Sunday Deep Dive! 🤿

Let’s start the year off with one of the most popular companies hiring low time pilots from all over the world. They fly turbo-props around Indonesia (C208B, LET-410, AT-802 and PC-6) and have been trending in the low time pilot facebook groups lately: Susi Air.

If you’ve ever researched ways to build time outside the US, you’ve definitely heard of them. One of their pilots was kind enough to go in great details about what it takes to become a C208B SIC at Susi Air.

This is a 1-hour recording, summed up in a 7-minute read. I didn’t finish transcribing the whole thing yet. I figured I’d lead with the cool things, and will put the more educational stuff (application & interview process, tips…) in a separate email.

Just wanted to keep today’s read short. Let’s dive in!

i kept the tone today’s interviewee wanted to adopt, so, excuse the occasional french…

“I currently hold both EASA and FAA licenses. I started with my EASA PPL in Belgium, and I ended up doing my FAA and EASA training in parallel, in California. I finished everything in November of 2023 and applied for Susi Air around December. At the time, I had a total of 335 hours, including 70 hours of simulator, because in Europe, as part of the requirements to be able to fly for the airlines, we have 40 hours of MCC training.

About 2 months after submitting my application, I got an email with a quick questionnaire. They liked my profile, so they sent me an invitation for the first interview at the end of March 2024. After going through their entire process, I finally started working mid-July.

My ultimate dream is to be a seaplane pilot, preferably in a country where I can speak the language—Spanish, English or French—and my current goal is to fly in the Caribbean (Winair). I don't really care about the plane itself. I'm more interested about the place where I'm flying and the adventure side of aviation.

A DAY IN THE LIFE OF A SUSI AIR FIRST OFFICER.

It’s pretty early days, waking up at 4, 5 or 6 AM depending on the base.

So, you wake up and have breakfast, then your ride comes to pick you up. Commute to the airport takes between 10 and 40 minutes depending on traffic. You get there, go through security and finally get to work.

Well, as a First Officer, you don’t really have much work to do: check the weather, the NOTAMS, do your walk-around… basic pre-flight stuff, making sure everything is okay and then you get the operational flight plan.

Some more paperwork later (weight-and-balance, technical logbook, passengers manifest), all you have left to do now is wait. When the passengers arrive, you welcome them, the ground crew puts them in their seat and the captain will brief them while you make sure all the doors are locked, and complete your checks.

Captain gets to fly a leg, you fly the other.

Standard CRM: whoever’s pilot monitoring handles the radios, takes care of the paperwork for next leg in-flight, double-checks weather if need be… 😴

And that’s what you do all day, every day. Maximum duty time per day is 12.5 hours and you can fly up to 6 days a week. When you have 8 or 10 leg-days, that's a lot. In any case, you’re capped at 40 hours of flight time a week and 100 hours of flight time a month.

THE SUSI AIR EXPERIENCE.

→ What I like most about working here? the flying.

It’s amazing because the scenery is great and the infrastructures are good. The runways are just as good as the ones in the U.S.

It’s so cool to fly the Caravan here. You have to fly in bad weather, to destinations where people from Australia go in vacation. Those guys are going to amazing places, surfing in small islands where the water is turquoise. And you are the guy flying this thing there. It's still a small plane, but it honestly feels great. Good performance and everything…

Then sometimes you’re about to land and there are pigs crossing the runway or a random guy walking around. That stuff doesn't happen in our countries, and it's kind of fun to have that, ya’ know.

So yeah, the flying in general. It's just so great.

Volcanic eruptions, strong winds (…), a lot of things that make your life complicated, which I love. I would say the best parts in the flying portion are the challenge and the beauty of Indonesia.

I mean, this country is so much different from what we know. The people are great. The ground crew are cool and I love the captains here. They're just the best guys ever. I did have one bad experience but most of the time, the captains are just so cool. They are there to help you, to teach you whatever you need. They're there for you.

→ If there’s something I particularly dislike? Yes, a lot of things. But first [and foremost], the salary. Second, the lifestyle.

The lifestyle is ✨ and 💩 at the same time. I know, it sounds weird, but it’s true. […]

And yeah, the job can be exhausting. I like to go out, and I mean just “go out” not even party. But when you work hard, it's almost like you cannot, because you need to sleep those eight hours. You need to recover, you need to rest and be fit and ready for the day after.

Because sometimes, I don't know why, air conditioning can be shit, you can have diarrhea, malaria (mostly in Papua), you can have this, you can have that… And then you have the mosque prayer at 4 AM, you're sweating like a pig because it's 30°C (86°F) with 100% humidity, pouring rain outside because it's raining season, and so a thousand bugs want to come inside. Then you have a rooster waking you up and you’re like, what tf am I doing here? 🤣

But you also get to spend time with your intakes, the people who also passed the interview. I have been very lucky, it was a lot of great people from New Zealand, Europe, the US, Asia. We all get along very well together and had a lot of fun in Jakarta. Now we're still friends and it’s always good to see eachother whenever we end up in the same base.

LET’S TALK NUMBERS.

Yes, the sensitive topic. I personally don’t care, it’s only sensitive because here, it’s shit.

Payday is on the 15th of the month. As a First Officer, you get paid $55 a day (half of that during training) before taxes—i think, i never even check, so pissed about my salary lol—and $5-8 for food depending on where you’re based. After upgrade to captain, it doubles ($110) and could go up to $135, $155 and $185 the longer you stay at the company.

If you go into Papua, you get paid around $30 more a day. Not worth it because of the risks associated with flying into mountainous area, getting shot or kidnapped, or contracting malaria. But it’s the best experience you’ll get, so I would personally go and try still. I average $1000 a month. There are no guaranteed hours because you’re expected to always fly as much as possible anyway. The schedule is 4 weeks on, 2 weeks off.

The initial training contract is $3,000 that you get back after 24 months. Afterwards, if you want to upgrade it’s $1,500 that you get back after 12 months of being captain.

TWO CENTS ABOUT FLYING HERE.

I spent 2 hours on the phone with an american guy some days ago. He wanted to apply. I explained everything to him and his concerns were what I expected: what people most worry about is the comfort of living.

I mean, here, we have guys from New Zealand, Australia, Europe… We have solid opportunities in our respective countries, opportunities just as good as in the US—okay, maybe not the salary.

But we came here because we want adventure. Don’t come here if you don’t.

Some guy was complaining the other day “oh, it’s dirty…” Of course it's f-ing dirty. Come see my room, there is mold on the ceiling. And also, the house is good but you have to wait 10 extra minutes before you shower because, bad water pressure!

There is only one McDonald's for the guys who like it but you cannot eat there every day. I’m not saying that you guys eat McDonald's every day, don't get me wrong (😂). What I'm saying is, don't go outside and expect to eat the food you’re used to eat. The food here is healthy, it’s the hygiene that is not as good as it is in our own countries. So don't come here and expect everything to be on top.

Obviously, I don't like cockroaches and rats but if I see some around the kitchen well, I'm aware of the situation, right? I knew before I came.

Don’t have high expectations at all. You come here for the human experience, you come here for the flying experience, you come here for the life experience.

One more thing. A lot of people are going to complain about the salary, even me (especially me). Just stay aware of it: you're gonna be paid shit, you're actually probably going to spend more than you earn at the end. You need to have savings. You need extra money before coming here. I mean, you can come without, but you're going to be on survival mode and you're going to suffer.

To give you an idea, I add about $1,400 extra every month and I'm paying back my loan as well. But I also like the good life. Next week, I'm going to Thailand for two weeks and I'm gonna enjoy it.

I heard a lot of bullshit myself. Before coming here, I didn't know what to expect about the company. It’s really cool to give a better and real idea on what's truly happening. I think this can be helpful.”

*My* thoughts?

It sounds pretty much like flying in Madagascar—except I flew a lot less down there—so I’ll pass. I’m sure it’s an absolute blast living in Indonesia and flying for Susi Air, but I didn’t leave my already not-so-comfortable country to go live in another… hahaha

As discussed, I want to write about what everyone is interested in, not just me.

So I hope you enjoyed. Always let me know if you didn’t because there’s no need for me to send the rest of our conversation on how to apply and pass the Susi Air interview if no one actually wants to read about it, right? 😏

Jk, I know who need it (thank you for completing the survey! if you haven’t and would like to, it’s here, it’ll only take you 30 seconds), so that email will be out soon. You can submit your C208B First Officer application here in the meantime.

Until next time!

🫡

P.S: one of my favorite anti-CFI memes.