Mesa liars
typhoonpilot said:
Once upon a time there was a good little commuter airline in California called WestAir . . . . Can't remember the exact date, but lets call it a couple of years later, Mesa Air buys WestAir. WestAir is a unionized carrier with decent wages for a regional. Mesa, at that time, is a non-unionized carrier whose new hire pilots must pay $10,000 or so to be a first officer on a Beech 1900 at crappy wages. Slowly observers see Mesa Beech 1900s flying WestAir routes in Southern California. To make a long story short this cancer spreads until WestAir folds in the late 1990s, a shell of it's former self. All because of Mesa . . . . That is why I hate Mesa, not necessarily the pilots, but definitely the company.
(emphasis added)
Good history lesson, especially about WestAir/United Express. My first regional interview was there.
I interviewed at Mesa in 1990, about two months after my WestAir interview. I was rejected. Ten years ago, I had suffered a termination from a subsequent job. I applied to MAPD as an instructor, was interviewed, and was hired. I disclosed fully my problem at my previous job on my app and at my interview. I was very excited about being hired by MAPD, because the real deal for MAPD instructors back then was being sent to ground school to become 1900 FOs. I thought that after five-plus years of futility in trying to get a regional airline job that I would get my chance.
Not so. After I had moved one-thousand miles and reported to Corporate, I was asked for a five-year job history. I provided all details of my previous job and termination, which, again, I explained fully to the Chief Instructor and Gary Risley, the corporate counsel, at my interview. The personnel lady then said that I might not be eligible for hire
at all because of my termination. She said it was Mesa's policy not to hire pilots who suffered terminations. Shock was not the word, especially after I had just moved a thousand miles for a job I thought I had. The personnel lady then went back and talked to her boss, and everything was straightened out, to the extent that I would be hired at MAPD.
The Chief Instructor told me a day or two later that I could work for MAPD but I could not be considered for hire as a Mesa Airlines pilot because of my termination. He said he was not aware of a terminated pilot no-hire policy. To this day I do not believe him. And, surely, the Corporate Counsel must have known of this policy.
This experience, among other reasons, is why I do not like Mesa.
I know I push MAPD quite a bit on these forums. I like the program because of the potential and training it offers for new pilots. Students pay a bunch of money for their training, but it is not P-F-T because they earn ratings and a degree. I certainly would not recommend Mesa for a long-term career because of my experience there and for reasons others above enumerated. I realize that Frank O. (intentional) and not the Risleys are in charge, but, as the expression goes, the more things change the more they stay the same.
I will not give names on a public board, but MAPD ATP trainees and long-time Mesa pilots will know who I mean.
