Airline Pilot: A Week in the Life
The following is a week in the life of a regional airline pilot.

Day 1

It is day 1 of a 4-day trip and the alarm wakes me up at 7:45am. I normally give myself about 30 minutes to get ready before heading out the door to the airport. After taking a shower, getting dressed, and making sure all of my items are packed, I head out the door for the drive to the airport. My family is still asleep, so I decide to let them be as I head out the door. Hopping in the car, I take the 25 minute drive to the airport. Traffic is pretty light as it is Sunday morning. I arrive at the employee lot, park, and grab my suitcase and flight kit to catch the employee bus to the airport terminals. I see a flight attendant that I have worked with before, sitting on the employee lot bus, so we start talking, and we quickly realize that we are on the same trip.

We arrive at the airport terminal in about 10 minutes, and getting through security is relatively easy. It is now about 9:00, and the report time for the trip is 9:10, 45 minutes before our first flight. I go through the normal routine at the crew room; check company email, sign in on the crew sign in sheet, and check my “v” file for any updates, paychecks, etc. At this point, I have everything set, and it is time to go to the airplane. The first flight is a deadhead, which means that my crew and I are being flown from one airport to another to get to our aircraft. The flight is fairly quick, about 40 minutes to Washington D.C, where there is a 2 hour wait at the airport before our 1:00 flight to Rochester. I meet the Captain I will be flying with this trip, and we spend over an hour sitting in the terminal and talking.        

It is now about 11:20am - time to head out to the gate to prepare for the flight. Just as the three of us (our aircraft has two pilots and one flight attendant) walk up to the gate, the aircraft pulls in. We wait until the passengers and crew get off before we begin preparing the aircraft for flight. I perform the external walk around check, walking a 360 degree path around the 87 foot long regional jet, checking for anything broken, damaged, or missing. As is the case most of the time, the aircraft is in good condition. I get in my seat in the flight deck and get ready for the flight. Before long we are boarded up, all of our checks are complete, and we are ready to go.

With just a little wait in line for take-off, we are soon on our way to our destination: Rochester, NY. The flight runs smoothly, and we arrive about 10 minutes early at the gate. With 40 minutes between now and our departure to Boston, I take a walk inside to buy some food to take with me on the flight. Our flights do not offer food, so we have to pack or buy food when we have the opportunity. We have a relatively quick turn, about 35 minutes to unload the passengers, refuel, and re-board for the next flight to Boston. The day continues smoothly as we fly from Boston to Buffalo, NY, back to Boston and again to Buffalo, ending our final flight at about 10:20pm. It has been a pretty long day of about thirteen hours of duty time. Tired, we get our bags off the plane, and walk to the outside curb for the van ride to the hotel. It is about a 20 minute drive to the hotel. Arriving there, I go right to my room, get changed and fall asleep at about 11:30pm. I have been awake for about 16 hours.

Day: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4