Originally Posted by
Rahlifer
But regional airlines are entry level jobs. Where else in the world (outside of the military) could anyone get a job flying a jet with 250 hours and a wet commercial certificate? Or become a "captain" at 1500 hours with nothing more than a few hundred hours of Cessna command time under their belt? The standards dropped so incredibly low that regionals will forever be seen as substandard.
That's how it used to be at majors. I talked with guys who were aware of 25 year old Boeing 707 captains in the early 1960s. Yes, you read that correctly.
The father of a friend of mine was a Private Pilot when he was hired at Northwest Orient. He retired a DC-10 captain about 12 years ago or so.
Virtually all the flying done at so-called "regional" airlines was done on mainline certificates 25 years ago. It was done on DC-9s and 737s. Regional airlines were created to put an end to that.