Let me put it in perspective. Four or five years ago our VP of flight ops discussed in an email to crew force a possibility of MD11s being based in HKG.

Last week in captain's class he said "…expect the bid end of this week, or early next week at the latest…" It was out the next day.

Not trying to disparage anyone, just pointing out when we cannot get a straight answer from the VP of flight ops (…likely because many business decisions come above from finance, etc) asking a FedEx pilot for SA on hiring, staffing, future plans, etc is a joke. We hear rumors, we hear informed opinions, and sometimes we even get a few facts. Facts, however, are usually only days, if not mere hours…before its out on the street anyway. Point is a FedEx pilot rarely knows anymore than most of the folks in the line at OBAP or WAI about what is going on in pilot hiring or recruitment. We aren't being jerks--they don't tell us anything. Thinking they do just makes our inner cynic come alive.

This place hires in spurts…afterburner, idle, afterburner, idle… I understand how challenging predicting business can be. At the same time, I've been here 13 years and have about 1500-1600 behind me. Retirements are predicted to be 100-200 a year. Seems like a slow, steady hiring of 10-20 a month would not overwhelm the training pipeline, would allow for future retirements and still be able to absorb some of the sine waves of the business. When you manage to meet short term financial targets, however, there will be a whipsaw at times. Efficiency is not key when trying to please shareholders for the quarter or meet an MBO bonus target. So--its going to be crazy again for a while, and most of us who work there have no good SA on when it will start and end. What I will say is every time I have ever heard "we are going to hire 500", etc, we seem to stop at the 80% or so mark of the target. Maybe this time will be different, but if you want to join this place don't wait around to apply or get your app in. We stop hiring on a dime too, and have closed up shop for years several times since I've been here.