Whats with Pinnacle..........

[DoinTime]

Pinnacle's interview process is some what strange. they evaluate on a frasca sim, which has less than zero in common with the RJ. You are single pilot, which has less than zero to do with the RJ. So I do wonder how they determine who to hire.

The reason for the Frasca is not to see if you function well in a complex, mulit-crew, high performance aircraft. They put you in there for a much more simple reason....TO SEE IF YOUR WORTH THE INSTRUMENT RATING ON YOUR CERTIFICATE. If you can't control an aircraft via instruments you have no business in any comercial operation let alone flying people around.

Its not a perfect system but its a good place to start. PCL will never cough up the $900/hour to use a CRJ sim for new hire evaluations. Considering they didn't used to have a practical test at all they are at least moving in the right direction.

My qualification for saying this? I have 3400 PIC in the RJ.

So do I, but I have to disagree with you.

 

[skyta]

My qualification for saying this? I have 3400 PIC in the RJ.

I just updated my logbook and so far I have 20,000 PIC in the Space Shuttle.

 

[xjlifer]

I just updated my logbook and so far I have 20,000 PIC in the Space Shuttle.

But how many shuttle go arounds do you have??

 

[sinkrate]

I recently was offered an interview with Pinnacle and was reviewing the gouge and even heard word from friends who work there. Whats up with the interview process? They hire on average 3 out of 10 applicants despite qualifications IE 121 135 or military. Even ones with internal recomendations and letters are being shown the door. Yet they appear to be so severly understaffed. Anyone one know what it is they are so determined to find in their approved applicants?

NWA has reduced the total number of flying hours for Pinnacle. New hires are sitting for weeks on reserve without flying. New hire classes have slowed significantly but they evidently are interviewing at the same rate.

For sometime Pinnacle had a problem with FO attrition. They changed their interview process and hiring profile and have reduced it significantly.

 

[e=mc2]

Every industry has a bottom and Pinnacle is it for the Regionals.

Example: Waiting for a flight and these tools come up in their leather Jackets and Bellman Hats, sit down and start talking. My girlfriend asks them who they fly for, Answer: "Northwest". Got Northwest Airlines on the Roller Bag so must be true - right. Guess they attended Bill Clinton U in Arkansas, cause they left out the "Airlink" that goes along with the Northwest. She goes on with "What do you fly?" Without repeating all that followed - it was humorous and painful listening to it.

If the clothes make the man - then the hat must make the pilot!

 

[BOHICAgain]

Every industry has a bottom and Pinnacle is it for the Regionals.

Example: Waiting for a flight and these tools come up in their leather Jackets and Bellman Hats, sit down and start talking. My girlfriend asks them who they fly for, Answer: "Northwest". Got Northwest Airlines on the Roller Bag so must be true - right. Guess they attended Bill Clinton U in Arkansas, cause they left out the "Airlink" that goes along with the Northwest. She goes on with "What do you fly?" Without repeating all that followed - it was humorous and painful listening to it.

If the clothes make the man - then the hat must make the pilot!

So beacuse one of our jack@ss said some stupid ******************** we r the bottom of the regional world yeah ur so smart. Also whats wrong with wearing a hat.. I dont and its optional here but so what are you gonna make fun of all the airlines that wear hats??

 

[Dumb Pilot]

I'm in training, not hiring. But what I hear is that a good portion of the washout during the interview is because they fail the written test and/or mess up holdings or fail to read a departure procedure. Things like that.
Out of the folks that I get on OE, most of them are with a background as a CFI with 600 to 800 hours. Here and there you get a PFT applicant with 300 hours total time. The couple that I've had, haven't done too bad really. if you look at the exposure that they have had to the CRJ, they already are typed on the A/C so they don't really do a bad job flying the Airplane. Where they need a LOT of work is in radio work, operations out off heavy traffic airports, that sort of everyday flying stuff that they simply haven't had any experience with. Getting their visual approaches stable seems to be the biggest problem with new applicants. Recently I had one of those individuals that paid $76,000 for his training. He was typed on his certificate and a grand total of 300 hours. It took 50 some hours of OE but he actually made it into the line.
The programs advertising makes it sound like the job is guaranteed, but it isn't really. I don't come across them very often.

 

[pilotshan]

Every industry has a bottom and Pinnacle is it for the Regionals.

Example: Waiting for a flight and these tools come up in their leather Jackets and Bellman Hats, sit down and start talking. My girlfriend asks them who they fly for, Answer: "Northwest". Got Northwest Airlines on the Roller Bag so must be true - right. Guess they attended Bill Clinton U in Arkansas, cause they left out the "Airlink" that goes along with the Northwest. She goes on with "What do you fly?" Without repeating all that followed - it was humorous and painful listening to it.

If the clothes make the man - then the hat must make the pilot!

They all claim to be Northwest pilots.... What's up with that? I was going home one day after a long trip and this Pinnacle pilot told me "When I got hired by Northwest, I was flying the Saab, but I'm on the CRJ now." Everytime we make small talk with their pilots in the crew van they say they fly for Northwest and then the truth comes out when we ask what they fly.

Tools.

 

[SEVEN]

Apparently, they are experimenting with a "pay for training" outfit. I understand they have an agreement with Jet U where these 200 hour pilots are paying for their training.

This $hit is out of control! There is a class full in FXE getting ready go.

That's correct. They are presently showing the door to many applicants with thousands of hours, and opening the door to inexperienced JET U applicants with less than 300 hours. That's a fact. Amazing isn't it?

And just for the record, I never have and never will apply at Pinnacle. I would rather commute to Australia.

In the famous words told by a Pinnacle Captain of an inexperienced F.O. It was snowing in DTW and the FO looked at the Captain and said: "Hey, it's snowing out, are we okay to fly then?"

 

[SEVEN]

They all claim to be Northwest pilots.... What's up with that? I was going home one day after a long trip and this Pinnacle pilot told me "When I got hired by Northwest, I was flying the Saab, but I'm on the CRJ now." Everytime we make small talk with their pilots in the crew van they say they fly for Northwest and then the truth comes out when we ask what they fly.

Tools.

I couldn't have said it better myself. The truth is there are good and decent pilots at 9E, but there are far more TOOLS than the latter. Sad but true.

 

[Mr. Irrelevant]

In regards to Dumb Pilot's post, it is interesting to hear him describe the issues they have with these super low time pilots. Just the issues they shouldn't have if they had AT LEAST an additional 1000+ hours of experience doing CFI and/or charter work. Really amazing and illuminating to hear his input on this thread.

Mr. I.

 

[Amish RakeFight]

Did someone say Pinnacle??!!

http://forums.flightinfo.com/showthread.php?t=71374&highlight=pinnacle



.

 

[bailey3083]

That's correct. They are presently showing the door to many applicants with thousands of hours, and opening the door to inexperienced JET U applicants with less than 300 hours. That's a fact. Amazing isn't it?

And just for the record, I never have and never will apply at Pinnacle. I would rather commute to Australia.

In the famous words told by a Pinnacle Captain of an inexperienced F.O. It was snowing in DTW and the FO looked at the Captain and said: "Hey, it's snowing out, are we okay to fly then?"

One of the best zero to hero comments by one of these SJS kids I have flown with is " Wow that is the longest I have ever been in a cloud. I just tripled my IFR time!"

 

[Mesabi Miner]

Where they need a LOT of work is in radio work, operations out off heavy traffic airports, that sort of everyday flying stuff that they simply haven't had any experience with. Getting their visual approaches stable seems to be the biggest problem with new applicants.

Seems to me like another 700-1000 hrs in a C-172/Archer/Arrow/Seminole would clear up these problems very nicely. Not knocking on any one company in particular but someone with 300 hours, in my opinion, has no business in a Part 121 airplane. Period.

 

[Amish RakeFight]

I'm in favor of the ATP certificate as a minimum hiring requirement. After all, you are technically an airline pilot after all. Commercial is really only a minimum cert. needed to legally accept payment for your flying duties. 135 IFR minimums are still the norm for operations outside of airline flying, such as single pilot 135 freight and pax operations. With the typical equipment and operations found in scheduled flying, one should at least possess that many hours and have the ATP in hand.

It really says a lot when someone isn't qualified to command a 135 IFR trip, yet be able to fly right seat on regional jets and props.

 

[Dumb Pilot]

I've got a funny story. A few months back, I gave a ride to a lady captain from LAN-DTW. The back was full so she rode with us in the front. While my F/O was doing the walk around, I gave her the J/S brief and told her that I was doing O/E and that she was going to see "instructing" rather than a normal line flight.
At the end of the flight, my F/O jumped out to do his W/A and she thanked me. "Always welcome" I answered. "No, I'm not thanking you for the ride" "I'm thanking you because I have just being offered a Check Airman position and after this flight, The hell with that, I'm not taking it."

 

[SEVEN]

One of the best zero to hero comments by one of these SJS kids I have flown with is " Wow that is the longest I have ever been in a cloud. I just tripled my IFR time!"

Those are funny stories. But whats not funny is that there are 50 clueless people riding along while those morons "gain" experience at 500 knots.
I guess we can all agree now that Pinnacle's hiring standards are a laughing stock and a joke at best. Always remember one thing. Keep the people you love off those airplanes.

:uzi: Pinnacle/Gulfstream/Jet U:smash:

 

[Dumb Pilot]

This is a trend gentlemen that regrettably is not exclusive of PCL. Low time pilots are being hired at most regionals these days. And the trend will get more wide spread, you will see before not too long low time "program" individuals hired at major carriers. It is happening now in other parts of the world. I used to transport European Airline Crews in position all over the Caribbean. LTU, Spanair, Air Europa. A-330 crews with the captains at 4000 total and the F/O's with 500 hours. Granted their selection and training programs are more intense on relation to what we have here in the States. But as the demand for crews increase in the next decade or so, you will see low time pilots not only at most regionals like you see now, but at the majors as well

 

[XJohXJ]

Northwest signed up with one of those programs recently, didn't they? One of the universities. Granted, they have plenty of checks in place, for CYA, until they see how it goes.

 

[Rook]

They all claim to be Northwest pilots.... What's up with that? I was going home one day after a long trip and this Pinnacle pilot told me "When I got hired by Northwest, I was flying the Saab, but I'm on the CRJ now." Everytime we make small talk with their pilots in the crew van they say they fly for Northwest and then the truth comes out when we ask what they fly.

Tools.

First off,

No. We don't all claim to be Northwest pilots. You were talking to one of our 'finest' I guess. And why lump all of us into that category just because you were talking to a jerk? I'm sure a lot of your Hitler youth compadres tell folks they fly for the Sky nAAzi's. I got a lot of buds at Eagle. I know you guys aren't all pretentious.