Originally Posted by
vdawson
I’m 39 and I am prepared to make a career change and enter a career in the airlines. When I first began researching which regional would be right for me, I thought I should place I high priority on flying time. The thought process being that I’m already behind, no reason to sit around at Envoy or another regional with flow not flying. Need to upgrade ASAP. Recently however I have started thinking flow may actually be better for me. If it’s 7-8 years on average before most get to the majors, by that time I’ll be in my late forties and that would probably be a big disadvantage going the interview route. So maybe my best chance of making it at all would be to go to Envoy and tough it out. I do have a Masters degree in a field unrelated to aviation. Thoughts?
If you're going to settle for seven to eight years to get to a major, then you might as well head to someplace like 9E or YX where you'll be well compensated while you wait.
That being said, you can probably get to a major in five off the street once you get competitive with PIC time. Unless you really want AA, you'll probably get to a major sooner OTS (or CPP or DGI) than you'd flow at an AA WO.
If you take the 20-somethings that DL hires out of the picture, the average new hire age at many majors is somewhere around 40. You won't be too old.