About me, your agriculture pilot:
- My name is Tyson Lukasavige and I’ve been an Ag pilot for 16 years.
- My wife and I now run out our own operation in North Dakota with 3 planes.
Baseline Info:
- Ag pilots fly aircraft 10-15 feet above crop fields and spray the fields with fungicides, insecticides, fertilizers and more.
- Their services help farmers grow our food, cotton for our clothes etc.
- The aircraft they fly are usually single seat, large turbo prop tailwheel aircraft built by Air Tractor or Thrush. They are specially built to carry 500+- gallons of product, which is a carefully mixed solution of water and chemical. For perspective, to spray a football field sized plot, they only need to use a Coke can’s amount of chemical (12oz). The rest is water!
Everything you need to know about becoming a crop duster:
Flight School Cost: $50,000 - $100,000
- Varies based on your choice of program, extra ratings, aircraft situation etc.
Options to pay for flight school
- Start with the cash needed in-hand and knock all your ratings as fast as possible.
- Pay as you can afford to, flying weekends and working during the week. Slower, less optimal.
- For veterans, consider using your benefits to cover flight school. One option is to pay for your own Private Pilots License then use your GI Bill to cover flight training up to a capped amount, and the other is to pursue a 4 year degree that includes all flight costs/ratings in the curriculum. There may be more options, find out for yourself! https://www.va.gov/education/about-gi-bill-benefits/how-to-use-benefits/flight-training/
- If you’re a teen, consider joining Civil Air Patrol, where you can get your PPL nearly for free.
- Consider taking out a loan, which some programs offer.
Timeline: Zero to Ag Pilot:
- Fast track: 4 years
- This is considering that you take around 1 year to get your Private license and Commercial rating, tow banner or gliders for a season, work on a ground crew for a couple seasons then get into a seat. This isn’t the norm, but can be done if you work your tail off and have an excellent relationship with the owner.
- Realistic: 6-7 years
- This considers you take 1-2 years to get your Private license and Commercial rating, work a tailwheel job for a couple years, then work on a ground crew for 2 or 3 seasons before getting into a seat.
- Side note: these timelines are considering that becoming an Ag pilot is your main focus and that you're hustling to make it happen. Considering how small the community is, you have to very persistent to make your way into your first seat.
Step 1: Second Class Medical Certification (Avg: $200)
- Good for 12 months, this is a medical examination that will qualify you to fly commercially.
- Costs around $200
- FAA guide to get examined: https://www.faa.gov/pilots/medical_certification/get
Step 2: Private Pilots License (Avg. $9,000 - $20,000)
- Timeline: 1-3 months flying full time, or 1 year if flying part time. The timeline is up to you.
- To save money, consider joining a flying club.
- Consider flying a tailwheel if possible
Step 3: Get your Commercial Pilot rating ($50,000 - $100,000, including the cost of your PPL)
- This allows you to legally be paid to fly, and is the step from hobby to a legal job.
- To achieve this you will build at least 190 or 250 hours, depending on your program.
- Timeline: 1-3 months if you're flying as much as possible, or around a year flying part time. The timeline is up to you.
- Consider getting these hours in a tailwheel aircraft
- Your instrument rating is recommended but not required
- The least expensive option is to attain your PPL and Commercial rating at an affordable location like an aero club. The more expensive option is to pursue other ratings as well and go to an all-inclusive flight program.
Step 4: Get your tailwheel endorsement and build hours flying a tailwheel aircraft
- Some companies will provide you a tail wheel endorsement, and if not you will have to fly a tailwheel aircraft with an instructor and display proficiency before being endorsed. This typically takes around 10 flight hours and a couple thousand dollars if you rent everything.
- Great options are to tow banners or tow gliders in a tailwheel aircraft.
- Some people will buy an affordable tailwheel aircraft for $30-50K, build their hours in it, then sell it once it's no longer needed.
- Aim for a minimum of 250+ hours of tailwheel time and 500 hours total time. The amount of experience you’ll be hired at varies greatly from company to company, these numbers are just loose goals to hit.
Step 5: Network and find an operator who is willing to mentor you
- This industry is very small and it's largely about who you know. Speak to your local operators, attend state and national Ag aviation conventions, join Facebook groups like "Rookie, I want to be an Ag Pilot" and touch base with as many operators as possible.
Step 6: Work a couple seasons of ground ops for an operator and get your applicator license.
- You'll learn the trade from the ground up and will fuel the plane, mix and load the product, prep load plans and more. This is where you put in your time and earn your seat in the aircraft. Make sure to work for a company that gives you a clear path and timeline for you to actually start flying the plane.
- Here (or anytime in your career up to this point) you'll also take 1-3 open or closed book tests to become a state licensed commercial applicator. Costs around $200.
Step 7: Get into the seat! (and get your part 137 logbook signed off)
- Your first job ‘in the seat’ will probably be in a smaller plane like a Cessna Ag Truck. You’ll build hours and experience within the company, then will probably be moved up to a larger Air Tractor or Thrush aircraft after 200-500 hours flying the smaller plane. This is heavily company dependent and varies per situation.
- The part 137 is essentially your 'blessing' from the chief in-house pilot / the FAA for you to fly and conduct agricultural operations within the company.
Pro Tips!
- You can start working on a crop dusting crew while you are building hours to get your PPL / CPL / tail wheel time! Think of this like getting a head start on the ground time you’re going to have to put in with the company.
- Consider becoming an aircraft mechanic as well. You’ll be even more useful/desireable to the company and will be capable of working on your own aircraft.
Schedule:
- You’ll be flying 16-17 hour days (sunrise to sunset), for weeks straight during peak season.
- As a pilot I have personally flown 6+ weeks straight of 16 hour days.
- The work load ebbs and flows; you sprint for as long as necessary then may have a week or two down, then back at it. It depends on your area’s needs.
- Some days we sit around waiting for bad weather to pass
- You will probably not get any time off during the season. In our case, we work extremely hard for about 4 months, then take 6+ months off during the offseason.
- In northern states like North Dakota, our season is about 4 months.
- Some states like California, Arkansas and Florida have seasons that can be 9-12 months.
- As a rule of thumb, the more north you go in the USA, the shorter the season will be.
Location / Accommodation
- Most pilots live local
- Some pilots relocate for the season. For examples, 2 pilots who work for me move up here to North Dakota for 3-4 months per year.
- Some companies (like mine) will provide accommodation to their staff during the season. We rent a house that our ground crew and pilots share.
- In some situations you can also bring your own camper/rv and live right next to the hangar.
Pros:
- Flying is very fun
- The schedule is ideal: work hard for a few months then take the rest of the year off.
- We have a fulfilling mission. Our work helps farmers feed America and produce other products like cotton for clothes, field corn and soybeans for bio fuel, etc.
Cons:
- After weeks of 17 hours days, you get burnt out
- During peak season you cannot take days off, go to weddings, relax on holidays etc.
- It’s a stressful job. You have a high volume of work to accomplish in limited time.
- Your pay isn’t guaranteed. One season you may fly a ton and do well for yourself, and the next, crop prices could be down so low that farmers don’t have crop spraying in their budget. Factors like these just aren’t in your control, and could occasionally leave you with less pay than you planned for.
Pay:
- For your first season in a smaller aircraft, you may make 20k-30k.
- For a 4-5 month season flying full time in the upper midwest, you could make 60k-100k.
- For a year round position with frequent flying, you can make 150k-200k.
- Pilots are usually paid a dollar amount per acre they fly. More flying = more money
- Your pay is influenced by the weather and economic conditions. If it's rainy and windy, you’re not making money. If a massive drought or flooding kills the farmer’s crops in your area, they aren’t going to need you to spray, and you’re not going to be making much money that season.
- Occasionally, companies will offer their pilots a guaranteed minimum income for the season. For example, Company ‘A’ offers a 30k minimum for the season, and in the event of a bad season causing their pilot to only earn 20k, the company will pay the difference to make their employee generate at least 30k of income.
Danger Scale:
- 7.5/10, because…
- We fly 5-15 feet off the ground at 150mph
- We takeoff and land all day
- We fly all day non stop, causing fatigue
- Sometimes we have to apply product to fields with windmills and other hazards nearby.
- Some parts of this job include handling concentrated chemicals, which without proper PPE can be harmful
- To mitigate these risks, we stay on top of maintenance, circle fields and identify hazards before spraying, and take extra care to do things the right way.
- It is a dangerous job, but most pilots go their whole career without incident.
Other details:
- As with most things in the aviation industry, things are much different from situation to situation. You can choose to knock out the required ratings and more at a top dollar flight school, or you could just do the required ratings at your local flight club for half the price. You may work on the ground crew of a cropdusting operation for just a few months before getting moved into the pilot position like I did, or you could spend 4 years on the ground putting your time in at another company. It just depends.
Advice for someone thinking about pursuing cropdusting:
- Find an operator to mentor and train you
- Have a good attitude
- Remember that you're a pilot, but equally important you're an applicator
About me and my path:
- Tyson Lukasavige
- I have a Bachelors Degree in Aviation Technology from Utah State University. In college I got my:
- Private Pilot license
- Instrument rating
- Commercial rating
- Multi engines rating
- A & P (Airframe and Powerplant Mechanic) certification
- During college I also worked at a local airport fueling and aircraft and doing ground duties. Once I got my A & P, I started working in the maintenance shop as well.
- After graduating, I flew banners in New Jersey to build tailwheel time.
- For about a year I networked, attended cropdusting conferences etc, which is where I was offered my first cropdusting job.
- I worked on the ground for 3 months then was moved into the plane to start cropdusting.
- After flying for other companies for 13 years, my wife and I bought our own operation.
- We now own 3 aircraft and work to provide the best aerial application service to farmers in south central North Dakota.
Resource
https://www.agaviation.org/career/#aspiring-pilot
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