Twin Bee Crash

[pilottravis]

Hasn't been a very good weekend for aviation. One of the few Republic Twin Bee's in existence crashed in Winter Haven killing the DPE.
http://www.fox13news.com/news/local...hes-into-winter-haven-home-killing-pilot

 

[Cujet]

I knew the pilot, as his (previous) office and my office are in the same hangar.

Incredibly nice guy. Very, very sorry to hear about this.

I don't want to speculate on what happened. However, I do have a general thought that is shared by many of us who knew him. Please do not misinterpret this, as he was a very competent guy.

The very low pay and utter lack of benefits of many of these "high end" corporate pilot positions, leads to the necessity of post retirement jobs, flying junk for peanuts.

In some ways, we in the corporate world simply "eat our own" so to speak, as we accept these abusive conditions. If we don't, there has always been someone who will.

I'm not going to name names, but when I see these career pilots living in low income housing, and dying broke, I know they are getting screwed intentionally.

 

[pilottravis]

I know the DPE was passionate about seaplanes and flew them every chance he got. He worked for Chalks while they were around and was the chief pilot for an operator in S Fl flying amphibious Caravans. Also participated with the Seaplane Pilot's Association regularly. Not to speculate either, but the twin bee as cool as it was is an absolute dog on one engine. It will not climb, only extend options to land if an engine is lost at altitude, not many options if losing one on takeoff. My wife got her Multi Commercial Sea in that exact aircraft with the deceased as her DPE several years ago. Only practiced engine out scenarios over lakes so if it wouldn't come back to life they would simply set down in the water to troubleshoot. Shame we lost a rare bird as well..

 

[Mr Nice]

I thought corporate pilots made decent wages... ?

 

[Cujet]

Originally Posted by Mr Nice
I thought corporate pilots made decent wages... ?


Let's put it this way. If you are 35-40 qualified and intelligent, you have a job. At $35k per year, as a newbie. To pay your dues. You'll be expected to do everything the big boys do. And if you don't, the next guy will. Your only move may be to quit and find a better position. If you stay for 15 years, your pay will go all the way up to $35k per year [sarc, but nearly true]

I'm not kidding when I say that other pilots from the same department were living in and died in HUD low income housing.

Some (no, not all) owners think nothing of spending 40-70 million on a jet that will depreciate at the rate of 2-4m per year. The crew, however gets to compete for peanuts.

In fact, some of these flight departments could fire the entire crew and go from a $6.3m annual budget down to $6m with zero employees! Yes it can be that bad.

The good ones are few and far between. And those of us in good jobs know it and are very thankful for it.

 

[BusyLittleShop]

Photo shows right prop feather and intact which suggest it was flying on one engine...