Growing Pilot Shortage

[atpcliff]

According to a breakdown from ALPA, Delta hired a 61y/o guy recently (I don't understand it either). Delta isn't having any trouble finding eager applicants with more time of useful consciousness.

I don't know anyone who can get the inside scoop on this.

Delta was having no-shows for class, and new hires leaving during class, earlier this year...as was FedEx, SWA, and Hawaiian.

 

[bafanguy]

Delta was having no-shows for class, and new hires leaving during class, earlier this year...

atpcliff,

That's what I heard also. The SVP, Flt Ops, even commented on it in a weekly update but said the numbers were not beyond "usual attrition" or words to that effect...kind of downplayed the issue. Hard to say.

It also works the other way with a few coming from the likes of UAL, etc., TO Delta. I'm familiar with a couple of those.

Times are very different. I personally took friends' apps in for review by the guy who was then head of pilot hiring in the early-mid 70s. They were furloughed from UAL/TWA but DL wouldn't touch them because they "belonged" to another carrier !! They would gladly have resigned their seniority number but DL wouldn't consider them.

Frankly, it's better now that people have the potential to make choices.

 

[pilotyip]

Wow maybe there is still life at FI, a whole thread on an aviation topic.

 

[bafanguy]

Wow...a whole thread on an aviation topic.

yip,

Why not...the price is right !

You probably don't really want to get me going on the matter of pilot hiring.

 

[pilotyip]

You probably don't really want to get me going on the matter of pilot hiring.

Tell us more, we need those great stories

 

[bafanguy]

I took my Zantop buddy's app in and sat across the desk while Mr. Hiring Guru went over it line by line:

"That looks good."

"OK, that's fine."

"Uh huh, good."

"Oh !! Sorry, we can't hire him. Our minimum height is 5'6" and he says he's 5'5.5". [paper apps contained such questions at one time]

My jaw must've hit the desk. He said:

"Flight Ops did a study and found there are controls that can't be reached from the LHS of the L-1011 if a person is less than 5'6"?"

So, if a 5'5.5" guy was on the property when the L-1011 was introduced, they'd tell hm he couldn't bid it ? Sure they would?:nuts:

We had guys so short they practically had to stand on an orange crate to reach the sequence reports hanging on the ops counter.

I exercised more self restraint than I can usually muster, thanked him for his time and left.

 

[pilotyip]

I took my Zantop buddy's app in and sat across the desk while Mr. Hiring Guru went over it line by line:

"That looks good."

"OK, that's fine."

"Uh huh, good."

Oh !! Sorry, we can't hire him." Our minimum height is 5'6" and he says he's 5'5.5". [paper apps contained such questions at one time]

My jaw must've hit the desk. He said:

"Flight Ops did a study and found there are controls that can't be reached from the LHS of the L-1011 if a person is less than 5'6"?"

So, if a 5'5.5" guy was on the property when the L-1011 was introduced, they'd tell hm he couldn't bid it ? Sure they would?:nuts:

We had guys so short they practically had to stand on an orange crate to reach the sequence reports hanging on the ops counter.

I exercised more self restraint than I can usually muster, thanked him for his time and left.

So you are a Zantop Alumn? Me too, when and what equip, I drove the L-188. Have you read Peter Fusco's Book "Moondog's Academy of the Air and Other Disasters" He is an ex-Zantop guy who tells stories similar to yours. A good read.

 

[bafanguy]

yip,

I'm not a Z alum but knew a couple of guys who were. One of them made it to DL but he was fortunate: he didn't have my "help".

When I was a DC9 capt, I worked with a retired USAF guy who had taken a shot at the airlines after his first tour when he was 31 y/o. Result ? He was TOO OLD.

But when he was 41 y/o...HE WASN'T !!!

 

[pilotyip]

yip,

I'm not a Z alum but knew a couple of guys who were. One of them made it to DL but he was fortunate: he didn't have my "help".

When I was a DC9 capt, I worked with a retired USAF guy who had taken a shot at the airlines after his first tour when he was 31 y/o. Result ? He was TOO OLD.

But when he was 41 y/o...HE WASN'T !!!

yea the old joke. If you were over 30 to get an interview at a major in 1977 you needed two logged lunar landings ?

 

[bafanguy]

Any search for logic in the airline hiring process will only find frustration.

Of course, the HR types all think they have a scientific process producing the perfect new hire. If it's so infallible, why do they change it...and change it...and change it ?

I suppose one could cite changing circumstances and demographics to support the need for occasional change. Mmmm, maybe...

The current process at the legacy level is a good example. Much more subjectivity than science.

Yet they have 10s of 1000s of seat to fill and they want to see the applicant reading Dr. Seuss books to blind orphans on his days off ?

Or, want to know what he'd do as captain if the FO refused to wear his hat. As if any answer to that question meant anything.

Flight time...professional history ? Not so much.

Prediction: sub-750 hour r-ATPs coming to a legacy near you. :laugh: