Can airline pilots live in a different city from which they are based?
For example, if a pilot flies for United Airlines and is based out of Chicago, could he/she live in different city, say Charlotte, and commute from Charlotte to Chicago for their assigned flight?
Air Travel - 5 Answers
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1 :
Charlette where? the answer to you question is yes
2 :
I don't know about pilots for sure, but I know flight attendants can. They can fly for free or next to free, so she would just catch a commuter flight to her base. Of course, she flew international, not domestic, and that's an entirely different animal. Her flights were around 12 hours long, and she did one trip a week -- a flight out, spend a few days there, and a flight back. I think when she flew domestic she had to have an apartment in the base city, but several flight attendants shared one apartment since they were always coming and going.
3 :
Yes, pilots can live in another city. Pilots bid on their schedules and routes. So when they know they will be flying, they will fly to the city where they are based and stay at a crash pad. A crash pad is an apartment shared by up to 20 flight attendants/pilots together. They all just come and go when they in that city until they start flying. Commuting is a pain. Though you may only fly for three days during that week, you may spend up two extra days just commuting. They have to fly standby to get to their base city. All airline pilots can fly for free on all other domestic carriers. They do have some priority for the cockpit jumpseats should the cabin become full, but there's no guarantee. But you almost have to live in another city. Most base cities are Boston, New York, Chicago, Long Beach, Fort Lauderdale and many others. The cost of living is really expensive in most of those cities. So alot of them will live in cheaper cities and just hop on a flight the day before they start flying.
4 :
happens all the time!
5 :
Sure its actually pretty standard for the pilots not to live where they are based. The airlines have crash pads for the crew, etc... to stay at in the cities where they are based.
