Funny you should say that... it really would make things interesting. From what I hear, most ME airlines are having a pretty tough time recruiting quality pilots. EK's attrition rate has increased significantly... and it's only going to get worse as UAE GCAA has ruled that ONLY time spent at controls of ULR flights count towards your flight hour limits - bunk time does not count.

Stop and think about this... Take a DXB-LAX flight of say 16 hours each way... under the present scheme, if you spend roughly half of the time in bunk, you will have only "flown" 16 hours. Considering they build their lines to 92 hours.... do the math.

The conspiracy theory says that this GCAA ruling was to help EK maintain schedule considering their expansion and attrition which was crept up substantially in the past year or so.

You want to kick the ME3 in the groin? Start hiring American expats from foreign airlines - there are several hundred at EK alone (one of the largest groups), same at EY and QR... and almost all have apps in back home.

It will have an effect, believe me... while there is still interest in flying for EK in Europe, there are some that are leaving EK to go back to Ryanair. It's only the beginning...