Welcome to Flightinfo.com

  • Register now and join the discussion
  • Friendliest aviation Ccmmunity on the web
  • Modern site for PC's, Phones, Tablets - no 3rd party apps required
  • Ask questions, help others, promote aviation
  • Share the passion for aviation
  • Invite everyone to Flightinfo.com and let's have fun

Airline pilot shortage; Kit Darby still at it!

Welcome to Flightinfo.com

  • Register now and join the discussion
  • Modern secure site, no 3rd party apps required
  • Invite your friends
  • Share the passion of aviation
  • Friendliest aviation community on the web

radarlove

Well-known member
Joined
Mar 21, 2005
Posts
677
http://www.aero-tv.net/index.cfm?videoid=92fb493b-a494-4d9e-b19c-93d1dd1fc0aa

A boring presentation, but I couldn't stop watching. This numbnut keeps talking about the lack of qualified pilots, how college training doesn't prepare for airline work, it's just sickening.

Yeah, the problem is that there aren't enough qualified pilot applicants. That's the problem! We need to make more and better applicants for the airlines!

I think the flight colleges are off in a weird world of unreality. Kit Darby has been preaching "Impending pilot crunch" for more than 20 years now and they're still (still!) biting.

Their solutions? "Encourage career instructors with better pay and benefits", "Find ways of getting retired airline pilots interested in training." "End users (airlines) are going to have to share in this new cost"

I can't go on. What a chump.

Edit: it's not Kit Darby talking, it's some weird guy who looks like he broke in at Watergate. But Kit Darby was a featured speaker.
 
Last edited:
this guy is a real tool. promoting his own line of bulls**t. as always. he has lost touch of reality.
 
There is a shortage of pilots just like there was a shortage of workers who built the Great Wall of China.

There is never a shortage of pilots, just a lowering of the standards. 250 hours commercial pilots will line up all night long to get a flying job, just like people who line up for iPods.

Give me a break on this pilot shortage. And give me a break about the high retirement numbers coming! The old will have to die in the cockpit to be removed.
 
No, it should read like this.

Pilot job Shortage.
your just not reading the fine print.


 
What is he talking about! I'll bet there is a HUGE drop in interest going on right now. The costs are getting out of hand and once upon a time it used to be worth it to shell out a good amount of dough for your ratings. You suffer through the 135 and regional times and then make it "big" in the majors. Well, I think those days are gone. The airlines via ATA and Air Conference have shot themselves in the foot in regards to the future. They have lowered expectations to a degree that this career is not worth the costs. Less than a decade ago most pilots scoffed at a career with SWA. Management at the majors begged their pilots to accept that payscale and the pilots scoffed. Then bankruptcy courts took them below SWA. Now everyone wants SWA wages and management says that is way too high and we must accept lower. Who wants to deal with that? Your debt will never get paid off and your life will suck. Also, why would a military guy quit active duty before 20 years to take such a low paying major job? A major in the Air Force is bringing down well over 100K with the bonus...why would they want to go to an airline and make only 30K-70K, live out of a suitcase and get treated like a cost unit by management??? I know a ton of guys at Alaska looking for work elsewhere. This job is not the job it used to be. Furloughs and bankruptcy were always a part of the equation but it was possible to start over and make over 100K after a few years. Not anymore. Starting over is not possible for many people well into their thirties and forties. Kids, college and bills necessitate a job outside aviation unless you want to settle for VA rates. I think there will be a shortage down the road...a shortage of QUALITY professional pilots that the airlines need to safely fly.
As far as the age 65 thing goes, as much as I don't like it, many of those guys lost everything with the draconian bankruptcy courts. They need to look out for number one right now. I cannot fault them even though it hurts me. I fault the Alaska old timers because they stick around for fun. They have a fully funded pension and can retire. Some will but many won't.
I still like the flying but this job kind of sucks right now in regards to everything else and I see it getting a lot worse.
 
Well-said.

Unfortunately, even with the huge slump in new pilot entrants into the workforce, you won't see a major "shortage" of pilots, especially as airlines across the U.S. pull down capacity in an effort to make money.

The ONLY way this career will work is IF the government re-regulates the industry, treating it as the commodity it is. Until then, you'll get the repeating cycle of profit/bankruptcy/employee raping, as the pay and benefits become less and less.

Even looking 20-30 years down the road, unless things change dramatically for the U.S. in terms of finances, demand will NEVER come back up. The middle class has been taking home less and less every year when adjusted for inflation. It's already starting to show: leisure travel is off significantly. Business travel is also off as better and better video conferencing options become available.

As always, the only airlines that will hurt for qualified applicants are the regionals that barely pay above the poverty line for new-hire F/O's and the overseas gigs where they can't train enough of their own to satisfy growing travel demand. In the future, I see that pay coming up with the lack of entry-level pilots, but that's going to take another 10 years to start happening, too, and I don't ever see the overseas gigs getting realistic with the pay AND time off required to take it as a commuting option.

No U.S. major has ever had a "pilot shortage" in the last 2 or 3 decades. I don't think Kit Darby claims that they have, either... He never says "major", he just says "airline pilot shortage".
 
there is one overseas if you have a type in anything built in the last 15 years
 
Kit Darby is a salesman and he's simply selling his product. Of course he's going to say that there is a pilot shortage and that he, hallelujah, can you lead to the promised land of milk and honey as a highly-paid professional pilot. All you have to do is buy his product.

And, Kit, on a personal note: none of us at NetJets will ever forget how you sat across the table from us in negotiations and attempted to help sell us an insulting contract.
 

Latest resources

Back
Top