Are Low time new hires at regionals safe?

[Captzaahlie]

I think the issue boils down to the individual more than it does experience.

I have flown with guys with 200 hrs that would be professional, competent and safe FO's after a 121 training course. Maybe 10-20% of pilots fit in this category. They have a natural aptitude for flying, good multi-tasking skills, and a good attitude. Usually very smart folks.

The majority of pilots are ready for a 121 cockpit after 600-1000 hrs, depending on the diversity and quality of their time and training. I would say 60-70% fit here.

10-20% of pilots have no business in a cockpit at all, much less with pax in the back. For some it's attitude, some decision-making, some basic skills, or a combination. We have all flown with them and it's no different at 200 hrs, 2000 hrs, or 20,000 hrs.

Good post, I completely agree for what my little 14 1/2 years of left seat 121 time is worth....

 

[Captzaahlie]

Answer- wait for the mainline flight even if it costs you more money.

There are plenty of lazy, non checklist using, complacent old timers out there at the mainline level too............ I've been on enough jump seats over the years to see it with my own eyes first hand.

 

[Mazdarx7]

They must be, havent heard of any accidents lately..

 

[ifly4food]

As fewer and fewer professionals exist at the regional level, what's left is a cadre of sloppy, lazy and under-skilled pilots who pass those attributes on to the next generation of captain. In over 10 years of regional flying I've never witnessed such a low level of knowledge and competence in the cockpit yet the scary thing is no one wants to listen to those concerns much less the pilot himself. The company will put up front any warm body to keep the completion factor nominal.

Answer- wait for the mainline flight even if it costs you more money.

Are you in the training department? How do you get to evaluate so many captains?

Your terse generalization makes your post totally non-credible. We all know that not all regional pilots, in fact not even a majority of regional pilots suck. Now if you have PROOF of the contrary (not more opinion), I'm all ears.

 

[waveflyer]

So the solution, then, is for ALPA/APA/IPA etc-to get our hand deep into the training world instead of letting the FAA have complete control. Ensure the professionalism and competency at that level and that will ensure that young pilots know what they are getting into and value what they do. Young pilots are not the problem- the problem is pilots, young and old, who do not value what they do- then act and vote accordingly-- ie:don't study or train well enough, and vote in concessions.

 

[Oakum_Boy]

Are you in the training department? How do you get to evaluate so many captains?

Your terse generalization makes your post totally non-credible. We all know that not all regional pilots, in fact not even a majority of regional pilots suck. Now if you have PROOF of the contrary (not more opinion), I'm all ears.

I've flown with many marginal FO's who are by miracle in the left seat now. Couple them with the FO's we hire now and there's your proof. Every day the regionals such as mine are losing their best pilots.

BTW- reading a checklist with your eyes focused strictly on the paper does not constitute professionalism. 9/10 pilots don't seem to even know how to use the damned things.

 

[30West]

From almost a decade worth of training and checking airline pilots, I can say that it is definitely possible to train low time pilots for airline cockpits.
However, what is a fact is that it is exponentially more difficult to do so.
Generally the largest obstacle is inexperience. Most guys I find have good attitudes and hit the books pretty hard.
There are still the usual turds in the bunch that think they are owed something or that "you're short of pilots so you need me". These guys are usually the weakest airmen and can be easily beaten down or washed out in the sim.

I believe Captains should all get overrides for being instructors. That's infortunately one of the new roles as captain. If training departments washed out every new hire that wasn't 100% airlines would quickly go out of business due to crew shortages.

If airlines would wake up and realize all they had to do was throw in a few extra bones and tweak some work rules they'd keep more experienced people and not waste so much money on "revolving door" training events.....

 

[Captzaahlie]

I've flown with many marginal FO's who are by miracle in the left seat now. Couple them with the FO's we hire now and there's your proof. Every day the regionals such as mine are losing their best pilots.

BTW- reading a checklist with your eyes focused strictly on the paper does not constitute professionalism. 9/10 pilots don't seem to even know how to use the damned things.

I know many outstanding career regional pilots that are happy where they are at for several reasons, seniority, pay, schedules or the fact that they have military retirement cash coming in additionally to enhance there pay. You must have seen a whole lot of crap at Mesa huh? Maybe you should have picked a better regional to fly for because your comments are slightly ignorant at best...............
:bomb:

 

[check6]

If that kid is flying a prop, I don't think its a big deal. The Captain has enough time to react and take the controls, but if he's flying a Jet, hum.......I don't know...

How will Mesa advertse pilot jobs around 2015-
" have you solo? if you have, come and join one of the fastest growing airlines in the country."

Prop or Jet... I don't think it makes a difference. An engine failure in a prop will eat your lunch just as much as a jet.

 

[rustypigeon]

I'm not sure which is worse, the low time or the immaturity. When I was down in training a couple months ago I saw some new hires tackling each other in the halls and playing football in the parking lot. Please leave the high school maturity when you leave high school, even if you just graduated last June.

 

[chignutsak]

I hope that this was you barely flying at all cause i think I mastered x-winds at around 100-120 hrs.

Trust me, you mastered nothing at 100-120 hours.

 

[Captzaahlie]

Trust me, you mastered nothing at 100-120 hours.

I agree most people with that "overwhelming" :erm: amount of time only know enough to be dangerous.

 

[timeless]

At the small freight company I fly for I've noticed that the low time FOs (250-350 hrs) did better than the other guys. 1000 hours of part 91 piston time isn't that much better than 350 hours. Who cares about the flight time. The problem I've noticed is that underperforming pilots aren't washed out of ground school because they are needed on the line.

 

[JSky26]

Trust me, you mastered nothing at 100-120 hours.

Don't tell him that...lol

 

[ALIMBO]

OMG it was a ********************ing joke lol.

 

[time builder]

At the small freight company I fly for I've noticed that the low time FOs (250-350 hrs) did better than the other guys. 1000 hours of part 91 piston time isn't that much better than 350 hours. Who cares about the flight time. The problem I've noticed is that underperforming pilots aren't washed out of ground school because they are needed on the line.

At 250-350 hours a Shorts is an opportunity. With over 1000 hours, if you're still looking at a Shorts FO job, something must be wrong. Sorry to be blunt, just a reality check. I really don't think your 1000 hour FO's are representative of the industry.

 

[ifly4food]

I've flown with many marginal FO's who are by miracle in the left seat now. Couple them with the FO's we hire now and there's your proof. Every day the regionals such as mine are losing their best pilots.

So you're basing your view that a majority of regional captains suck (and that people should wait for a mainline flight) on having flown with a bunch of crappy FOs who now SUCCESSFULLY passed [insert airline here]'s FAA supervised upgrade program, and are now captains? Once sucked, always sucked, huh? Guess you never improved as a pilot? I know I was a sucky FO... I just didn't care back then.

Think maybe you're making a blanket generalization? Your credibility is lacking here. You have only proved that you have a strong OPINION. And a propensity to post flamebait.

 

[Tank Commander]

My biggest concern is not time in the cockpit, but time in life. At 24, Your still 24. No training, no type rating, no special wavier can make you wiser. Nothing against 24 year olds. I was 24 once. My Dad use to tell me " Son, their are two things that will give you maturity in life. Time and pain. Physical and mental pain."
He was so right.

 

[ohplease!]

I know many outstanding career regional pilots that are happy where they are at for several reasons, seniority, pay, schedules or the fact that they have military retirement cash coming in additionally to enhance there pay. You must have seen a whole lot of crap at Mesa huh? Maybe you should have picked a better regional to fly for because your comments are slightly ignorant at best...............
:bomb:

Actually, he's here at ASA. Not sure if thats good or bad luck for us.

 

[ifly4food]

My biggest concern is not time in the cockpit, but time in life. At 24, Your still 24. No training, no type rating, no special wavier can make you wiser. Nothing against 24 year olds. I was 24 once. My Dad use to tell me " Son, their are two things that will give you maturity in life. Time and pain. Physical and mental pain."
He was so right.

What a great point.

 

[ohplease!]

My overall experience with our newhire FO's has been good. Most of thm seem to be pretty "with it" . I attribute MUCH of this to the great training dept. we have. The best in the regionals without doubt. Better than or atleast equal to the majors.

As long as things go according to plan, the low timers seem to do pretty well. I worry about those few times when ********************HitsTheFan and we have to start getting outside "the box" and do some of that "pilot"********************".

 

[ohplease!]

My biggest concern is not time in the cockpit, but time in life. At 24, Your still 24. No training, no type rating, no special wavier can make you wiser. Nothing against 24 year olds. I was 24 once. My Dad use to tell me " Son, their are two things that will give you maturity in life. Time and pain. Physical and mental pain."
He was so right.

My dad's was a little different:
"if you're gonna be dumb, you've gotta be tough".....and I'm one He!! of a tough SOB.

 

[BOYCAPTAIN]

My biggest concern is not time in the cockpit, but time in life. At 24, Your still 24. No training, no type rating, no special wavier can make you wiser. Nothing against 24 year olds. I was 24 once. My Dad use to tell me " Son, their are two things that will give you maturity in life. Time and pain. Physical and mental pain."
He was so right.

what a load of bull!

 

[bmpilot2003]

what a load of bull!

I agree some people are just born with more maturity and ambition than others.

 

[dustrpilot]

BOYCAPTAIN you owe me a new computer. I just puked on my old one after seeing your avitar. Thats got ta go!

 

[Crossky]

Wasn't there a time back pre 2001 when 300 - 500 hours was the norm? I hear alot of Captains complaining about low mins when a lot of them where hired 9 or 10 years ago with the same time. I can honestly say that I've flown with low time FO's and they do a great job. I think in comes down to training.

NOT flying an RJ, there weren't too many around before 2001 anyway. In the late 90's after most regionals did away with the pay for training programs, you could get on with the lower tier turboprop 19 seat airlines with low time, IF you knew people and had a BS degree from the right university. Back then, if you wanted to get with Comair, SKW, or Am Eagle, you needed good cargo or commuter T-prop time, or jet time. Now, you need a pulse and a 500 TT.

What concerns me with the low timers I see having trouble the most are deficiencies in landing a swept wing no-slat jet. They aren't used to the speed regime (which a turboprop would assist in teaching greatly) and will float, balloon, drift, land with too much sideload, too much vertical rate, too slow, you name it. They don't have the experience, ability, and confidence to quickly see and fix problems that can arise in the seconds from thrust reduction to touchdown. The CA ends up actually giving flight instruction to save the landing, it's either that, a balked landing, 'my aircraft'.

My fear is this will happen: a weak CA permits a new FO to flare and float an RJ too high (hung up at 50') with too much of a thrust reduction (flight idle), and the A/C crashes in a high sink rate/low energy state (stalling) because no one called for or performed a balked landing. IMO it's just a matter of time. I've seen this happen a few times at night, the last time I told my FO to lower the nose twice, I'm sure we would've impacted hard otherwise (rather than very slightly firm).

Anyway, be careful guys, and listen to those Radio Altimeter calls.

 

[dustrpilot]

"My fear is this will happen: a weak CA permits a new FO to flare and float an RJ too high (hung up at 50') with too much of a thrust reduction (flight idle), and the A/C crashes in a high sink rate/low energy state (stalling) because no one called for or performed a balked landing. IMO it's just a matter of time. I've seen this happen a few times at night, the last time I told my FO to lower the nose twice, I'm sure we would've impacted hard otherwise (rather than very slightly firm"

Already happened. Jazz did it and drove both main gears through the wings. I don't know what kind of time the Captain had, but it really doesn't matter. A landing can get nasty in a CRJ in the last 50' and no matter what kind of experiance you have, you might not be able to save it.
The Jazz pictures are on the internet, I just don't have the link.

 

[JoeMerchant]

Was this it.....???

http://acpilot.blogspot.com/2007/05/ac8911-crj-aircraft-recovery-operation.html

 

[Tank Commander]

Young pilots, of what I've are very impressive. The knowledge they pick-up is great. I do agree its a credit to training departments and other pilots shearing knowledge that helps. Young people are smarter then my generation was. My kids do work in school well ahead of what I was doing at their age. I met a young man one day at our training center. He looked like he was in his early 20's. There was a new hire class going and I asked him if he was in the class. He said no, he was there for up-grade. He told me he as 24 just got married, has a baby due in a couple of months, and is closing on a house in a few days. I thought, wow! at 24. 24 for me was a blur. liven life large in the military no real responsibility. just learning the ropes of life. My old advice I gave him was "Right a round 30-35. You are going to get this over-whelming feeling that you missed out of something. Don't do anything rash. Hopefully it will go away.........

 

[Leroy Smith]

My old advice I gave him was "Right a round 30-35. You are going to get this over-whelming feeling that you missed out of something. Don't do anything rash. Hopefully it will go away.........

I decided to become a pilot.......... good advice.