We all have to sit the same exams to get a licence, only then do we venture out into different aspects of the industry.

The typical heli pilot has to think more, has to work more at the controls, and has to expose himself to more hazardous situations to make a living. Every aeroplane lands on the same runway (except bush pilots) and every helicopter pilot is endangered by the fact that all it takes to design a heliport is the ability to spell "H", if we have the luxury of using one in the first place.

How many airline pilots would put up with a telephone pole exactly in line with final approach? What airline would allow its operations to land long, over the high tension lines? Or want to land on a runway that is moving all over the place, and surrounded by water.

Ask an airplane pilot to fly over water with one engine – never.

We earn our pay by being able to do the un-usual, which is why the job needs a helicopter to begin with. We earn our pay figuring it out as we fly, going into rough country where the GPS is the only back up and there are no charts – as in the Amazon.

Landing at night with rain on the bubble and nothing to look at but the white disc from our landing light. We are captain, navigator, radio operator, engineer, and refueller.

I think in 50 years time, when all the flying transport is done with microchips and lasers at the stick, they'll still need helicopter crews to kept the greasy side down during hot insertions, and bring out the wounded, pull crews off rigs when all goes wrong. To winch up sick and endangered crew from crippled ships, and to land beside icy highways to whisk injured kids to hospital.

I've landed next to rushing rivers in Alaska where you have to guard the machine against bears, and I've taken photographers to mountain tops that no human has ever climbed. I've put my aircraft back on the deck in 30 foot seas after loosing the tail rotor. I've landed on glaciers with 200' ravines only feet away – try these things in an airplane!

I'd rather be earth-bound than walk into a terminal with a flight case, climb into a big aluminium bus and drive down highway Victor, let the self-loading cargo out, reload, and go back to base again.

If it can't hover, then it can't really fly.