On Sep 12, 12:07 am, "Viperdoc" wrote:
I went the same route as you are now taking. It is a long hall, and the
difficult part is that once finishing residency it takes a lot of time to
start a practice, pay back student loans, take call, and find family time.

Yeah, but if it was easy anyone would do it. :-) Seriously, I
understand what you're saying, and I don't think I'm under any
illusions about the profession. you're right, it's a long road ahead.

Can I assume from your name that you joined the Air Force at some
point? I've heard that it can compare favorably to private practice
since they take care of your overhead and malpractice premiums.

However, if you still have the fire, at least the financial aspect of it is
less of a challenge, while the hardest thing is finding the time to fly
consistently and safely.

That is one problem with generalizing my case: while the money was
definitely a factor in my decision to stop flight school, the major
one was my realization that I had four years of med school and at
least three of residency in front of me. And to be perfectly frank, I
anticipate that I'll be so busy during that time that I wouldn't be
able to keep current with flying even if someone handed me an airplane
for free, let alone actually afford rentals on a resident's salary.

But I do think that the cost of learning to fly and keeping in the air
is something that the GA community should keep an eye on. As I
alluded to above, I should be a perfect candidate for the next
generation of private pilots, in some ways: airport fence kid, airshow
junkie, Young Eagle, the works. And even absent my decision to go to
medical school, I have grave doubts as to whether I could have really
afforded aviation.

I suppose the reason I'm harping on this is that, in my admittedly
somewhat uninformed opinion as a former student pilot, rec.aviation
lurker, and AOPA website cruiser, this is a potentially missed
opportunity for the aviation community. Most of the proposals I've
seen for making it easier to fly seem to center on cutting down the
number of hours needed to get a PPL, which might not be the right way
to go for two reasons. First, it doesn't do anything to address the
cost of keeping in the air once you're a pilot, and second there are
good arguments that the PPL course really shouldn't be cut any further
than it already is.

Meanwhile, as I think another poster alluded to upthread, AOPA's focus
seems to be on high-end aircraft like Cirruses (Cirri?) and Columbias
that cost as much as a house in a high-end suburb. New build Cessnas
seem to be better, but not by a lot. The Cessna 152s are soldiering
on, but they're not getting any younger and nothing seems to be coming
along to replace them in the "cheap" ($30K) manufactured aircraft
range. There are experimentals that can come assembled in that range
such as the Kitfox, but I have a hard time imagining FBOs and aircraft
clubs taking on experimental aircraft as rentals. The high cost of
new airplanes and lack of new "cheap" designs for purchase or rent
seem to present a significant entry barrier into aviation, one that's
probably as if not more important than the number of hours required to
earn a ticket.

What's particularly disappointing to me is that it seemed the new LSA
rules were a golden opportunity to introduce a new generation of cheap
airplanes onto the market, even if they didn't have all the
capabilities of a larger private airplane. I couldn't believe it when
I saw that most new LSAs are still six-figure. It seems like there's
a real need being ignored by the manufacturers here, and that if the
piloting community could bring their attention to it and make a case
for a new generation of cheaper aircraft it would probably do much to
make flying more accessible and increase the number of private pilots.

Allright. I've said my piece twice now and probably exposed a lot of
ignorance along the way, so I promise to stop beating the dead horse.
I just wish someone would come out with a new build non-experimental
for less than $100K. :-)

-JTD