Originally Posted by
skybolt
My point is simply that pilots who ENTER the airline business having never learned to deal with the edge of the envelope will NEVER be trained by the airlines to deal with that possibility. If a pilot has poor stick and rudder skills and inadequate stick and rudder sense, the airline flying and training environment will NOT impart those qualities to that pilot. A pilot must gain good flying "sense" from somewhere other than the airline training department.
Actually while i agree for the most part. I have another side to this argument. When i got hired 3yrs ago at former carrier. I had 1300hrs 200 or so hours multi. I was an instructor. I will fully admit my instrument skills where lacking when I got hired. While i am a CFII and MEI. I ended up with a lot traffic pattern work. I actually was a anxious about flying in the clouds as i did not have a lot of actual time. I had few bad experiences with ice and t storms in the GA airplanes. I guess you could say i learned something from these experiences. However, i didn't feel comfortable flying around in actual conditions. After being hired by commutair, flying the B1900, no autopilot; flying through the rain, snow, ice, thunderstorms, fog. Landing on snow cover runways with mountains around in Rutland VT and Saranac Lake NY. That did more for confidence then anything. It really fine tuned my instrument, flying skills, and made me comfortable flying through anything. Now i want to go flying through the eye of a hurricane. So I think it depends what type of aircraft new guys jump into.... JMO