Looks Like 1500 Hours May Become the New Hiring Minimum Among Other Things:

[Lear70]

What does 1500 hours do for anyone? I have interviewed a USAF pilot leaving active service with less than 1500 hours after 10 years of service, but it was all MEL turbo jet, mostly EC-135. By this standard he could not fly in the right seat of a commuter 121 airplane. But Joe CFI with 1501 hours, 4 MEL would take his place. Who would you rather have in the right seat? About helo pilots where would they fit into this proposal.

Too bad, so sad, suck it up, cupcake, and sign up for another 4 years, get your 1,500 hours, and come back when you have it.

I don't really care who gets their feelings hurt or who might have to shlep it out longer as a CFI or humping the airport for multi time (like most of us non-military folk did) or fly in the military a little longer than anticipated as long as it starts to address the many issues our career has.

Don't like it? Go do something else. I don't really give a sh*t whether you think it's fair or not; this needed to happen YEARS ago.

 

[JumpersAway]

It's always struck me as strange that a pilot needed to go to an airline in order to build up enough time to fly checks in a Cherokee Six under part 135. Bout' time this was fixed. Whether you like ALPA or not, this just bought everyone more leverage, and your skill and tallent just became worth more....................

 

[Draginass]

1500 hours after 10 years of military service is pretty weak. Sounds like someone who was more interested in sitting at a desk instead of progressing in a flying career. In any case, tough. Mins are the min.

 

[Diesel-9]

1500 hours after 10 years of military service is pretty weak

In this day and age, maybe not. EC-135's probably don't fly many sorties and with all the cutbacks he probably got a desk jockey tour also. The military pretty much dictates your flying career. I douht he had much control over the hours he accumulated. Adding the .2 per sortie probably didn't help him much either.

 

[brokeflyer]

Id rather have a 1500 hour freight hauler in the right seat than any regional, military, falcon 20 standards manager any day of the week.

 

[Trash8Mofo]

How about some standards to regulate flight schools. One of the reasons why pilot salaries continue to decline is that there are UNLIMITED supplies of pilots. There is always a 22yr kid with no obligations ready to take your job for $20K/yr. Look around, there are 3 or 4 flight schools on every field. Anybody with $40K can be a pilot. Toughen up on the flight schools and toughen up on the FAR141 standards will not only improve safety, but also limit the supplies of pilots (which will improve salaries in the long run).

 

[brokeflyer]

How about some standards to regulate flight schools. One of the reasons why pilot salaries continue to decline is that there are UNLIMITED supplies of pilots. There is always a 22yr kid with no obligations ready to take your job for $20K/yr. Look around, there are 3 or 4 flight schools on every field. Anybody with $40K can be a pilot. Toughen up on the flight schools and toughen up on the FAR141 standards will not only improve safety, but also limit the supplies of pilots (which will improve salaries in the long run).

I cant find the thread but I said something like that a year ago and was called a communist for it.

I suggested that they limit the commercial and ATP to meet demand. I had my commercial in 1968 for no other reason than to just have it. I decided later that I wanted fly for a career.

 

[Nevets]

How about some standards to regulate flight schools. One of the reasons why pilot salaries continue to decline is that there are UNLIMITED supplies of pilots. There is always a 22yr kid with no obligations ready to take your job for $20K/yr. Look around, there are 3 or 4 flight schools on every field. Anybody with $40K can be a pilot. Toughen up on the flight schools and toughen up on the FAR141 standards will not only improve safety, but also limit the supplies of pilots (which will improve salaries in the long run).

Here is what ALPA said about that:

Need for Stronger Academic Emphasis
The Joint Aviation Authority (JAA), now the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), and FAA pilot licensing requirements are both ICAO-compliant. The single biggest difference between EASA and FAA is knowledge requirements. The FAA theoretical knowledge is simply not as demanding as EASA, which has 14 written exams versus one by the FAA, which is a multiple-choice exam. The EASA exams require the student to be tested for 30-40 hours. By stark contrast, the FAA publishes its exam questions with answers provided so a student can purchase them, study the questions, and pass its single exam. Examination questions are not available for EASA exams in such a manner.

The least demanding Federal Aviation Regulations which govern commercial pilot license requirements (i.e., §61.125 and §61.155) specify the aeronautical knowledge requirements for commercial and airline transport pilot ratings. These rules were written decades ago, when there was no expectation that they would be used as minimum standards to train pilots to take jobs as airline first officers. The requirements emphasize weather and navigation, including interaction with air traffic control. There is some mention of aircraft aerodynamics and human factors, including aeronautical decision making and judgment as well as crew resource management. The regulations allow self-study and many such training courses emphasize passing the test rather than learning the material. We do not feel these requirements are adequate to prepare a professional airline pilot. The ground instruction of these subjects needs to be strengthened with required formal classroom academic instruction and more extensive testing and examination.

The EASA-approved training course for a commercial airline pilot tends to be rather structured and rigorous. FAA should develop and implement a corollary ground school and testing process in FAR Part 121 for all pilots who seek commercial airline careers. Testing akin to the quality of the Certified Public Accountant (CPA) exams or bar exam for attorneys would benefit aviation by serving as a screening tool to ensure that, in the future, only the most knowledgeable and dedicated pilots join the ranks of airline pilots.
http://www.alpa.org/portals/alpa/pressroom/testimony/2009/PraterTM_6-11-09written.pdf

 

[ultrarunner]

A 1500 hr requirement will put a huge dent in the bridge program model that have been offered in the past as incentive to enroll with a pilot mill. The "non-CFI" crowd may be heavily put off and not bother to pursue a flying career. Seems many skipped this character-building step to get hired on with 300-500 hours.

That's a good thing! The supply-and-demand will finally shift!

 

[Superpilot92]

This is fantastic and its exactly what needs to happen. The airlines will fight it because thats how they can keep the pay low by having an endless supply of pilot mill students. They are getting away with sacrificing safety for the almighty dollar. Imagine that, require and AIRLINE PILOT to possess an AIRLINE TRANSPORT PILOT certificate before flying in the 121 world!! I think that ATP mins should be the lowest requirement as far as time goes but not necessarily the certificate. If a guy has the time then the airline should give them their ATP while going through training that way new pilots dont have to pay for their ATP.

 

[General Lee]

I think this is great. The regionals will have to bring up pay, since pilots with 1500 hours or more will be high time instructors, or cargo dogs flying Caravans. Those Caravan pilots often make pretty good money (to keep them there flying in the "sticks"), and they won't leave for a $16,000 a year job flying a CRJ. This will also make regional flying more expensive for the legacies, which may make them rethink about dumping smaller mainline planes for 76 seaters. A win win for everyone---higher pay for new FOs, on fewer regional planes. The passengers will like it, (no more sitting next to huge Samoan dudes on 3 hour flights in smaller RJs) and the flight crews will like the higher pay.

Next, could we get a mandatory retirement age for stews?


Bye Bye--General Lee

 

[ImbracableCrunk]

I'm sure the pilots already hired with less than 1,500 hours would be grandfathered in. Ex post facto laws are unconstitutional.

1,500 hours sounds like a realistic starting point to me.

I don't think they're criminalizing low-time-pilotry, so I think they'll be safe from the prison system.

 

[pilotyip]

Ive never been impressed with military pilots transfering to civilian. Myself included.

We are very good at what we do but when we go to civilian, we may as well start from scratch.

My expereinced is just the opposite.
We are not a great target for the military pilot, but about 30% of our hires are military trained pilots. We like to hire them because of a higher percentage successfully complete training, like one failure of 47 new hires and the civilian side it is like 14 failures out of 119 hires. In addition, no military pilot has needed additional IOE time or had any problem going through upgrade. This includes Helo pilots, which normally on the second sim session, blow their fixed wing non-turbine civilian counter parts out of the water. Side subject, but I can not understand the airlines hiring department prejudice against Helo time, they are fantastic sticks and we are lucky to get them.

 

[Lear70]

Next, could we get a mandatory retirement age for stews?


Bye Bye--General Lee

That's the funniest thing I've seen on this board all week...

 

[DrewBlows]

The military vs. civilian debate is pointless to argue. The answer is you hire the person who can make intelligent decisions, be pleasant to work with for multiple days at a time, and who can pass training...in that order. Back ground gets you to the interview, your personality will determine the things I detailed above.

Requiring an ATP will do very little to change the quality of new hires unless the training standards to obtain the ATP are changed to emphasize human factors and decision making. This, of course, is only my opinion.

 

[Bringupthebird]

I think this is great. The regionals will have to bring up pay, since pilots with 1500 hours or more will be high time instructors, or cargo dogs flying Caravans. Those Caravan pilots often make pretty good money (to keep them there flying in the "sticks"), and they won't leave for a $16,000 a year job flying a CRJ. This will also make regional flying more expensive for the legacies, which may make them rethink about dumping smaller mainline planes for 76 seaters. A win win for everyone---higher pay for new FOs, on fewer regional planes. The passengers will like it, (no more sitting next to huge Samoan dudes on 3 hour flights in smaller RJs) and the flight crews will like the higher pay.

Next, could we get a mandatory retirement age for stews?


Bye Bye--General Lee

More likely, they will just cut flying to marginal cities if it costs them more than they will make flying them. There will be fewer jobs which pay more, and I would expect the ripple effect to continue up the chain to affect narrow body positions as well if there are fewer passengers fed to meet them.

As much as folks gripe about deregulation, it provided many of the jobs we pilots have, albeit at lower pay. The more likely scenario is the same lousy pay remaining with consolidation acting as the Sword of Damocles countering any supply and demand leverage pilots may gain because of it.

This is a win for the IGM's and the guys who have yet to over-invest in their flying careers and still have time to pursue other things. Margins are very thin in the airline biz and many will simply choose to do less of what loses them money.

 

[livin'thesim]

This will kill bridge programs, which is what needed to happen.

 

[ualdriver]

More likely, they will just cut flying to marginal cities if it costs them more than they will make flying them. There will be fewer jobs which pay more, and I would expect the ripple effect to continue up the chain to affect narrow body positions as well if there are fewer passengers fed to meet them.

As much as folks gripe about deregulation, it provided many of the jobs we pilots have, albeit at lower pay. The more likely scenario is the same lousy pay remaining with consolidation acting as the Sword of Damocles countering any supply and demand leverage pilots may gain because of it.

1) I'm not sure I buy that argument. Pilot costs are too small a cost of the total operation (around 2% at a major airline, probably less at a regional) to see large scale service reductions solely because they now have to pay entry-level co-pilots 40 grand-ish a year (my guess) instead of 20K. Future fluctuating jet fuel costs are going to have a greater effect on what markets airlines serve in the future than this legislation.

2) I'm wondering if this 1500 hr. ATP deal is going to stick. Don't get me wrong, 200 hr. Commercial pilots have no business sitting in the right seat of an airliner, but if I were a betting man, I'd bet that ATP requirement is going to be reduced. Maybe to 1000 hours or similar. Maybe they'll tie this "mentoring" program I keep hearing about into it. Maybe they'll make "low time" guys (to be defined) fly with a "high time" mentors (i.e. a high time guy with a clean training record with lots of Captain time) until the "low time" guy hits some sort of experience hurdle, kind of like we do with new guys in a seat and LCAs. Maybe they will make an "LCA lite" position?

The above is complete speculation on my part but I don't see how the U.S. airline industry can produce enough 1500 hr. pilots to satisfy demand after the current (admittedly huge) glut of pilots gets eaten up, say 10 years down the road. The ATA will be crying about that and costs and will probably influence the final version of this legislation, just like ALPA will.

 

[General Lee]

What does 1500 hours do for anyone? I have interviewed a USAF pilot leaving active service with less than 1500 hours after 10 years of service, but it was all MEL turbo jet, mostly EC-135. By this standard he could not fly in the right seat of a commuter 121 airplane. But Joe CFI with 1501 hours, 4 MEL would take his place. Who would you rather have in the right seat? About helo pilots where would they fit into this proposal.

What does 1500 hours min do? It keeps away the 250 hour "Empty Nipple" rich kid wonders. Boy, Gulftream INTL will go away after this is implemented. Wages will go up, and FedEx Caravan pilots will be in high demand at all of the regionals.


Bye Bye--General Lee

 

[General Lee]

More likely, they will just cut flying to marginal cities if it costs them more than they will make flying them. There will be fewer jobs which pay more, and I would expect the ripple effect to continue up the chain to affect narrow body positions as well if there are fewer passengers fed to meet them.

As much as folks gripe about deregulation, it provided many of the jobs we pilots have, albeit at lower pay. The more likely scenario is the same lousy pay remaining with consolidation acting as the Sword of Damocles countering any supply and demand leverage pilots may gain because of it.

This is a win for the IGM's and the guys who have yet to over-invest in their flying careers and still have time to pursue other things. Margins are very thin in the airline biz and many will simply choose to do less of what loses them money.

Doubt it. Ever heard of EAS routes? Even guys flying Great Lakes BE1900s will have to have those hours when hired, and smaller cities will want their transportation links. There may be fewer flights as you say, but towns will pay airlines to have links. Why does Great Lakes go to Wolf Point, MT? Because the Gov't pays them to do so. And Great Lakes only gives the Captains Jepps BTW----that should be looked into also.


Bye Bye--General Lee