What is it like to be a helicopter tour pilot? — featuring JUSTHELICOPTERS (Sundance Helicopters)

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0:37 suance helicopter has been here since 1985 we're currently running about 27 helicopters on our certificate our bread and butter I would say is tours to the Grand cany we also do a little bit of Charter work as everybody probably knows we were purchased by air methods and we've been growing ever

0:55 since the path of becoming a tour pilot often starts with flight instruction as we're all aware we also get a handful of military transitioning into the civilian world you usually have to have a minimum of a th000 hours pilot in command for the helicopter before you can even apply

1:12 and then obviously you need to meet the 135 minimums which are typically less than that if you if you meet that th000 hours most guys also meet the 135 minimum now in regards to turban time it's not required definitely would help if you had some previous turban experience but uh we do initial training

1:27 here as well what we're looking for in a new hire is beyond the stick skills what we're looking for is attitude uh ability to get along with others somebody who really wants to be part of a team um somebody who isn't afraid to put in some extra time when it's needed and somebody overall who just has a demeanor that is

1:47 professional and is willing to work with the company so a typical day for a tour pilot might be you know showing up here at around 5:45 in the morning um you're going to show up you're going to look over your paperwork you're going to make sure you have a legal aircraft you're going to look at your weather briefing

2:02 make sure you're flying in VFR conditions and then you'll go to the helicopter and do a thorough pre-flight including checking your own fuel then once you have a helicopter it's green your passengers mingle with them and uh you're pretty much the first uh image of the company there once we depart McCaron

2:20 International Airport we head out to the Grand Canyon but first we're going to take you by the Hoover Dam on most all of our tours and not only do the passengers get to hear pre-recorded audio of the area in their headsets but uh we always encourage that our tour Pilots enhance the tour with different

2:36 information history tidbits of all the scenes that we're going to be seeing everything from the Hoover Dam lake me the Grand Canyon itself the Colorado River and all the pilots have different information to contribute to that once we get to the bottom of the canyon uh we're going to shut down the aircraft uh

2:51 we're going to get the passengers out allow them to go take pictures usually we encourage picture taking right off the bat to kind of burn up some time while we're getting the picnic set up uh the pilot is setting up a little picnic we have some little uh baskets that we put out champagne and and then once

3:07 they're done taking their pictures we invite them over for a little meal and uh and a drink and then you fly them back and you just basically repeat that all day [Music] long typical Duty day can require a pilot to fly somewhere between two and three flights a day uh different tours

3:26 uh usually your ship will last up to 9 hours sometimes times and you can log somewhere between 3 to five flight hours a day so some guys might come in in the morning and some guys might come in in the afternoon they might come in at 12:30 11:30 it kind of depends on the flight schedule and uh they'll come in

3:45 and do a couple flights in the evening and then maybe some strip tours and those operations go on until about 11:00 at night so either way especially in the summertime the days are so long they have to be split in half so we assign two pilots per aircraft per day uh to split up that ship now at our west rim

4:01 of the Grand Canyon location you'll be doing uh about 6 hours flight time a day and plus 50 take off Landings as well out there so it's a busy operation out there and uh makes for busy uh exhausting workday the Pilot's job first and foremost is to safely fly the aircraft to and from the location I

4:19 think we're all taught that from day one when we start flying that your your first thing is to uh aviate navigate and then communicate which is a big part of our job here as well um we are the entertainment um along with the helicopter and the sites I guess so it's really important that we're interacting

4:34 with our guests and answering questions and making sure that they feel comfortable and uh at home in the helicopter with respect to paying the tour business usually an entrylevel tour pilot can make somewhere around $50,000 or more a year depending on how much he flies and what different duties he's

4:51 doing and of course as you gain seniority in a company and you're doing different specialty duties everything from instruction to Charter work that pay can go up to $100,000 the toughest thing about being a tour pilot is the varying schedules uh typically you're not going to know what

5:05 your next day holds until the evening before so it can become very difficult to try and plan other things in your life on your work days and then of course the long days in the summer especially as our busy season so you're flying a lot and it is hard work biggest challenge I've come across as a tour

5:21 pilot is the language barrier with the the passengers now we get passengers from all the world um France Germany Russia You Name It We have them here and and a lot of times they they don't know how to speak English they've never been to America before so was the first time so trying to explain to them what to do

5:36 and what not to do around the helicopter gets pretty frustrating at times I like this job because you get to work a good shift you go home and see your family every night and still fly helicopters and really fly them in a beautiful place what I like most about being a tour pilot is the customers a lot of times

5:54 they've never been in a helicopter before so it's definitely something they can remember for the rest of her life and that's always a highlight of their trip is flying on a helicopter out to the Grand Canyon so it's something that they're not going to forget [Music]