CAL/Colgan

[hou757]

The issue here is the training program not just the hours of the pilots!

 

[generaltso]

Thats EXACTLY what needs to happen. I emailed my state and local reps about this a couple days ago. Imagine that, requiring pilots to have a *GASP* Airline Transport Pilot rating to fly as an Airline Pilot. Crazy i know The airlines can now just hire anyone they want often without even a sim evaluation just to get a warm body to fill a required seat. Force them to hire people with an ATP, people who have shown they can fly to Airline Transport Pilot standards (i know another gasp) then the airlines will have to raise pay to attract actual qualified pilots. That would also help get rid of alot of the zero to hero pilot factories. This absolutely needs to be what happens.

Your an idiot!

Having an ATP has nothing to do with being capable to fly a turbo prop or jet aircraft. You can get your ATP in a god damn light twin for christ sake. If you think having an ATP makes you some kind of superior pilot, you are sorely mistaken. In my opinion, it doesn't even really qualify you as someone that knows what your doing.

What needs to happen is this - regionals need to step up their training programs. The problem with many of these regionals is that they are too cheap to fire someone who performs poorly. They have so much invested in a person... they want to get that person through the system and keep him/her on the line, where they make money. I think some of the better regionals aren't like this (AQP operators)... but the bottom feeders certainly are.

I have seen many people get through the regional AND major training that should not have been. I am still at a loss for why it happens... but it does.

Also it would be nice if people went out and did real flying before coming to a regional. Super, you were CFI->right seat 145 right?

 

[sleeves]

Your an idiot!



Also it would be nice if people went out and did real flying before coming to a regional. Super, you were CFI->right seat 145 right?

No, you are an idiot.

To get an ATP you need 1500 hours. That would require some of that real flying you speak of. I used to do IOE for a regional. Two times I had students that had their first actual IFR in the right seat of a 145 while I was giving them IOE. That is not fair to the Pax, to me as the instructor, or to them as pilots. Stepping up the training programs is also needed but this ridiculously low time has got to stop.

 

[turbodriver]

More people have to die.......

Nothing will change until this happens. Unfortunately.

 

[SpauldingSmails]

I can't help but feel this issue isn't in the mind of the of the public as much as we'd like to think. We tend to pay close attention to what the media says about the profession, because heck, we're in it.

In my opinion, people really don't care all that much. "Every couple years one of those little planes crashes", is what Joe Public thinks. Unless there is an alarming rash of fatal accidents, this will just be another footnote in the annals of aviation disaster.

The "regional pilot" will take it on the nose, due to inexperience. Life will go on, and everyone will forget.

Interesting there's not as much dirt to dig on pilots at major airlines when they make egregious errors. Delta and NWA both had incidents where the aircraft were never properly configured for takeoff, they went off the end killing a total of 164 people in the process. Simply lack of attention to detail, same as letting the airspeed decay... a fatal brain fart.

 

[Bad-Andy]

True, but having an ATP will make you a better pilot than the 500 wonder that came out of gulfstream who has had NO prior experience in a RJ let alone in a glass cockpit.....

Having flown with a good number of those "500 hour wonders" (as you called them) back at X-Jet, and a good number of 3000-4000 hour F/Os on the Whale, and now teaching both in Fifi, I can tell you first-hand that numbers of hours definitely does NOT have any bearing on flying skills. I flew with plenty of 500 hour guys that were great (and had better attitudes). I flew with plenty of "high-time" PFOs on the 74 that scared the crap out of me.

The 1500 hour requirement for an ATP is a joke. You could get 1500 hours in a C-152, then go do an ATP in a Seminole or Duchess. I guarantee that guy is a worse pilot than the 1200 hour check hauler bouncing around single-pilot in the weather (yet without an ATP...).

The answer is not to require an ATP, but rather to require more thorough hiring practices (SIM, in depth background checks, pre-employment check of training records, etc). The problem is it is too easy for someone that doesn't belong in a plane to end up in the cockpit... And, it would be waaaaaay more expensive for a company to properly screen candidates (and we all know that they are ALL too cheap to spend $$$ when they don't have to...)

 

[pianoman]

The solution is simple; allow a committee of pilots to have final say over who gets the offer instead of HR personnel unfamiliar with flying.

 

[motch]

It comes down to minimums people...

Some of us remember when you needed a minimum of 500hrs MULTI just to get the interview at a regional! Not to mention Instrument time, total time... In the past few years there were carriers that were hiring and looking at 500 total time. Unreal.

If no major carrier allowed their feeders to hire pilots with low time, we would not be in this problem. If UAL (and their pilots) had said no to Mesa and GoJets, we wouldn't have had the begining of this problem.

I say again.. ATP rating to pilot a part 121 aircraft.

And before Bad-Andy says it's too easy to get a ATP, I'll add that no one that I've ever met could fly 1500 hrs in a 152 and then get a VAILD ride for an ATP.

I've seen guys (and gals) fail their ATP ride at my old carrier when trying to upgrade to Captain. ATP must be flown to standards.
Only then, when you have the ATP should you try and get on with a 121 carrier. And then you still need to pass their interview process and training program.

It will be interesting to see just how far the families of those lost on Colgan, Regions, Comair and Mesa go after those companies, the FAA and also the Mainline Carriers they were flying under.
That is the only way it will change!~

Motch

 

[superrav]

I think you guys all are correct, ATP is not the only answer. I think the training program at Colgan is the problem. At expressjet we hired plenty of 500-600 hr guys, but i think our company invested heavily in the training program and it shows.

 

[chjack]

I wonder what would happen if dozens of Colgan pilots started using the new Fatigue Policy? Kind of like he Chuck Colgan put your money where your mouth is!

exactly! I also like how he claims commuters are REQUIRED to have local accomodations. The best is that they have now made it even harder to get a job at Colgan when the next round of hiring begins. So that means that you will have to jump through even more hoops to work for that bottom feeder.

 

[eaglesview]

All this talk about an ATP is great, but it would not have effected either of the Colgan pilots. Captain with 3000+TT and the FO with 2000+TT. Low timers didn't crash this Q400.

Actually that amount of time is low time. I know there are even lower ones out there but that doesn't make these two any better.

 

[Lear70]

Actually that amount of time is low time. I know there are even lower ones out there but that doesn't make these two any better.

Agreed.

5,000+ hours for a CA, 3,000+ hours for an F/O is about what I'd call an "experienced" regional crew.

It doesn't take that long to get, either, with as much flying as you do every year (850-950 hours). Hired with ATP mins, you could upgrade in about 2 years, and 3 years later you'd be what many would consider an "experienced" Regional Captain.