How!?

[urflyingme?!]

I'M 19. I go to the Mesa Airlines School. How do you guys think a pilot should "pay his dues" and how are we supposed to get a job without lowering the bar? I cant just walk into United and start out as a 57 capt......

 

[uscpilot]

Not another PFT discussion

Please dont tell me there is going to be another PFT thread. Try a search, or just go to the training forum, there is a huge PFT thread. If you still have questions, or if by then you dont think your comment about walking in and being a 57 capt is not absurd, then come back.
usc

 

[urflyingme?!]

i read the pft thread. maybbe i should be more specific

People here seem to hate the regionals, mesa included possibly at the top of the list.

I have been given the oppourtunity to skip the years of waiting around at my local field for some schmuck to let me take him up and tell him about p-factor once a week. I have been given the chance at becoming a first officer on either a rj or a turbo prop. Yes the pay is bad, but it is better than being a CFI... This will also provide me with multi/turbine time, and expedite my timebuiling as well as the quality of my time.

So I ask, what is the big deal here? Why is it such a travesty to accept a turbine job at 21yr 0mo of age and begin my career?

 

[350DRIVER]

The Mesa Airlines Pilot Development Program (MAPD) is about as far from PFT as you can find. You must prove yourself, succeed, etc, etc, or you will be booted from the program and sent on your way. The people who go through this program do extremely well when they hit the line due to the strict standardization, procedures, etc, etc. They train you to be an airline pilot from day one, bottom line. This is surely no walk in the park and will not baby sit you. This is much different from anything that you could label PFT ala Gulfstream or Tab Express, you are not "renting" a seat out or anything along those lines.


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[urflyingme?!]

that is exactly what i have seen at tis program... now let me ask another question.... I see so much talk of pft, but where can i find a good definition of this?

Are we talking type ratings and recurrent training?

 

[Gulfstream 200]

why do you care so much about what people think????...

heck, you will be a turboprop F/O instead of waiting around at the airport to teach some schmuck!!!


(or at least thats what you believe)


every time I read one of the moronic posts I wish I had started some "FO training program" and gotten rich off of idiots....what a missed opportunity.....oh well

 

[avbug]

I have been given the oppourtunity to skip the years of waiting around at my local field for some schmuck to let me take him up and tell him about p-factor once a week. I have been given the chance at becoming a first officer on either a rj or a turbo prop. Yes the pay is bad, but it is better than being a CFI... This will also provide me with multi/turbine time, and expedite my timebuiling as well as the quality of my time.

Too late. You just lowered the bar, all by your little lonesome self. Congratulations, and don't let the door hit you on the way out.

 

[JB74]

I don't understand. How can you call a guy a "schmuck" who has the same interests and goals as you do. Not cool.

 

[Traumahawk]

I'll take the bait....

I have been given the oppourtunity to skip the years of waiting around at my local field for some schmuck to let me take him up and tell him about p-factor once a week. I have been given the chance at becoming a first officer on either a rj or a turbo prop. Yes the pay is bad, but it is better than being a CFI...

...........and expedite my timebuiling as well as the quality of my time.

So I ask, what is the big deal here? Why is it such a travesty to accept a turbine job at 21yr 0mo of age and begin my career?

The Audacity of these comments. This has to be a joke.

Instructing can be one of the most satisfying things in aviation, and you my friend, just cemented once again that I am going the right way. I'd much rather teach some schmuck about P-factor then have to teach some *ss like you about perspective.

And go get yourself a pen. You can do a lot more "timebuilding" for less.


--T-hawk "AKA former----er, no, still a SCHMUCK"

P.S. I don't care where he/she flies, w/ that attitude this person is the BEATING HEART of PFT.

 

[enigma]

I'M 19. I go to the Mesa Airlines School. How do you guys think a pilot should "pay his dues" and how are we supposed to get a job without lowering the bar? I cant just walk into United and start out as a 57 capt......

urflyingme, there is no shame in the MESA PD program. If if understand correctly, it is a training program that takes a pilot from zero to hire-able. You are truly paying for training. Going to MPD is no different than going to a local junior college training program in the PFT respect.

The confusion over "PFT" is caused by the way the term is used; in truth, PFT would be better termed PFJ, with the J standing for Job. "PFT" is pure and simply, when equally qualified pilots are ranked according to their willingness to write a check for the job. In past practice, a company such as Comair or Continental Express required that you show up at newhire groundschool with a check in hand. The check wasn't for any sort of training, because their minimums were still somewhere around 1000/200, or higher. PFT was a way to extract profit from a pilot oversupply. Or put another way, COEX would hire an FO qualified pilot with $10,000 and put him in an E120 at a time that they could have hired a 727 typed ex-Braniff Captain for the same job. The discriminator was the applicants willingness to pay for the job.

That is/was PFT.


In the threads that have been contested lately, the arguments were not really against young beginners who are trying to get ahead. The anger was being directed towards those who make a fortune in some business venture, then decide to be a professional pilot because of their midlife crisis, and are happy to work for nothing. They don't choose to work for nothing because they need experience; they choose to work for nothing because they don't want to enter the profession at the traditional bottom. They want to undercut someone who started out like you are and take his job. Since they don't "need" the money, employers love them, and take advantage of their desire to fly. Some employers are so enamoured with their desire to work for less, that the employer will make hiring decisions on that desire instead of basing his choice on the best qualified.

Now quit calling any paying customer a scmuck.


regards,
enigma

PS, one last thing, the reason that I even bother getting into a PFT discussion is to educate a newbie so that they will not make the mistake of undercutting us ALL by whoring themselves out. Shortcutting the system may get you ahead for now, but it drags down the very wages that attracted you to the profession in the beginning. Please note that "you" doesn't mean you personally.

 

[sf3boy]

A friend of mine just upgraded to ERJ captain who has been at Air Midwest/Mesa for about five years. The first thing he told me was how excited he was about having 300 hour San Juan guys in the right seat. He wasn't to thrilled about having to teach FO's what clouds are. Go instruct, fly some freight, or go military. I would recommend some actual experience before one flies paying passengers around.

 

[350DRIVER]

The first thing he told me was how excited he was about having 300 hour San Juan guys in the right seat. He wasn't to thrilled about having to teach FO's what clouds are. Go instruct, fly some freight, or go military. I would recommend some actual experience before one flies paying passengers around.

The above is pretty comical but faceless and false for the most part. I know quite a few of those guys at Mesa who sign the flight release and I have heard nothing but praise on how well the first officers are prepared, line ready, etc, etc, upon completion of ioe.

urflyingme?!,

You have the opportunity so now is the time to prove yourself and make it through the program, not a very easy task by any means but hard to beat the training. This program will prepare you for the line upon completion and you should have absolutely no (zero) problems when in training. That is why it is such a standardized and difficult training program from day 1.


Some people seem to neglect to realize that the washout rate is very low with the mapd grads, obviously due to the quality of the program and the way that it is tailored and set up. You will be fine when all is said and done. I have talked 3 of my former students into going there and I will continue to be an advocate and supporter of it, facts speak for themselves.

3 5 0

ps> you should not give a flying fuc% what anyone else thinks..


pss>> I am willing to make a rather large wager on the fact that I think Tab Express/FO is behind this one as well... After reading the second reply everything seemed to come together.- Too bad he picked a school that is n o t PFT.- Tab, you could have done better than this....

 

[sf3boy]

350Driver,
I am a changed man. I now have realized the errors in my old fashioned, closed minded thinking. I firmly believe that all airlines should hire 300 hour pilots to fill the right seat of 50,70,90 seat jets. That way when they have enough seniority to be a captain, they can say, "wow, the last a/c that I was in command of was.....wait, I've never been in command of any aircraft." Thanks 350, from this day on I will be the first to say experience is for suckers.

 

[Dubya]

I've heard of banging the company drum...but sheesh.



W

 

[350DRIVER]

sf3boy,

The bottom line is that this program works, like it or hate it... These applicants can have 300TT or 2000TT, does not matter since they still have to pass interview, indoctrination, systems class, sim training, ride, oral, ioe, etc, etc. No 121 carrier can allow a "short cut" to the line due to reduced flight hours. The mapd students are put to the test long before they are line qualified. If one cannot cut it then they are weeded out long before they make it to ground school.

3 5 0

 

[urflyingme?!]

Thanks for the advice everyone. I would like to make a few points though... i do not think that instructing is a bad job, it's just one that is poorly paid for the skill required. I also do not want that to be my first carreer, i DO look forward to instructing at a later date, though...

Thanks for the input guys... And I don't believe I have lowered any bars, because I was still in High School when that contract got voted in!! (Man....)

 

[sf3boy]

I have thought more about this today and have come to the conclusion that we all payed for "training" unless we were from the ranks of the military. It has been the paying for the job, like enigma stated, that really bothers me.

On the other hand, my passengers pay anywhere from 300 to 2000 dollars for a seat. I would only hope that these passengers would like to have experienced pilots at the helm.

I did think of a good money making scheme though. Paris Junior College should offer a one year surgeon course and then give them placement at a hospital after "testing out". What the patients don't know won't kill them. We hope.

 

[surplus1]

My Nickel's Worth

Thanks for the advice everyone. I would like to make a few points though... i do not think that instructing is a bad job, it's just one that is poorly paid for the skill required. I also do not want that to be my first carreer, i DO look forward to instructing at a later date, though...

Thanks for the input guys... And I don't believe I have lowered any bars, because I was still in High School when that contract got voted in!! (Man....)

I read your original post and all the replies so far.

I don't know anything about MAPD or the quality of your training.

I do know that in this country everyone who learns to fly, with the exception of military pilots, has to pay someone, something, for his initial licenses and ratings. Call it whatever you choose, it costs money to learn how to fly and it always has.

It is wonderful that a young person like yourself is still willing to prepare for a career as a pilot at a time like this. A time when all the down-sides of being an airline pilot are perhaps more clear than they have ever been.

I congratulate on your desire to have wings and to join the rest of us in this very challenging but interesting adventure that we all love. I think you're crazy and could probably do much better by pursuing a more stable avocation. However, I've been where you are and I understand your dream.

I want to welcome you to the world of flying, and I don't give a hoot where you got your training. What I do care about is how well you do your job and how dedicated you are to giving your best. If you work hard, don't get filled with too much pride, and ask questions, you'll learn more everytime you leave terra firma and you will get better with every flight. Strut all you want in the terminal building, but once you enter the cockpit, turn off the Pride Switch before you sit down, and don't turn it on again until you flight has ended, at the gate.

The first time you make a flight and you don't learn something or have some new experience, should be the last time you make any flights. Remember that, no matter how many "hours" you have.

You could have paid for your flight training at the local FBO, at Embry Riddle, at UND, at Purdue, at the Comair (now DCI) Academy, at Flight Safety or at a thousand other places, some good some mediocre, some bad. You chose MAPD for whatever reasons. The point is you wanted to fly and you are doing it. Regardless of where you went to school, you will get out of it what you put into it.

Some schools are better than others. Some give you what it takes to pass an FAA flight test and nothing more. Others are more structured and offer a much broader perspective, some are what we call "license factories".

Much is said about the advantages of being a CFI. Well, it can't hurt you to do that, but the truth is that most CFI's are not teaching because they want to teach, the are teaching because they can't get a job anywhere else. You often learn in spite of them rather than because of them. It is, more often than not, a classic case of "the blind leading the blind". And yes, I've been a CFI. I learned a lot doing that, probably much more than my students did. If you choose to become a CFI you will learn a great deal from the experience, but you certainly don't have to be a CFI to become a good airline pilot. Simply put, it is not a requirement. Like most pilots, I did not become a CFI because I was thrilled by the idea. I became a CFI because, at the time, it was the only available way to get a flying job.

There's a lot of rhetoric about flying freight in some junk airplane in the middle of the night to "build experience". Well, I've done that too. It is also true that I had several acquaintances that literally "died trying". Yes, I learned a lot of things and many of them have been useful later on. It is also true that I developed just as many, if not more, bad habits that later had to be unlearned. I was also lucky that I didn't kill myself or manage to get violated and put a tarnish on my record. I did not do it because it was "great experience" or because I thought I needed to "pay my dues". That's BS. I did it for the same reasons that most of us do, i.e., I couldn't get a better job somewhere else.

And by the way, it happens I was a military pilot first. Before I got a CFI, and before I had to fly a beat-up Beech-18 in the middle of the night. When I got out of the military the industry happened to be in one of its infamous "down turns" and jobs were not easy to get so, like everybody else, I did what I had to do. When I got furloughed and yes, I did, I just did what I had to do again, to survive and feed my family. So you're not talking to a "cherry".

Bottom line. If your flight school will give you a chance to prove you can fly better equipment, in a safer environment, and if that is what YOU want to do, take the opportunity and don't look back.

That DOES not mean that I approve of what is called PFT (enigma is right, it should be PFJ). I do NOT think that any company should require a pilot to pay for the specialized training that Company is required, by law, to give that pilot before they can put him/her "on-line". Some companies do that and it is not a good thing.

However, that does not seem to be what MAPD is doing. It appears they are putting you into a "structured" program that is designed to better prepare you for entry level airline flying at the parent company. If you complete that program and it gives you a chance to fly for the airline that operates the program, it is my opinion that you should take that opportunity.

It is not your fault that someone else did not choose to go to that school or preferred a different route. You are responsible for the choices that YOU make, not for the choices that others make, good or bad.

If your school gives you the opportunity to get an interview or a job with an airline, when you only have 300 flight hours, my advice is easy, take the job! There is no logical reason why you should have to spend 1500 hours flying in the traffic pattern or the practice area before you do it, just because that's the route that somebody else chose to follow. By the time you get 1500 hours yourself, chances are you'll learn and know a he!! of alot more than that disgruntled CFI. If you don't, the airline will can you long before you get 1500 hours. And by the way, 1500 hours or any other number of "hours" is nothing more than an arbitrary by-product of the law of supply and demand.

Military pilots find themselves in command of complex weapons systems with Mach 2 capability, with the same 300 hours that you will have. They can do this because they have the benefit of the best structured and specialized training in the world. Additionally, at least when I was there, they don't have a bunch of "CFI's" who are themselves just learning how to fly. The IP's are experienced and highly competent.

Your training at MAPD or any other civilian pilot school will not be as good as military training, simply because no civilian school can afford to offer that type of equipment and most pilot trainees could not afford to buy it if they did.

Many foreign (West European) airlines have ab-initio training programs that produce new pilots who begin with zero flight time. They are very selective (more so than any US school), very structured, and very effective. The graduates step right in to the cockpits of 737's or similar equipment, and they do well, with 300 hours. They do not do this because they feel like it, they do it because there are shortages of qualified applicants in those countries. That doesn't happen to be the case in the USA, or our airlines would do it too. MAPD may not be as good as those programs, but apparently it is good enough. The truth is that 300 hours of experience can be a lot better than one hour of experience repeated 1000 times.

What you are doing or have done at MAPD doesn't sound like PFT to me. I'm glad you were able to do it and I'm sorry if some other folks that chose a different path are unhappy about that. That's life. It's not fair (life) and it isn't ever going to be. The majority of us got the jobs that we have on the basis of "luck", not skill. We just happened to be in the right place at the right time, with whatever quals that particular company wanted at that time. It did not happen because we were giants of aeronautical expertise. We were just plain lucky.

I'll probably get "stoned" for what I've said to you, but I still think you should take that job at MESA if they offer it to you. "Pay your dues" by working at MESA. That particular company would not be my "company of first choice", but if that is the company that will hire you with 300 hours, then let them. You can always move on at a later date if you don't like it. Meanwhile, work hard at becoming the best professional airman that you possibly can be. Never mind the naysayers. A high percentage of that is envy. You don't know and I don't know what any of them would do, if they had the same opportunity and the tables were turned in their favor.

I wish you the very best in your future. I only wish that I was lucky enough to be 19 again. God bless you.

Sincerely,
Surplus 1.

And yes, I'd be happy to have the chance to share a cockpit with an ambitious young pilot like you seem to be (but I don't work for MESA). I especially don't think you should get "jumped" on by a bunch of unhappy pilots for asking an honest question that shows your concern and need for advice. I also feel "lucky" that I don't have to work for MESA at this point, but my reasons are very different from those of a "new" airman. If I was just starting out I would prefer other airlines, but with 300 hours the choices are very limited.

 

[Aerosurfer]

AMEN to that!!!!

 

[urflyingme?!]

Surplus thanks for the info... to all who had constructive things to say thank you, to the naysayers wellllll.............