Originally Posted by
Whacker77
I guess one reason to believe hiring will continue in some form, although it's not the most convincing one, is XJet just signed and agreement with ATP flight school in February guaranteeing an interview to those who complete one of their RJ courses.
That is interesting.
Here is something I can promise. Management is genuinely worried about a pilot shortage in the not to distant future. That doesn't mean there will definitely be one, or it will definitely be severe, but they are concerned enough about it that they are taking steps to try to ensure they have a pipeline moving forward. If you look at it cynically, you could say they are trying to keep supply up to maintain a flow of cheap labor (the other way to get more pilots is to simply pay them more, but it's cheaper to ink deals with colleges and flight institutions). If you look at it practically, they are just trying to set themselves up for a successful future. Whatever your view, it says something to me that they are preparing this far in advance.
The previous poster was right about the classes in April. Rumors are circulating both ways. For a while all we heard was 500-700 pilots this year. Lately there have been rumors of that slowing.
I've said it before and I'll say it again - I got burned early on reading too much into the Expressjet forums regarding rumors about hiring, new flying,etc. This company keeps a good pipeline of information open but they typically give you a one month forward looking view on things like hiring. It's probably better than over-promising and under-delivering (can you imagine if in January they said they'd hire 600 pilots this year but then stopped hiring mid-year? People would freak out).
Personally, I don't think hiring will stop completely. It may pause for a few months after the summer, but the ERJ side is losing about 16 pilots per month, equivalent to at least one monthly new hire class. The captain I flew with today told me he's already been hired at Jet Blue, just waiting on his class date to turn in his notice. I know there are a number of captains moving on, so hopefully attrition starts picking up some more as well. They did announce only one upgrade class planned for June-July, after two in the previous period, but that's been known to change. Can't read too much into it.
For now, we are hiring like gangbusters. Hopefully it will continue.