What Kind of Helicopter Pilot Job Is Right for You?
Choosing what type of aviation career path is right for you will largely depend on the kind of lifestyle and work environment best suits your personality. Do you prefer stability? Non-stop adventure? Or something else altogether.
Your goals and reasons for taking to the sky may change throughout your life, but with the right training under your belt, you’ll have no problem landing the job of your dreams.
Let’s explore some of the most well-known industry careers available to professional helicopter pilots.
Flight Instruction
We’ll start with flight instruction because it’s one of the most popular jobs for newly licensed helicopter pilots. While it may not be the most glamorous position available, it’s one of the most accessible opportunities for new pilots and gives you the chance to build up flight hours to qualify for the job of your dreams.
New pilots often benefit from working as flight instructors because they can hone their skills and grow within the industry. At the same time, they’ll solidify the things they recently learned in flight school by sharing their knowledge with others.
Pilots starting their careers as flight instructors can expect to make approximately $45,000 per year, but experienced flight instructors can earn up to $175,000 per year. You can expect a somewhat low-stress environment where you’ll still have the opportunity to learn from your superiors, especially if you become a flight instructor at the school you attended.
Tourism
Tourism piloting is another popular choice among new pilots but is also an excellent option for those with a healthy dose of wanderlust. If you dream of hopping in a helicopter to explore the world and connect with others, tourism might be the way to go.
Tour pilots need to have strong communication skills because they work directly with customers. Keep in mind that many of the places that hire air tour pilots may be seasonal, or distant, destinations, so it can be difficult to find steady work year-round without making a more significant move than required of other industry careers. But while you’re building your hours, spending a summer in a fun destination can help you make connections outside of your training program and launch your career.
Tour pilots often make around $45,000 per year to start and can work their way up to a paycheck of $80,000 per year. While these jobs pay less, they are low-risk positions that allow you experience amazing views around the world, every day, while getting paid to do it.
Firefighting
Helicopter pilots have become increasingly crucial in fighting fires, whether the aircraft is used to quell flames or transport teams and equipment efficiently. In many cases, helicopters will fly around the edges of a fire to prevent it from spreading. If the fire is smaller, the helicopter may be used as the primary tool to extinguish the flames.
Needless to say, working as a firefighting helicopter pilot requires a great deal of bravery. If your goal is to become a firefighting pilot, we recommend working toward your Airline Transport Pilot (ATP) License so you can perform jobs that require larger aircraft. Firefighting is a high-risk job, but it also comes with an extremely high reward of conserving our land and protecting the impacted communities.
Firefighting helicopter pilots typically make $80,000-90,000 per year, but pilots with their ATP license can earn over $175,000 per year. Keep in mind that some departments pay an hourly rate for pilots on standby instead of a fixed-rate salary. However, since wildfires are becoming increasingly common in some areas such as California, some departments will offer bonuses to pilots working overtime.
Emergency Medical Services (EMS)
(Former Lake Superior Helicopters Student that now flies for Stanford Health)
Another high-reward job is as an EMS helicopter pilot. Like all other medical jobs, working as an EMS pilot comes with a great deal of pressure, whether you are transporting donated organs across the country for a transplant or airlifting a patient to the hospital. If you want to help people and work within the medical industry without necessarily getting a medical degree, this is the perfect job for you as you will be an integral part of providing people access to the urgent care they need.
The requirements for a position as an EMS pilot will vary depending on the employer you’re applying to, but it will be best to get your ATP license to secure the highest-paying jobs. Many companies will also want to see that you have experience flying in various weather conditions, at night, and with different aircraft to prove your fit for the demands of the job.
EMS piloting is one of the highest paying vocations for helicopter pilots, as many jobs offer $60,000-70,000 per year as a starting salary. The work is steady, and many pilots can work their way up to earn around $150,000 per year.
Offshore and Utility
Helicopter pilots can often find consistent work for a livable wage in the offshore and utility industry. These positions often include transporting workers, tools, and other resources between on-shore bases and off-shore oil rigs. Don’t be fooled into thinking this is a mundane job, though—you will often be flying in choppy weather conditions and will likely have to land and take off from floating rigs or survey vessels. Not to mention the fact that you may have to help with hurricane or storm evacuations on occasion.
Many offshore and utility pilots need their ATP license because they typically have to fly larger aircraft to carry cargo. You will also need significant hours to have the experience to navigate the aircraft safely in more harsh weather conditions.
While the starting wages for off-shore and utility pilots land around $45,000 per year, many will earn between $80,000-110,000 per year with the right training and experience under their belt.
Electronic News Gathering (ENG)
An exciting option for pilots is to take a position on an electronic news gathering crew. These pilots will help transport journalists to capture video and audio clips to present news.
As an ENG pilot, you might have the chance to take a reporter in the air to relay some breaking news or track weather conditions. Either way, the work will be steady because there will always be the need to gather information for the reports.
ENG pilots typically earn a starting salary of $50,000-60,000 per year and can work their way up to $80,000-90,000. While these positions may not pay as much as others, they come with significantly lower risk.
Agriculture
Many farmers prefer the help of helicopter pilots to tend their fields. Ag pilots, or crop dusters, help with spraying and fertilizing fields and are often expected to work in the early mornings and evenings. Many ag pilots will need extensive training before flying the aircraft as flying with heavy loads at low levels while avoiding obstacles, can be extremely risky and intensive work. Additionally, they’ll need to be able to take off and land on country roads and open fields.
Some consider ag piloting to be more of a way of life than a job since the hours are irregular and the work is usually seasonal (six to nine months in fertile farm areas). The most significant risks with ag pilots typically come from those that require them to work closely with poisonous liquids and chemicals.
Ag pilots often start by earning $50,000-60,000 per year but can usually get up to a salary of $110,000-130,000 per year depending on their employer and the size of the operation they are tending to.
Law Enforcement
In the same vein as firefighting, pilots with a motivation to help others may be attracted to a job as a law enforcement pilot. Many will require you to become an officer, but others will allow you to join the team if you are a US citizen and pass a background check.
The qualifications for becoming a law enforcement pilot are largely based on the employer and their need to fill the position. While many incoming law enforcement pilots will have trained to become law enforcement in addition to their flight training, others will come across the positions and qualify for them upon reaching the required hour minimums.
Law enforcement pilots are typically asked to patrol certain areas, perform aerial surveillance as part of police operations, participate in search and rescue efforts, help in emergencies, or support disaster recovery efforts. This can make for a regular schedule in some departments, and an extremely variable one in others.
Law enforcement offers a high starting salary, with many pilots earning $60,000-70,000 per year. If you’re passionate about law enforcement piloting, you have the potential to work your way up to $175,000 per year with the right training, within the right departments.
Corporate
The corporate industry typically offers a handful of private jobs available to helicopter pilots. While it’s difficult to pin down exactly what the requirements or expectations would be because each job will be unique, you can expect steady pay in the corporate sector. If you’re searching for something with more flexibility, you might be able to find a position that ticks off all your boxes.
Some caveats of becoming a corporate pilot are the potential inflexibility, or limited availability, of your schedule outside of work. While your working schedule may be more regular, you are often one of few pilots within your company— leaving any irregular operations or last-minute trips on you. You may also find yourself away on work trips for extended periods of time.
Corporate pilots can earn anywhere from $60,000-175,000 per year. The maximum salary for a corporate pilot can be even higher, depending on your employer. As we said before, it all depends on the type of job you’d be accepting.
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At Lake Superior Helicopters, we help you get the training and experience you need for whichever career you want to pursue. Our comprehensive program pathways can be customized to fit the needs of any student looking to get started training. With industry-leading instruction, specialized certification training, and unmatched, student support, we ensure our students with the skills and expertise to have an advantage over the competition.
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