some beer or harder stuff, and then go flying. They were a tight crew and lived on the fringes of " acceptable behavior". But they were generous to those who did accept their ways and I never heard of any of them crossing the law.
When the war came, they were soon scooped up to become either instructors in the many civilian schools that were contracted to train the military, or into the military as transport pilots,etc. I knew of only one who survived the war.
It was great experience to be around at that time and exciting to see the crop dusters at work but their string was short and had a predictable ending.
Switches

 

Interestingly enough, my friend who used to crop dust managed to die in bed at 91, so I guess it doesn't always get you. Of course, he had the sense to stop crop dusting after only a couple of years... Switches, you probably know who I'm talking about-- he's most famous for flying through a hangar, among other exploits.

 

That is a pretty ignorant statment comparing an airline pilot to a bus driver. I am afraid you dont have a clue on what your talking about.

I do plenty of "real flying" including ADF approaches to non radar places such as Bosnia and Macedonia, GCA and PAR approaches into Iraq and other unique airports where we dont just turn knobs and dial an ILS and rely on the automation. Thats what makes it challenging, unique and very rewarding for me.

 

Not to mention the 1G rolls you guys do at night "just to see if anyone notices."

Try that in a bus!

 

We get to have our fair share of fun thats for sure! Much like a bus driver! I am in Hawaii for 3 days than off to Guam.

Beats working!

Cheers

 

Right now the only one that I can think of that I knew would be Paul Mantz. That's funny because I just ran across a little snapshot of him taxiing in the Avenger that they used in a film that they made at our airport in 1948. Quite an interesting guy and the first pilot that I ever met who down played Amelia as a very poor pilot. Kinda burst the bubble about her.However, Mantz died in the crash of the hybrid airplane while filming " Flight Of the Phoenix".
Switches

 

My close friend is a 22,000 hour pilot. He says when he's flying the Airbus he feels like a "glorified bus driver". Maybe solofast's statement wasn't so ignorant?

 

I know an A320 pilot and he has made the same statement. But, I must believe that there are those who have to prove their worth by flying into less automatic situations.

 

To suggest that every pilot is a "glorified bus driver" may be a little out of line. But lets be honest here the vast majority of line airline pilots check the weather, program the FMS, and then sit around monitoring as highly paid and trained backup systems.

I don't say that in anyway as to degrade their experience or training, but it's the truth. We do need them, and I have great respect for the training, but I can definitly understand how the flying is less than thrilling....

 

A friend of mine in Idaho used to dust crops. He told me one day not to tell his mom, "she still thinks I played piano in a whorehouse back then."

On the other hand, one of the guys that flies chase for us on occassion (F-16 pilot chasing Raptors) also flies crop dusters a lot and loves it. A lot of the ones I've seen in Eastern Washington had turbo props, USAF issue helmets and masks hooked to breathing air like a fighter pilot.

I don't think the exposure to what's in the hopper is like it used to be when they were dusting with Stearmans with a 450HP Pratt hanging off the nose. It was a lot dirtier for the pilot then.

 

I think that you are correct regarding the dispersion of the dusts but when I was messing around with them the engine was a 220 Continental and there were no masks. Most of the guys walked the field or at least looked at it first to detect stumps and the disposition of wires at the perimeters. I saw some of them go under the wires sometimes in short fields. You sometimes could hear the tires slapping through the leaves of the celery and that is how my friend Tommy Livermore hit a short stump one day and rolled his airplane up. He didn't check the field. He escaped serious injury somehow but lost his life as a passenger in a C-54 during the war while deadheading back from South America. It disappeared in the Caribbean. He always said that he would never die in an airplane if he was flying it.

 

I never cease to be amazed at how this forum triggers so much recall from the past.

 

Right, buy you aren't flying an Airbus for a scheduled airline on a milk run three times a day between Charlotte and Philly..... You may do a lot of flying, but a typical airline pilot doesn't. JMHO, but I have three very good friends who fly left seat for a major, and they all told me the same thing. The most fulfilment they get is chasing stew's on layovers...

Like blue@heart said, flying a large transport category aircraft takes a lot of skill and training, but the reality is, as a job, driving an automated airplane doesn't have much seat of the pants flying involved in it, and I am sure it gets boring day in and day out. You get a few mintues of real flying on takeoff and landing and the rest of it is just sitting there.

 

Airbus guys all say that, but then, literally, it's true.

 

Nope-- Swede Ralston.

 

I don't know what comments from my end of things would be of help to you but if they did, that's good. My youthful self indulgence in some airplanes did nothing to enhance aviation but I did get a lot of joy from it and I met some fine people. Thanks.
I saw some wonderful tail dragger performance yesterday at Paine Field when they demonstrated an F8F , P-51's, and a gaggle of T-6's all of which made some of the silkiest three-pointers ever, especially the F8F.
Switches

 

Beverley in New Zealand

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Extract from a letter written by Group Captain F.C. Griffiths Blackburn Beverley, XM104 RAF Transport Command.
" ......... on our way to Rotorua [in the vicinity of Ohakune] we saw a plume of white smoke in a deep valley. As we got nearer it manifested itself as a cropdusting [topdressing] operation. I took the power off and we watched from about two miles away as he dropped his load, landed on the small farm strip and picked up another load and took off. It was the first time I'd seen cropdusting and it was a very slick operation, maybe only four minutes between take-off's.
We'd been briefed to fly low and show the Beverley to the inhabitants so here was an opportunty!
I don't think either the pilot of the cropduster or the loading party on the ground had any idea we were standing off at reduced power and I judged it nicely. The Beverley is a superb aircraft though large for landing in small places at low speed. As the cropduster took off we came in just behind him to the utter astonishment of the party on the ground. I don't suppose four engined aircraft often came into their farm strip. I touched our wheels and off we went to Rotorua.
I'm not exactly sure where this place was as we were a bit lost at the time but at least there must be someone who will remember the incident....."
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I've often thought of doing the crop duster thing as well. I've travelled the world quite enough in the military, thanks. I do so enjoy stick and rudder flying. A role model is the best pilot in San Antonio, a former F4 guy that has his own small duster company west of town. Amazing skill AND judgement, and a thoroughly honorable gentleman.

I also thought about going to one of these DC3 type rating schools. A job as a #2 working up on a DC3 might start with low pay, but damn it would be great. I wouldn't talk to anyone I know I would feel so cool.

I just had a friend finish airline dispatcher school, which is a lot more complicated than it sounds.

Check out the Sport Pilot FARs - you could easily be a Lite Sport instructor and start a school.

Whatever you do, have fun and do it. As someone wise once noted, "Did you ever notice how much of life is spent just waiting?"

Do it.

 

Good one Russ,
...and you can always take your daily driver with you!
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