Ask HN: Have you ever thought about learning to fly an airplane?

[dkatz790]

Heyo! I'm a resident geek based out of San Francisco (but a New Yorker at heart), entrepreneur, and pilot. I started flying as a kid...my dad always wanted to fly and figured I should do it instead. It was love at first flight.

Have you thought about learning to fly an airplane? Ever take an airplane ride at a local airport? What would it take to get you in a private plane for your first flight?

I'm getting tired of the average age of pilots at local airports being 60+ and would love some insight from non-pilots :) Thanks!

[dmfdmf]

Its all about money. Planes are woefully expensive and the 60+ crowd has money or they aren't flying.

As I used to tell a buddy of mine who was a pilot; planes are for rich people, motorcycles are the poor man's airplane but we only get 2D's of freedom not 3D like a pilot. Similar arguments apply to boats, which is left as an exercise for the reader.

[dkatz790]

Flying is expensive - no argument there. But, most pilots are not wealthy. They are ordinary middle class people with a passion. The old timers at the airport are often in the same boat.

Many used planes can be purchased for the price of a non-luxury car. Maintenance is affordable if done right. With a partner, even more affordable.

Cost is one barrier, but not the governing one.

[BorisMelnik]

Time and money. I took many classes and it is basically going to take up a ton of your weekends. Depending on where you live it might be way more than this. I am lucky enough to have lived near a private airport where I knew a few people that owned planes and had one for rent.

It is also a very monotonous process. You basically learn by riding along, doing very small tasks one by one and by the end of your training you are basically flying.

Getting instrument rating is a totally different ballgame. I witnessed a plane wreck so I backed out after things got pretty surreal.

[cdvonstinkpot]

I was enrolled in lessons when I was 18, just before the first Gulf war. As soon as the war started, gas prices went through the roof, & my family could no longer afford to pay for my lessons since the gas factor increased the cost so much. I've since lost the desire to learn, and am happy on the ground. I'd rather spend that money on something else.

[dkatz790]

What got you interested in learning when you were 18?

[cdvonstinkpot]

A family friend has a license, & I liked when I could fly with him. I started learning "Airframe & Powerplant", an FAA sanctioned technical school program which had I completed it would have been what I needed to become an airplane engine mechanic. The required FAA testing was so rigorous I eventually quit & moved on elsewhere at the tech school. It was just about when I quit flying lessons, too.

I was building a remote control plane at the time as well, but never finished it. I regret not putting more time into that, since it had an oversized engine & would've been real fun.

[b_t_s]

I always wanted to learn to fly, but it's really expensive & fairly time consuming so I never got around to it. Then I had a kid, and that was the end of that idea. Maybe I'll have the time/energy/money again when I'm closer to 60+ :/

[JHof]

Is flying popular among the tech professionals who can afford it? Where do they do their flight training? Typical flight schools seem sort of old school for a place like the Valley.

[dkatz790]

Not really - like you said, flight schools are old school. # of pilots in the Bay Area seems to be lower than the national average from the stats I have seen. From what I have seen, not many people know that flying themselves is even an option on the table. I would love to say that I have a great group of pilot friends my age that I fly with regularly...not the case!

[JHof]

I feel like there's something there - updating the training process, making it "cool". Flying yourself is viable if you can afford it, and not as expensive and some might think when the costs are shared. Plus, a modern plane, such as a Cirrus, feels kind of like a jet with the screens, autopilot, etc. New pilots love it. I've observed that if you can get a group of professional instructors together who know what they're doing, with nice planes to train in, flying becomes a lot more attractive to "normal" people. How traditional flight schools in the Bay Area are received is something I've been wondering about. Flying is a good fit for the engineer/programmer personality, but there's this gap where the industry can't seem to relate to the real world.

Edit: By the way, here's a cool startup that seems to be helping to close that gap: https://openairplane.com/. Just got a round of funding I believe.

[dkatz790]

Yeah - perception is everything. Making it cool again is key to drive the market. The problem is that commercial aviation provides a continual reinforcement of why the industry isn't glamorous!

Openairplane is a great company for existing pilots who want to rent planes more easily, especially while traveling.

[6d0debc071]

A belief that me flying would be safe(ish.) Mostly, I'm worried about fucking up in mid air and killing people. I don't know what the safety margins are for recovering from f-ups, so I don't do it.

[dkatz790]

You won't get a license if you aren't a safe pilot :) The training isn't like learning to drive a car...much more rigorous.

Aviation is safe when pilots don't do stupid shit. Just like drivers killing themselves (and others) driving drunk or while texting.

[6d0debc071]

When I was learning, I wasn't a safe driver. I learned to drive because of its obvious utility, but the only reason to learn to fly would be for enjoyment. The process of learning to fly with the prospect of killing myself, or someone else, would not likely be fun. I'd always have that image of screaming fiery death at the back of my mind.

It depends what the margins are though. If it is the case that if you mess up the instructor can recover the aircraft, then there's not too much to worry about – you're not going to kill someone while you're learning, or at least not with any high degree of probability. But not knowing the margins, not knowing how safe learning is.... That's the thing, rather than what would happen if I did get good at it.