Bygone commercial gigs

[NoHeat]

Which gigs for commercial pilots have vanished over the years?

Bank checks, maybe? I remember meeting someone decades ago who was flying checks every weeknight, in a twin. But I'm guessing that physical checks don't get sent much nowadays from one bank to another.

 

[k9medic]

Bank checks, pipeline patrol and powerline patrol (quickly going away with drones)

 

[GaryM]

The CIA's Air America gig might be gone. Or not.

 

[weilke]

Federal reserve bank courier flights. It's sort of like check flying but a circuit of the respective Fed locations.

 

[NoHeat]

...pipeline patrol and powerline patrol (quickly going away with drones)

It was only a few winters back that I met a shivering-cold pipeline-patrol pilot in a tiny Iowa FBO. He was trying to warm up on his way back to Michigan. About C-172s, he said "the heaters are not what they're cracked up to be."

 

[MauleSkinner]

QANTAS used Lancastrians to position spare Connie engines along their Sydney-London route. I always thought that would be a fun gig.

 

[Rgbeard]

In the 80s/early 90s, there was an MU-2 pilot that hauled film from CPS up to Chicago and brought the prints back.

I understood he worked for Walgreens.

 

[Bell206]

pipeline patrol and powerline patrol

FYI: Only in certain areas. Plenty of conventional airborne patrol and spotting jobs available as drones don't have the range or endurance to compete on a large scale. Actually it's satellite based systems that will take over the pipeline patrol side of the business and have been increasing in use for a number of years.

Or not.

Not. Never went away. Just reorganized and changed the name(s) to protect the innocent.

 

[Pilawt]

QANTAS used Lancastrians to position spare Connie engines along their routes. I always thought that would be a fun gig.

Likewise TWA's Fairchild C-82 Packets, performing the same mission for Connies.

 

[Busflyer]

In the 80s/early 90s, there was an MU-2 pilot that hauled film from CPS up to Chicago and brought the prints back.

I understood he worked for Walgreens.

I also knew a guy who flew film for Walgreens. Believe they were using a Piper T-1040.

 

[Plano Pilot]

Smuggling electronics into Mexico, legal from the US standpoint. I remember flying to south Texas and seeing some operators still doing it in the mid 80's. One pilot posted several stories at Aviation Adventure Stories by Ron Fox (bushwings.com)

 

[Bell206]

Smuggling electronics into Mexico, legal from the US standpoint. I remember flying to south Texas and seeing some operators still doing it in the mid 80's.

There used to be a completion center that worked on a number of Mexican reg helicopters to include ones with PEMEX and other gov't entities. Never realized how many TVs, stereos, washing machines.... you could fit into a Bolkow BO-105 or Aerospat S330J Puma helicopter if you really tried. The movement south of those items went well past the 80s for those "fortunate."

 

[Tarheelpilot]

Flight engineer

 

[Shepherd]

Someone is still flying a nightly route.
He/she passes over my house (every?) night at about 2:30 - 3:00 A.M.
Twin engines, slightly out of synch, at about 4,500 if I had to guess, going east.

 

[TCABM]

Traffic reporter

 

[Groundpounder]

I believe newspapers used to get flown on certain routes, back in the day.

Also, FedEx used charter a helicopter from a company I worked for to fly some sort of hazardous medical material from BOS to ORH because it couldn't be driven through one of the tunnels in Boston. They don't do that any more.

 

[MauleSkinner]

I believe newspapers used to get flown on certain routes, back in the day.

My Maule flew newspapers in Alaska at one time…the guy I bought it from said it used to have some kind of funky window on the back door for throwing newspapers out.

 

[SkyDog58]

Flight engineer

Not necessarily a commercial pilot gig.

 

[Tarheelpilot]

Not necessarily a commercial pilot gig.

Thanks for the insight.

 

[SkyDog58]

Thanks for the insight.

You are very welcome.

 

[Brad Z]

Traffic reporter

Yep airborne traffic reporting got killed by network consolidation, DOT traffic cameras online, and the prevalence of GPS with online traffic inputs.

for that matter, news helicopters are becoming rarer and rarer. Local network news budgets are hurting.

 

[Brad Z]

In Virginia, and probably other states too, airborne state police speed enforcement (VASCAR) has been a thing of the past for at least a decade.

 

[NH_Moose]

New Hampshire still runs a fixed wing VASCAR on RT101 towards the sea coast in the summer and as late as 2018 Maine had one on I95 south of Portland.


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[MauleSkinner]

Yep airborne traffic reporting got killed by network consolidation, DOT traffic cameras online, and the prevalence of GPS with online traffic inputs.

for that matter, news helicopters are becoming rarer and rarer. Local network news budgets are hurting.

For that matter, news is becoming rarer and rarer.

 

[Pilawt]

Oh no! Where will we get the car chase videos on YouTube?!

 

[kyleb]

Smuggling electronics into Mexico, legal from the US standpoint. I remember flying to south Texas and seeing some operators still doing it in the mid 80's. One pilot posted several stories at Aviation Adventure Stories by Ron Fox (bushwings.com)

I read an e-book on it. Most of the dangers of running coke north, minus the big payoff. Worse, if you get arrested in the US, you get a real jail and a real lawyer. In Mexico, not so much.

If anyone is wondering why they smuggled electronics into Mexico, Mexico declared things like TV's and microwaves "luxury goods" and imposed a 100% tax on them. Therefore you could smuggle RCA TV's or microwaves into Mexico and make a good payday selling to black-market resellers.

 

[NoHeat]

In Virginia, and probably other states too, airborne state police speed enforcement (VASCAR) has been a thing of the past for at least a decade.

Iowa State Patrol is a holdout that still does it. One of their planes is hangared near mine, and it’s just about the most active piston-engine plane on the field.

I knew an old-timer state patrolman pilot who started out in a Super Cub, maybe in the 60s. He used a mechanical stopwatch to time cars as they drove over highway markings. The State Patrol planes gradually got bigger and nicer over the years. The one hangared near me is a nice glass-panel 182 with FLIR. I’m guessing this trend of bigger nicer planes can’t continue much longer, though, before drones and such take over.

 

[Rgbeard]

@RyanB

 

[Brad Z]

Iowa State Patrol is a holdout that still does it. One of their planes is hangared near mine, and it’s just about the most active piston-engine plane on the field.

I knew an old-timer state patrolman pilot who started out in a Super Cub, maybe in the 60s. He used a mechanical stopwatch to time cars as they drove over highway markings. The State Patrol planes gradually got bigger and nicer over the years. The one hangared near me is a nice glass-panel 182 with FLIR. I’m guessing this trend of bigger nicer planes can’t continue much longer, though, before drones and such take over.

When Virginia was doing it, you had two troopers in the plane and at least one unit on the ground to Cindy t the stop. The trooper in the front of the Cessna flew the plane while the trooper in the rear did the stopwatch work and visually observed the vehicle from passing the ground checkpoints until being pulled over (he was also the officer of record should the ticket be challenged in court). I suspect needing three troopers and an expensive airplane to do the work of one trooper with a radar/lidar gun was hard to justify after budgets started to tighten.

 

[kaiser]

If anyone is wondering why they smuggled electronics into Mexico, Mexico declared things like TV's and microwaves "luxury goods" and imposed a 100% tax on them. Therefore you could smuggle RCA TV's or microwaves into Mexico and make a good payday selling to black-market resellers.

The border between Brazil and Argentina/Chile is like this. It’s so incredibly hard/slow/expensive to build data centers in Brazil that sometimes one must “import” equipment from neighboring countries… or so I’ve been told. I do know of a time when a firewall needed to be brought in immediately. A flight was planned to Argentina and back - same day. Equipment was loaded in a large carry on bag and declared as personal electronic equipment.

 

[mondtster]

Iowa State Patrol is a holdout that still does it. One of their planes is hangared near mine, and it’s just about the most active piston-engine plane on the field.

I knew an old-timer state patrolman pilot who started out in a Super Cub, maybe in the 60s. He used a mechanical stopwatch to time cars as they drove over highway markings. The State Patrol planes gradually got bigger and nicer over the years. The one hangared near me is a nice glass-panel 182 with FLIR. I’m guessing this trend of bigger nicer planes can’t continue much longer, though, before drones and such take over.

The ISP just got a Cirrus to do patrolling. I haven’t heard of any intent to decrease their activity; they’re also adding pilots.

 

[donjohnston]

I believe newspapers used to get flown on certain routes, back in the day.

My instrument instructor flew the Wall Street Journal from ARR outside of Chicago to MSP in a Caravan at 11pm. IIRC, they were printed at the Chicago Tribune presses. There were usually two or three planes flying in trail.

One night I went along. Loading and unloading reminded me of when I was a kid delivering newspapers.

 

[Gary Ward]

Which gigs for commercial pilots have vanished over the years?

Bank checks, maybe? I remember meeting someone decades ago who was flying checks every weeknight, in a twin. But I'm guessing that physical checks don't get sent much nowadays from one bank to another.

My buddy is a SW captain for 20 years now and has been flying 40 years. That is his Cherokee in my signature picture.

He has been flying commercially since he had about 200 hrs. he said when he was barely 20 years old. He flew at night in terrible conditions some nights in twins delivering all kinds of stuff including bank checks and film. He said many times he didn't even know what he hauling. He mentioned truck parts, computer parts and more. He has 25000+ hrs and has been paid to fly 99.5% of those hours. Wow when I think of that way!

Then I think what I paid to fly a 1000 hrs in the last 4 years in my personal 172. Wish I was younger...

 

[weilke]

I suspect needing three troopers and an expensive airplane to do the work of one trooper with a radar/lidar gun was hard to justify after budgets started to tighten.

Yes, they were losing money. And with money being the motivation for policing, they did away with it.

 

[weilke]

My instrument instructor flew the Wall Street Journal from ARR outside of Chicago to MSP in a Caravan at 11pm. IIRC, they were printed at the Chicago Tribune presses. There were usually two or three planes flying in trail.

Some of this may have been made obsolete by changes in printing press technology that now allow a newspaper press to spit out a run of the WSJ, the NYT and the LA Times without much of a change in setup.

 

[3393RP]

Some of this may have been made obsolete by changes in printing press technology that now allow a newspaper press to spit out a run of the WSJ, the NYT and the LA Times without much of a change in setup.

This reminded me of the huge press halls at the defunct Dallas Times-Herald and the barely surviving Dallas Morning News. I used to do work in their early computer rooms in the 80s.

At both locations the press halls were about 150' wide and 400' long, with 40' high ceilings.

 

[Groundpounder]

New Hampshire still runs a fixed wing VASCAR on RT101 towards the sea coast in the summer and as late as 2018 Maine had one on I95 south of Portland.


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The NHSP also likes 101 in the Epping area, and 93 between the Hooksett tolls and 89, plus a few other spots. I was told the airplane pays for itself with the money they bring in with ticket fines. They aren't going after people doing 70 in a 65, they go after the more egregious speeders, and therefore the tickets they "write" have some pretty hefty fines attached.

 

[k9medic]

Lots of smaller cargo airplane companies closed up shop too.

I talked to one of these guys years ago when they were getting ready to depart into a pending tropical storm in Florida. No autopilot and no GPS in the panel. Poor kid had a Garmin 296 sitting on a beanbag. Some beat to hell 210's and Barons. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_Express,_Inc.

 

[Todd82]

Someone is still flying a nightly route.
He/she passes over my house (every?) night at about 2:30 - 3:00 A.M.
Twin engines, slightly out of synch, at about 4,500 if I had to guess, going east.

Blood/tissue/biopsy samples possibly. I've got one coming over every night here too around 11pm in a Baron, LUK-CMH as per Flightaware. Quest diagnostics has a huge prop fleet for that.

 

[Jim Carpenter]

Years ago, at Salt Lake airport, SLC, when conditions got below ILS minimums (usually winter with ice-fog), they had Aztecs set up for cloud seeding. The pilot would fly the ILS through missed approach, the dry ice would cause enough precipitation to open up the approach for 2 or 3 airliners to land, then repeat the process. They used to issue a NOTAM, something like "ILS 35R cloud seeding ops in progress." As far as I know, they don't do that anymore, there may have been other airports that used that system, too, but I don't know.