FAA Set to Raise Retirement Age

[traffic pilot]

I'd love to stick around and discuss this but I have to go get my tips frosted and check out my facebook.

Now, where did I leave my back pack... TC

and where's my hat, oh yea, I never had one.

 

[Andy]

Many of those who lost their pensions got into the business prior to EAL going under and Lorenzo stealing the pensions at CAL (which resulted in the law being changed, ostensibly protecting pensions from corporate raiders).

Between EAL going under (not just a case of having pensions stripped) and the post-9/11 bankruptcies who lost their pensions without their company going belly up?

Dude, all it takes for THE BEST airline to go belly up is a succession of two or three bad CEOs.
Airlines go out of business all the time. Are you going to tell me that there's no way that AMR or SWA will ever go out of business? Is that inconceivable? Tell that to the Pan Am and Eastern guys who got hired in the 60s.
Any pilot who is not prepared for their airline to go chap 7 is living in a dream world.

 

[800Dog]

Many of those who lost their pensions got into the business prior to EAL going under and Lorenzo stealing the pensions at CAL (which resulted in the law being changed, ostensibly protecting pensions from corporate raiders).

Between EAL going under (not just a case of having pensions stripped) and the post-9/11 bankruptcies who lost their pensions without their company going belly up?

800dog may have had the foresight to know his pensions could be 1113'd but 99% of those working for the legacies had no reason to be concerned about their jobs or the security of their pensions.

Given the circumstances, 800dog's actions, while admirable, are akin to having a car but taking a cab everywhere because you never know when your car is going to crap out and leave you stranded... TC

Typical mentality of Americans these days. Its never my fault, I am not responsible, someone else is to blame for my failures, blah blah blah. Its no wonder you are not prepared financially for retirement.

 

[wolfpackpilot]

Excuse me!

I routinely fly with a man who is 70 years old! That’s right, 70, I’m 39 and he’s in better shape than me. We’ve operated the V all over the world together and this guy is as sharp as razor. He doesn’t miss anything, and he is an incredible pilot. I’d put my family in the plane with him any day.

Your lack of knowledge or experience with older pilots is obviously based on personal reflections and not the facts.

 

[Chest Rockwell]

Dude, all it takes for THE BEST airline to go belly up is a succession of two or three bad CEOs.
Airlines go out of business all the time. Are you going to tell me that there's no way that AMR or SWA will ever go out of business? Is that inconceivable? Tell that to the Pan Am and Eastern guys who got hired in the 60s.
Any pilot who is not prepared for their airline to go chap 7 is living in a dream world.

Any pilot who thinks that FARs will never change is living in a dream world.

 

[Bringupthebird]

Typical mentality of Americans these days. Its never my fault, I am not responsible, someone else is to blame for my failures, blah blah blah.

Maybe American liberals, but I digress.

Wait, aren't you arguing that your future (or present) success is dependent on a discriminatory outdated law?

 

[800Dog]

Maybe American liberals, but I digress.

Wait, aren't you arguing that your future (or present) success is dependent on a discriminatory outdated law?

Who says it is discriminatory or outdated? If the age is raised to 65, is not discriminatory to those over the age of 65? Is it not discriminatory that contollers have to retire at what, 58? What about FBI agents having to retire at a specific age? Where does it end. My problem is with guys complaining that the rule must be changed because they have not prepared financially for their retirement which by the way they knew was at age 60. If they were counting on the DB plan, they were stupid and and failed to take personal responsibility for their future. If the age is raised to 65 are you willing to change the medical standards to those of ICAO? Many will not pass. I have no problem with the age being raised but, the medical requirements for all pilots must be more stringent. Lets not have a retirement age and if one passes the stringent medical and checkrides, let them fly. We would not want to be discriminatory now would we?

 

[Bringupthebird]

If the age is raised to 65 are you willing to change the medical standards to those of ICAO? Many will not pass. I have no problem with the age being raised but, the medical requirements for all pilots must be more stringent. Lets not have a retirement age and if one passes the stringent medical and checkrides, let them fly. We would not want to be discriminatory now would we?

Sometimes change needs to be incremental and 60-65 is just that. Incrementalism does not make change illegitimate, it makes it digestible.

Whatever medical standards are in place it is the responsibility of each pilot to meet them. Those that can should not be penalized by those that can't. Who would argue with that?

 

[Mach 80]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB116606581244849849-search.html?KEYWORDS=hoot&COLLECTION=wsjie/6month

Ex-Astronaut Gibson Suits Up
For Posts at Rocket-Ship Firm
By ANDY PASZTOR
December 14, 2006; Page B3

Former astronaut and high-performance aircraft racer Robert "Hoot" Gibson is the latest aviator smitten with the promise of space tourism, becoming chief operating officer and head test pilot for a fledgling California rocketship maker.

Benson Space Co. hopes to gain some cachet by hiring Mr. Gibson, who gained prominence as the first Space Shuttle commander to dock with the Russian Space Station Mir and also ran the astronaut office for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The Poway, Calif., start-up company hopes to use a 1980s-vintage vehicle design, adopted from NASA, to take passengers on heart-jolting rides out of the atmosphere perhaps within two years.

Mr. Gibson's move, expected to be announced as soon as today, illustrates the growing attraction of the fledgling space-tourism industry for some mainstream aerospace engineers and investors. "You've got to be able to launch quite a few folks to make money," said Mr. Gibson, adding that space tourism has the potential to become "a really big developing market."

Mr. Gibson's decades of space experience and a string of notorious cockpit exploits (his hobby is racing high-performance planes, and two years ago he set a pair of world speed records in a single-pilot private jet) will likely give Benson Space a boost in the emerging space-tourism industry.

The closely held firm, created just a few months ago, is engaged in an uphill fight to overtake a more-established and better funded space-tourism effort directed by renowned aviation inventor Burt Rutan. Mr. Rutan and British billionaire Sir Richard Branson, chairman of Virgin Atlantic Airways Ltd., were the first to announce specific plans to open up space for tourists.

The 60-year-old Mr. Gibson, who retired from his job as a pilot for Southwest Airlines in October, said he began advising Benson Space founder Jim Benson about a year ago on a proposal to build a commercially operated cargo spacecraft for NASA. When Mr. Benson's team lost that competition, the entrepreneur opted to push ahead with a passenger version and persuaded Mr. Gibson to help manage the project.

Mr. Gibson's responsibilities will include overseeing construction of a prototype vehicle-dubbed the Dream Chaser -- that closely resembles the Space Shuttle. It will be built by another company affiliated with Mr. Benson.

Once test flights commence, Mr. Benson predicted, "Hoot will be able to fly as much as he wants and we can afford."

Despite his new commercially oriented role, Mr. Gibson can't forsake his adventurous nature. Already, he is talking about plans to set world altitude records for a ground-launched aircraft powered by a rocket. As early as the winter of 2008, Mr. Gibson said, he hopes to pilot the Dream Chaser to at least 104 miles above Earth.

In 1990, Mr. Gibson was grounded from astronaut flying activities for a year after his aircraft collided with a stunt plane at an air show, and he landed safely. He was punished for participating in the show in violation of NASA rules, not because the other aircraft crashed into a cornfield and killed its pilot.

Abandoning NASA's vision of a space capsule floating to the ground with a parachute, Mr. Gibson is working on a vehicle able to blast off without needing a separate rocket and then return gradually to land at an airstrip like an airplane. To make it economically feasible, rocket motors will be designed for fast turnaround, including replacement in about 15 minutes.

Deflecting questions about doing risky flight maneuvers and powerless glides at his age, Mr. Gibson said with a chuckle that his father continued working as a test pilot for the Federal Aviation Administration after turning 70.