Helicopters, once considered the realm of crackpots and adventurers, are everywhere in our modern world. From medevac choppers that whisk people to hospitals, to oil-rig taxis that take oil workers out to off-shore oil platforms all over the world, to logging helicopters that harvest trees without requiring destructive road-building in wilderness areas, helicopters are omnipresent. And the military reflects this trend, with helicopters performing many duties with every branch. As such, helicopter personnel are in short supply in the commercial sector, giving vets with helicopter experience an edge in finding good-paying jobs in the private sector after their tours are up in the military. Helicopter Association International’s (HAI) Heli-Expo, in Anaheim, California, last month, provided the showplace for the helicopter industry. The folks who know the business provide insight on how best to interface with this industry that is thriving while many others are laying off.

Who’s Who
The exhibitors at Heli-Expo were a veritable “who’s who” of the helicopter industry. Bell Helicopter had several divisions in attendance, including their tilt-rotor branch, allowing attendees to see a tilt-rotor aircraft close-up and personal. Erickson Air-crane was in attendance, with copious footage of their premier S-64 firefighting helicopter, used throughout the world to fight wildfires. And Sikorsky had several interesting presentations, including one by its founder’s son, Sergei Sikorsky, speaking on the history of that storied company and his legendary father, Igor Sikorsky. In all, more than 500 exhibitors hawked their wares to an estimated 17,000 attendees.

Vertical Reference Skills
So can a military pilot step right in to the pilot’s seat without any retraining. Not hardly. “Vertical reference is not their forte,” said Pat Pilolla, Director of Customer Support, Aerial Operations, for Erickson Air-Crane.

That’s a view confirmed by Erickson’s Chief Pilot, Dave Barnett, who was an Army helicopter pilot in Vietnam. “It takes military pilots six to eight months to get used to the long-lines, getting good with the vertical reference skills.”

Why is vertical reference so important? “If we’re doing a pond snorkel job, we’re looking back at the tail rotor to make sure it’s clear, up at the rotor to make sure it’s clear, and glancing at the wheel to get the wheel-height information to make sure that we don’t get sucked into the pond,” Barnett continued. “And also when we’re dropping water, we’re looking out more from a vertical reference standpoint rather than a horizontal reference standpoint, not only to insure accuracy, but also to confirm that all the ground firefighters are clear.”

Job Search
Looking for a job? At Heli-Expo there were advertisements for job opportunities literally all over the world. Job classifications included such positions as experienced pilots, A&P mechanics, avionics technicians, as well as aviation management & sales professionals, so it’s not just pilots that are in demand.

“The helicopter industry is hiring lots of ex-military pilots,” said Marty Pociask, Director of Communications for HAI and editor of Rotor Magazine, a major publication in the helicopter industry. “The Vietnam-era vets are retiring, so we’re getting a lot of Desert Storm people, as well as people coming back from Afghanistan and Iraq.”

Helicopter Foundation International
So how does someone fresh out of the military break into the booming helicopter industry? HAI has established an organization that can help with the transition. Helicopter Foundation International (HFI) is the non-profit arm of HAI and provides some very useful services for vets looking to break into the civilian helicopter market.

“HAI represents 1,600-plus member organizations with tens of thousands of employees and over 1,100 individual members in more than 74 nations, and could possibly provide opportunities for military veterans,” said HFI spokesperson Elizabeth “Libby” Meade. “Preliminary plans are currently being made for members of the HFI Board of Directors to meet with ‘Warriors in Transition’ at Fort Belvoir in Alexandria, Virginia, in June of the year.”

They also help those who have been injured in the line of duty. “HFI is currently working on an outreach program for military veterans and ‘Wounded Warriors’,” Meade explained. “We hope to be able to provide both a source of information and a marketplace to facilitate a transition into possible careers in the civil helicopter industry. For example, the Foundation's website features a ‘Job Corner’ for posting resumes--a free service.”

HFI is currently revising their website to include new info on scholarships, and the things they are undertaking for the next six-plus months. They provide services such as scholarships to help pay for training, education programs to train helicopter professionals, and, of great importance to job seekers, provide a year-round electronic marketplace where vets can search for jobs online. For more information, visit them on the web at www.helicopterfoundation.org. Time spent at this website could be instrumental in making a smooth transition into a high-paying civilian job.

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