The best day for Cathy Beaucage starts early.
“I’m a morning person. I’m useless after a big – or small, let’s face it – day of work!” She laughs. It’s the serene moments before the day truly begins that she relishes.
“I like the time I get around the heli before clients show up, prepping it all and fueling if I was too lazy to do it the night before. I don’t mind starting two hours earlier in the morning to get everything ready.”
When it’s time to get the rotors moving, that all changes.
“Action mode is kind of a blur – it’s like I turn on this other side of me. I’ve always had a thing where, as soon as I close the heli door and prepare to take off, nothing else exists. I had that exact feeling on my first solo flight, and I still have it now.”
“I never really knew what I wanted to be when I grew up. Most of my adult life was about backpacking around the world, until 2017, when I settled back home in Québec. I’d decided maybe after travelling for five years, it was time to try and have a career and stop moving around so much.”
Cath was 22 at the time and started working in insurance for her dad, thinking her path would probably involve taking over his company at some point, “As you do, you know?”
Cath’s dad had always been into aviation. He got his fixed-wing license in his 20s, later deciding to purchase an R44 and convert into helis. “I’d flown with him a bit but was never really into it. I’d always been scared of flying, actually, even though I was surrounded by it at that point.”
After working the desk for about a year, Cath was pretty miserable sitting behind a screen from 9 am to 5 pm, always doing the same thing. “Dad told me I should try getting my private license, that maybe it would be a fun challenge on the side that would make up for how I felt about my job. We’re pretty close, so I thought it could be interesting to learn – and then we could go on little trips together!”
They booked her a flight at the school where her dad got his license and, coincidently, where he still stores his heli. After that, Cath was hooked.
“I remember feeling exactly how I should. I don’t know how else to say it,” she says solemnly. “That night, I told Dad I thought I wanted to go for my Commercial, and he told me to quit my job and go for it!”
Her instructors conservatively suggested she get her PPL first and then consider a career. “I remember having a long phone call with the company owner that night, telling me how difficult of a job it was and how it’s mostly a man’s field and whatnot.”
It clearly wasn’t enough to sway Cath. She got stuck in.
She was able to do all her training in her dad’s R44, and, as the company she studied with hires their graduating CPLs wherever possible, was able to begin flying commercially right away. “They only take a limited number of CPL students annually for this reason. If you get your license and all goes well, you’ll get about 100 hours of flying in the first year, and that’s a huge help to get you going in the industry.”
Cathy was lucky enough to work two full summers there, the second being the summer of 2020. The job was flying short tours in eastern Québec, and due to the pandemic, domestic tourism was huge, so Cath got a lot of hours that year.
“It was such a beautiful place, and it was a good way to start because you do have to manage everything yourself. Two young pilots are sent there every summer, and they handle it all as a team, from prospecting for clients to making sure all the money’s there at the end of the day and preparing everything for the contract beforehand. That’s one of the main things I love about being a pilot: you’re usually the only one in charge.”
After 2020, things slowed down a bit. Cath’s chief pilot suggested she become a flight instructor. She started the training, but it didn’t take long for her to get bored. The too-familiar threats of monotony and a commitment of two to three years lurked, so Cath traded stability for odd jobs here and there, including a few months in the fall of 2021 for a sister company.
“Then I got sent to Northern Québec to a salmon outfitter to fly fishermen around for ten days. That lit a fire. The job itself wasn’t the most stimulating, but I was in an R66 – so a turbine, finally! And I was outside all day mostly. That’s when I started understanding what I really wanted out of a job.”
Cath has returned for seven weeks this summer. It’s a long time to be so far out, but it’s an excellent way to get to the infamous 100 hours on type, which she achieved earlier this year.
“After the first time I came here, I started to reflect on what I actually wanted to do as a heli pilot. I knew what I didn’t want – tourism isn’t a long-term plan for me, for sure. Initially, I wanted to do a lot of sling work, but I discovered I love flying people from different fields. I like learning new things, and I’m very curious, so the idea of eventually flying firefighters – my goal for next year – or powerline workers, geologists, whatever else; that’s what I’m looking forward to, now.”
“I’m also having a lot of fun getting more comfortable landing in more confined areas and on tricky grounds. I’m starting to get a glimpse of what the next few years might look like, which I’ve never experienced before – and I don’t hate that! I’m finding stability in an unstable job, and it’s the perfect balance for me.”
“My goal is to wake up and have fun every day, which I’ve managed to do pretty well so far, so I’d like that to keep going.”
First published in HeliOps Magazine – Issue 146 (Kia Kaha Media) in ‘A Greater View’, a column profiling women in the heli industry
Bronni Bowen 