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American the place to be in a few years?

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IFLYASA

Well-known member
Joined
Nov 27, 2001
Posts
545
I've been going over the numbers at AAI. They roughly have 11,000 pilots with over 1000 on furlough. They haven't hired since 2000-2001. Assuming most majors avg age for a new hire pilot is 35, their avg age for the last new hires is around 44ish.

With the age 65 rule kicking in, it will be much longer before they hire. Plus with the 1000 furloughs, I would say it may take at least 5 years for them to hire again. Now, that avg age new hire is around 49 years old. So in theory if these guys/gals go until 65, they will have to replace 11000 pilots within 15 years.

Talking about movement!
 
Well, AAI is Airtran. They don't have quite that many pilots. However AMR does, and when they do start hiring again, you're right, things should start moving pretty well.
 
I've been going over the numbers at AAI. They roughly have 11,000 pilots with over 1000 on furlough. They haven't hired since 2000-2001. Assuming most majors avg age for a new hire pilot is 35, their avg age for the last new hires is around 44ish.

With the age 65 rule kicking in, it will be much longer before they hire. Plus with the 1000 furloughs, I would say it may take at least 5 years for them to hire again. Now, that avg age new hire is around 49 years old. So in theory if these guys/gals go until 65, they will have to replace 11000 pilots within 15 years.

Talking about movement!
You're also assuming A) AMR won't shrink in size, and B) the pilot age limit doesn't go up to 75-80.
 
I've been going over the numbers at AAI. They roughly have 11,000 pilots with over 1000 on furlough. They haven't hired since 2000-2001. Assuming most majors avg age for a new hire pilot is 35, their avg age for the last new hires is around 44ish.

With the age 65 rule kicking in, it will be much longer before they hire. Plus with the 1000 furloughs, I would say it may take at least 5 years for them to hire again. Now, that avg age new hire is around 49 years old. So in theory if these guys/gals go until 65, they will have to replace 11000 pilots within 15 years.

Talking about movement!


If getting into the right seat is all that matters. You still have to deal with the other issues that make up your QOL. Take it from me, that everything else matters.
 
Was thinking about that the other day, actually, all identifier acronym jokes aside... ;)

If they remain the same size (arguable), they should be hiring back the furloughees in about 5 years. Let's say 1/3 of them don't come back (conservatively), that leaves plenty of bodies to fill classes, then they likely won't hire again for another 5-7 years.

By then, not only will the average guys be 10-12 years or so from retirement, BUT so will the majority of us who are currently in aviation (I consider myself young-ish for my experience level at 37, and 10-12 years from now I'll be 49).

Why is this important? Anyone who is already over 35 won't really benefit from this huge fallout at AA in about 10 years. Who WILL benefit? The guys in their 20's at the regionals NOW. They'll be 35 with lots of jet time from their regional airline, and will have 30+ years at AA with pretty quick seniority progression, probably a 10 year upgrade and 20+ years as an AA Captain.

As an aside, the people who are on furlough from AA right now, IF they go back, will probably have 5-7 year upgrades and get to spend the last 10-15 years as Captains. Someone at AMR mentioned the other day that the union did a study, and the #1 guy on furlough at AMR, if he comes back, will retire as #31 on the system-wide seniority list because of those projected retirements the last 5 years of his career. The bottom guy on the seniority list will retire in the upper 15% of the system-wide seniority list, holding whatever aircraft CA seat he wants in whatever domicile he wants.

Great news for them, for the rest of us it isn't going to really help.
 
You're also assuming A) AMR won't shrink in size, and B) the pilot age limit doesn't go up to 75-80.

Or that they don't merge......again.

Air Cal
Reno Air
TWA

They're about due for another...

I seriously don't understand why they buy these airlines...not much left of any of these purchases in today's operation.
 
Will the Eagle flow-through still be in place? Are there Eagle pilots still in line for AA seats when they become available (long-term)?
 

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