Originally Posted by
boilerpilot
You can do what you want, of course, but you might take it from others who have been in your situation, or at least educate yourself about the actual situation out there.
What makes you so sure that GIA is going to give you a year upgrade time? Do you not realize that almost every regional is around a two year upgrade time right now, with a couple of the likes like Mesa, TSA, Colgan, Mesaba, and others being around a year? And those places don't make you pay for training! Not only that, but in this volatile of an industry, all this can change on a moments notice. Not just upgrade times, but the actually financial security of the industry as a whole. Perhaps if the difference between a year or two years of upgrade time is so unbelievably important to you, it might not be the best thing for you to enter this industry?
My opinions are my own and only affect the people who either come to me because they need something from me or those who seek my advise, but I think you need to think long and hard about why exactly you're getting into this industry.
By talking to pilots at GIA! Ive talked to at least 4 pilots there that have upgraded in a year. And they don't have as many pilots as the other airlines.....so the upgrade time would be shorter. There's a total of 240 pilots. An FO that i talked to that's been working there for 8 months (3 of which are part of the 6 month FO program they have...because you get your seniority number in those last 3 months of the program) is already at seniority 120. They lose about 10 pilots ever month because they move onto other another regional airline or to a major airline. You do the math.
I'm in the industry because I know this is what I've always wanted to do. Because I want to progress as fast as I can does not mean that I don't belong in this industry. That's the mentality of anyone in any indstustry.