This isn't always a good thing. I spent a few days in a hospital with my son, rarely found an American doctor or nurse that understood or could communicate clearly what the issue was. I fear the day when you have to go overseas to find pilots who meet a logbook requirement. That said, 1500 isn't hard to meet anymore.
So put the hour minimums wherever they want, still wouldn't have prevented 3407, they both exceeded 1500 hours. As far as I can tell, 100% of the Part 121 crashes have been with pilots with 1500+ hours and an ATP acting as the PIC. Given the ATP can be done rather quickly in a PA44 for not much money, the requirement for an ATP is a big eh to me.
Until we clean up training and standardize it like it should be nothing is truly getting fixed. 1500 hour minimum? Go for it, don't care, won't feel any safer just because the FO had 1500 hours when they were hired and given the current shape of the pilot market and the current trend to park 50 seaters (albeit to grow larger but yet scope limited fleets) I don't think it's going to make much of a difference.
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As to this petition, NO. I wouldn't want a pilot who didn't want to be a CFI. That's a red flag to me.
+1
I agree with the 1500 hour minimum but I don't think it is absolute solution. I'm a CFI at a pilot mill training foreign students that go from zero to hero within a year and are off to fly metal bigger than RJs. What does it mean to pay dues anyway? You certainly don't owe anyone but yourself when it comes to getting the experience needed for a job. If you don't have a lot time just do whatever you can, get out there and get your hours and experience.
I believe the law is going to slow things down at small part 61 flight schools and there are going to be tons of CFIs in the market looking for a job. There wouldn't be enough students for all of them. I worked at a school last year that had 8 instructors and we were lucky if we flew 3hrs in a week. The cost of training is high, financing is not available and on top of that is the new 1500 hour requirement. Soon we'll probably have more foreign students training in the U.S. than local students.