Lucky you have a flying job, nowadays I hear you stand a better chance of winning the lottery than landing a flying gig with low hours & shallow pockets…
You’d think. Dead right about the shallow pockets bit but these days it’s the college trainees who are finding their way into every airline. A bit like overseas drivers working at a lot of the firms it’s down to money.
All the crew at United/Continental in London work under American FAA regulations, and are paid in US dollars. My wife’s salary every month depends on the exchange rate.
The United offices and briefing rooms (domicile it’s called) are in Terminal 1 at LHR, beyond passport control. Seniority (when you joined the airline) rules in aviation, and decides where you want to work on the aircraft. My wife usually chooses Business class galley as she is very organised and likes to organise the meal service. All crew are Purser qualified, and again seniority decides if you are Pursor or not that trip. Or, you can opt to give your Purser position to another crew member if you wish?
When it comes to travelling standby for a flight, seniority once again decides who will be the lucky ones to get a seat if the flight is almost full. I once went to Los Angeles with my wife when she was working a trip. On the return flight to LHR, the Captain wanted to take his wife on a trip to London with him. Unfortunately, he had to stand at the gate and see his wife turned away because my wife’s seniority beat his seniority and I got the last standby seat on the full flight. He wasn’t a happy Captain that trip apparently.
The United crew based at Heathrow are all different nationalities. You have American crew who are based at LHR on a three year visa basis, but have to return to the States after that time. The rest of the domicile are EU members from the UK, France, Italy, Spain, Holland, Germany, etc. Very few crew members actually live in London due to the high cost of living. All the pilots are American and are based in the States, staying at layover hotels in Central London when they work a flight into LHR.
There was a thread on Trucknet a few weeks ago, entitled ‘How far would you travel to work’ or something like that. The aviation world has the Super Commuters. Again, a lot of air crew don’t live near the airport where they are based, here or in the States, and they commute in from other places. On a typical flight out of London, there will be 12 cabin crew in the back of a 777. Out of that crew, there will be maybe three or four English that come in from Bristol, York and Southampton for example, then maybe a German who’s come in from Frankfurt, a French girl who’s come in from Lyon or Nice, a couple of Dutch who’ve come in from Amsterdam or Rotterdam, and a few Americans who live in London, or themselves have commuted in from Washington or Chicago but are based at LHR. Most United flights that are allocated to a Heathrow based crew leave mid morning, giving people time to commute in on an early flight from France, Holland, Germany etc.
The super super commuters will come in from the States, work three 3 day trips back to back, and then go back to their homes in the the States and have the rest of the month off, having done their scheduled quota of work in one stretch. My wife sometimes does that. Does all her trips in one hit of nine days and then has the rest of the month off. There used to be one super super super commuter colleague of my wife who lived in Sydney, Australia, who would commute in the day before, stay at the Ibis hotel on the Bath Road for 30 quid, and do her trips back to back before returning down under. I think the 24 hour journey to work finally got to her in the end and she works for Quantas now?
The same goes for the Pilots. They might work the flight back to Chicago and be based there, but they live a couple of thousand miles away. The joke at United is that within one minute of the aircraft arriving at the gate at say Washington DC, and the airbridge being attached, the cockpit door will be swinging back and forth like a wild west saloon door as the pilots race off the aircraft to catch their connecting United Express flights back to their home town of Sioux City, Iowa, or Gary, Indiana or somewhere.
I once went with my wife on a trip she was working to Chicago, with our six year old, and she took me into the United domicile (United have their main base and training centre in Chicago) and that one is truly massive. I saw hundreds of United cabin crew checking flights on computers, Pilots checking loads and weather, or crew resting in their own purpose built lounge with leather recling seats before working their flights. It was better equipped than some First class lounges at Heathrow I think? The luggage area was massive too, and was a sea of identical looking trolly bags and Pilots bags, all in black. How the crews identified their own particular bag again I don’t know?
One final thought. Don’t get p***ed up, or make jokes about bombs on board a United aircraft, cos they take it seriously. Twice, a flight my wife has been working on, has diverted to Bangor, Maine where they have a purpose built jail for unruly passengers, and she’s seen English chavs being hauled off in handcuffs unceremoniously by the airport police. Also, don’t make jokes about, or diss America while in the immigration area. She’s seen a young couple from Croydon hauled straight out of the immigration line in Chicago for making some disrespectful comments, and immediately denied entry to the United States for ten years by immigration officials who were a bit short on the sense of humour front !! 
Citycat, I enjoyed reading that 
All I wanted to be as a kid growing up next to the A702 near Biggar was a lorry driver, trucks were American then. Got into it in the mid '80s for a few years then got promoted to assistant coldstore manager. Cue several years away from the wheel.
Back to it in '96 for 11years on transporters, all good fun and tall tales. Then reality hits, 45 and looking at 20 more years. No thanks!
Having to work to tacho max to make a decent wage. Having to endure “facilities” that would have you complaining to the council if they were public. Less and more expensive parking where some knob would park a fridge in front of ?you at 2am to take his 3/4s. The “will I be home Friday” lottery. The increasing disdain others have for “professional” drivers. All things I’ve happily left behind!
Now I work as a semi-skilled tech doinv maintenance on drilling measurement equipment. Pension, healthcare, +50% ph on drivers wage and nobody indicating I’ve a ■■■■■ on my forehead on a daily basis. I still love trucks just not the modern job.
Would you change? My question is why wouldn’t you?
I always wanted to be a test pilot for lego, but was too tall!
Citycat…real good read
flyer747:
Citycat…real good read
+1
Only for those that are interested.
Three videos that show the typical view from my wife’s office window on the 777-200ER when taking off from Washington Dulles, and landing back at London Heathrow, as she’s sat in her rear facing jumpseat with her arms folded (for safety reasons as she’s been trained to do).
The second video is more to show the United/Continental livery.
The third video is rather long, so just jump to about 11:00 for the landing. Hard to tell, but I estimate about 06:50 is when she’s flying over our place in West London and the kids come out to wave. As the aircraft taxis, you can hear the typical arrival announcement she would have to make, virtually word for word, if she was working Purser position.
youtube.com/watch?feature=pl … mZNAOHuECA
Great videos! You must be really proud of her. I like the sound of those work at terms where you work 9 days in a row then rest of the month off. Any jobs 
Here’s a couple from my rat run. Not as nice as Continental though!
This one picking up 80 tonnes on the freighter in Lagos.
We get driven across the desert from the hotel in Dammam to the airport in Dammam. The drivers are nuts. One rolled over last year with a full crew inside.
Check out this local in Delhi. I reckon he was running at 44 tonnes!
Loading up in Dubai for Hong Kong via Riyadh dogleg
Freight Dog:
Great videos! You must be really proud of her. I like the sound of those work at terms where you work 9 days in a row then rest of the month off. Any jobs
My wife can also drop trips if she wishes, so she doesn’t have to work. What I mean by that is, she can put her trips up on a United computer bulletin board from our sofa, and other crew can choose to work them as overtime. So this month, she has chosen to drop all her trips so is not working at all in March, because we are doing some decorating. Of course, it means she doesn’t get paid, but we can survive on just my salary for a few weeks.
Some crew members who maybe have well off husbands, sometimes only work three days a month, while others who have mortgages and other debts to pay, try and grab all the flying overtime they can. If my wife puts up a trip on the computer, she can almost guarantee it will be gone within an hour, especially if it’s a West Coast Los Angeles or San Francisco with high flying hours.
However, the merger with Continental puts this useful facility to drop or pick up trips at risk because they don’t have that in their employee terms and conditions, so the United union will be fighting to keep that facility during the next round of negotiations for terms and conditions.
Nice photos by the way
Sorry if this came out twice. My useless fingers on the talk app!
Anyway, Taken in Islamabad on passenger flight picking up Hajj pilgrims for Mecca
Cheers! What a great flexible system they have. Makes perfect sense. Our poor cabin crew are living in Jeddah for 11 months out of a year. They are all Malaysian, Indonesian, Indians, Thais etc. We fly a mix of pax and freight. I prefer the freight though for the time being at least. We occasionally fly the USA on the freighter to Dallas but the Icelandics pinch all the good trips. We have to prepare manual loadsheets on the pax aircraft which is very antiquated. My last airline was all electronic. On the freighter you have a very knowledgable loadmaster to do it as its a science in itself.
This one was sent to me via a work mate who got it off spotter who i guess in turn took it. This bit of tackle was painted bright white fairly recently and you could smell the paint when you walked around it ha. You always have to be careful these days in work as someone is always taking pictures aren’t they? See that Stobart smoking thread!
With all this talk about the airline business, has anyone considered that the “far east missing plane incident” in the news this week is all about some mickey mouse pilot working on umbrella with less than 2 years flight experience? 
I suggest that if a “6 points OK” driver can put a truck into a bridge as the norm these days, then who knows what a pilot who’s not ex-airforce can do?
Sticking it down in the wrong ocean has gotta be a starting point here I would have thought. 
Certainly an impressive truck you have there. Does it have a bunk?
So, I guess you even have coach drivers and truck drivers in the aviation industry.
Oh, and do the pilots of Boeing 747’s and other heavies, look down on the pilots of 737’s like some class 1 drivers look down on class 2 drivers?
They do indeed have bunks! There’s a room in the flight deck to the left of the cockpit door that has 2 bunks. On long flights we sometimes heavy crew and take a rest of a few hours whilst someone jumps in the hot seat. On our passenger 747s there’s a whole room of beds for cabin crew accessed via a ladder in the tail end next to the last galley. There’s a sort of heater control (eberspacher? )and an intercom phone. I’ve come a cross of a few of us ex truckers in the job. Most of the Icelandics are ex deep sea fisherman and are as tough as a coach bolt. Being an ex artic driver really helped when it came to taxing the 747 around. You have to go past the turning on the taxiway somewhat before turning in. The rear 2 wheel trucks articulate when turning very tightly which helps the turn and reduces the chances of scrubbing. I remember as a newbie on artics being taught to watch how tight I turn an artic trailer so you don’t pull the tread off!
As for looking down Pilots of smaller aircraft. Definitely not. Not amongst anyone I work with anyway. It’s the same training and standards for the licence we all have to have. Most of us started small anyway and most admit they miss their earlier jobs in someway. You occasionally get employees of other airlines looking down on other airlines. Well BA mainly, for example. They seem to exude this holier than thou attitude. Funnily enough they all worked for other airlines before. Must be the induction day training they give you when you join
Can’t say I know anything much about that Mas triple. I’ve only read what everyone has read which includes all theories. You do get a fair few no experience people buying their way in these days. Not at a long haul contract company like ours as its not really a place for no experience. I had to start the hard way, towing gliders for no money in ex crop sprayer at a gliding club then 2-3 years back driving before my break, then flying for the coastguard on 8 hour flights without autopilot low level over the sea. Good fun but no future in it. Built your skills up though. Experience counts for nothing now in the UK.
I still love my trucks. I was always dead into anything HGV as a kid. My Dad and Grandad drove before me. I used to go out with my Dad when I was on school holidays. I was in awe the first time in an artic. All the gears, hissing brakes, cb crackling, really impressive.
I have a question, which I’m not sure how to phrase without causing any unintentional slur or insult, so please nobody read anything into it.
When I’ve been to the States with my wife on a trip, I’ve noticed that they have a lot more black pilots over there with United, AA, etc. I have to admit that I’ve never seen a black pilot with an English airline. Do ordinary people have more opportunities in the USA to become a commercial pilot? I’m not suggesting for one minute that ethnic minorites can’t afford the 100K for training, but it does seem to be a rich person’s profession these days.
I always remember reading a newspaper article many years ago, about a Milkman (remember them?) who worked his milk round for ten years, saving every penny he could so he could finance the training to be a commercial pilot. He later went on to work for Thomas Cook holiday charters or something as a pilot. I like reading about people like that making something more with their life.
That is a bloody good question actually. Not sure if I’m honest. I’ve not personally come across any British black Pilots at the companies I have worked for.
Was that milkman Northern Irish by any chance? I worked with a really great guy at my last lot who drove milk floats in his teens and early twenties for his family’s tiny dairy in the 70s. His old milk float is on display at the Ulster transport museum. I took a look one day after work. It was an electric 3 wheeler with just a wooden roof and no windscreen!
The three times I’ve been to Chicago with the missus, I’ve seen at least two or three black pilots walking around the airport each time or sat in the United domicile. Good on em I say !
I think the milkman was just an ordinary employee with Express Dairies or something. Don’t think he went out anywhere for ten years to save every penny he earned