Hiring @ Southern Air

[texarkana]

Still going on? Any more news??

 

[Flyingtom145]

Yup. Just brought another aircraft on the property today.

 

[ootskdog]

What's the word on getting 747-400s at Southern?

Also, with the new airplane today, how many are in the fleet now?

Thanks

 

[BUFF Flyer]

What knid of growth do you guys see this year?

 

[pilotbrain]

What knid of growth do you guys see this year?

I think that we 16 airplanes now. And i have heard rumors that we are getting 4 NCA airplanes.

 

[avbug]

You don't fly for Southern Air, pilotbrain. You were the guy that failed his interview for Skywest last year, remember?

It's important to keep the lies straight, you know.

 

[CX880]

Does SA hire Tprop guys? Also what's training like, is it paid?

 

[27 driver]

I do work for SAI and take it from me, if you come here bring a big tub of KY jelly cause you will need it. You will be abused. I tried my best to keep a good attitude here but it is impossible. If you have any other offers give them serious consideration.

 

[On Your Six]

I do work for SAI and take it from me, if you come here bring a big tub of KY jelly cause you will need it. You will be abused. I tried my best to keep a good attitude here but it is impossible. If you have any other offers give them serious consideration.

Can you elaborate a bit? Examples of "abuses."

 

[dakotaHC8]

In a nutshell, there are so many changes going on at Southern right now, that tings are pretty crazy. And as a result, the flight crews are dealing with a full plate.

The Merger with Cargo 360 is just about done, and with that was an ownership and change of control of the company.

There is a change of our crew scheduling/travel from the small in-house department, to a private company that specializes in crew scheduling.

There have been ongoing new hire classes, one after the other, that have been adding new personnel that need to go through IOE, and get online

New Aircraft have been coming in at a rapid pace, with the C360 aircraft now online, and a handful of other aircraft arriving soon. Predictions are for the fleet to grow to over 20 aircraft by years end. It was just 4 Aircraft when I started just two years ago.

Additional contracts and adhoc fllying have been brought on, with others to follow, so instead of a handful of destinations, we are pretty much going everywhere.

And the crew group has been getting involved with creating our pairings, trying to move towards a different style of schedule, more focused towards a 2 on, 2 off kind of flying, that has crews flying more + shorter layovers, so as to get your flying in quicker and allow a return to home... Yet with the shortage of pilots, guys are staying out as long as they had before, and just flying more.

Basically, there are a lot of growing pains, and it is the Southern crewmembers that are shouldering the burden. Hopefully the crew group and new schedulers will make for some improvements in the near terms, but if we continue to grow like they have planned, it will probably be chaotic for awhile.

 

[DA-20]

72...come over to gemini and enjoy a real azz exam..u aint seen nothing.

 

[27 driver]

Everything Dakota said is true. Except I no longer am looking through rose colored glasses. The crews are expected to carry the burden of making these flights move. I don't think that it will get better. This is the way management wants it. This is ACMI and the new owners are not interested in giving pilots a good QOL. They want a profit an that is the bottom line. MX is horrible. It is not the mechanics, they receive no support either. I will give you the real scoop. When you bid a line, don't expect to fly that line. Scheduling will change it at their convienience. They will screw you out of overtime pay and lie to you about the reason. Management does not adhere to the employee contract. The chief pilot will back them in their lies. I use to defend SAI. I can no longer do this. They keep saying hang in there it is getting better. For the last year and a half it has gotten worse. They recently screwed me out of about $1,000 dollars of overtime and blamed it on the computers crashing. The chief pilot basically said that is how it is. If you do come here just understand that you are a tool that management will use and abuse. I took me over a year to figure it out. I guess I am not to smart. They will send you all over the world with no established form of communication, no support, no instructions on how to get to and from the hotels, no idea how to get your outbound flight plan, and plan on getting to your destination and not having any hotel reservations. Oh yeah, and try to get runway analysis for new airports when you can't even contact the company. All this after 20 + hours on duty. And you will have many duty days over 20 hours. If you try to tell scheduling you are tired, they instantly get the CP on the phone to threaten you. I have spent over 30 hours on airplanes before. It will continue to happen. They will take trips from you and give them to other crews who are not over guarantee. If you like being lied to and abused, then by all means welcome to Southern Air. If I were you I would go to a regional and build time that way. At least you will have work and duty rules there. Supplemental ACMI has no duty time regulations and management takes full advantage of that.

And by the way, you will never see 2 weeks on and 2 weeks off at SAI. Never have, never will. It isn't going to happen. I am not bitter though.
cheers

 

[swordfish]

Pilotbrain does work at Southern. How's it going Pilotbrain.

 

[avbug]

Pilotbrain was the youngest captain at Cargo 360, a failed F/O at Skywest, a young hopeful to fly a King Air in Pueblo, Colorado, and a F/O for several regionals (including Skywest, where he also said he was rejected)...all in the past year. Now it's Southern.

Doesn't look good for your credibility either, swordfish.

 

[Reebo]

Doesn't look good for your credibility either, swordfish.

He and Pilotbrain are both G0Jet scabs :angryfire