Looking at the flight times of some pilots on these posts I don’t know why you don’t go to a regional with jets/fms’s/glass exposure. I too flew for one of the FedEx feeders years ago through the 9/11 experience as well. Many pilots left the feeders years ago to acquire jet/fms/glass experience. Unlike FedEx and UPS many Legacy/major airlines hire their regional pilots or steal each others. Just a thought from a sharp older person:)

🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮.

Its slow right now, they just hired a bunch of pilots because we are suppose to double our flying, so they needed to double the size of the pilot group. but the flying has not doubled yet, so the flying has been cut in half..like I've said, I'm still new, so i wasn't even here when there was a lot more flying to go around. but over the past 4 months I've roughly averaged 40 hours a month

This is an Empire policy

Double the flying? Are you receiving new ATRs or more hawaii ATR flying?

The operation started with 3 ATRs flying 2 pax lines, one spare plane. They bought a 4th ATR for pax, so that they can add another pax line, 3 total, and still have a spare. Plus they bought 3 cargo ATRs to potentially start flying 2 cargo lines, so we would be at 5 lines total.

1 of the cargo planes is not going to be here anytime soon though, so we just have 2 cargo planes and don't have all 4 pax planes yet, so we still are just doing 2 pax lines at the moment.

MSO flying
 

Any current or former MSO people out there that can shed some light for me? Wondering how much flying per month, typical day, and if you fly anywhere else other than MT.

Thanks

Not a deal breaker but was wondering if there is still a training contract for the 208 or ATR?

I don't know much about the route, looks like GTF-MSO. Doubt you'll build much time. I've seen both left and right seat jobs on JSFirm for that base. If you wanted to live in Missoula though, could be a great setup. I've visited there some and it's a great town. If you're already there, I know Alpine flys 99's and 1900's in there too. Or, GPI has a AMF and another cargo outfit too. Might build more time flying the smaller stuff.

No training contracts for qualified Pilots.

Great. Thanks for answering!

Can anyone speak on QOL and what training is like specifically for street captains on the ATR in Hawaii? I have 3600 TT, 1200 121 jet SIC, 1100 PIC and am considering a change from my current RJ gig. If I applied I could go straight to captain, right? Thanks

I know the training is actually in Idaho and Ohana only does day lines. Morning or evening shift. I know Hawaii is an incredibly expensive place to live in. It can be expensive to move to with pets or a shipping container. You probably at least want to ship your car, it's cheaper then buying one there. A cheaper house is over 600k and even a cheaper condo will cost $1000/month maintenance fees. You better learn about Hawaii culture too

Initial/Indoc is in Coer d'Alene, sim is in HOU at Flight Safety.
About a 5-6 week footprint.
Yes DEC is correct. Typical IOE and then AM or PM and a cargo line in the 72.
AM starts around 6:00am and done by 12:30PM, PM starts approx. 1:00pm finish by 8:30pm. (approx.)
There are cheap cars here but yes less than $2500 to ship a car from the East Coast, less otherwise, ie West Coast.
6 legs a day.

Thanks. Yeah I’m familiar with the cost of living in hawaii but with the bonuses and PIC salary I still think it’d be a step up in pay overall from my right seat RJ gig.

What’s the monthly schedule like? I.e How many days on/off? And is there much time on reserve?

PICs tend to work more currently because Ohana can't hold on to them. I'd say 18-21 days a month of work give or take a day. FOs have a little more flexibility because there are more of them and some want more flying and some want less. I'd say 12-19 days off work per month depending what you're goals are. This could change at any time due to staffing.

You have to work twelve days a month to get the bonus. You aren't eligible for any bonuses until you pass IOE, so don't count on any of that money for a few months after you start Indoc. Also, you will be working for 75% base pay until you pass sim training. Empire pays for the hotel and rental car at training. Also very important to note is that vacation and PTO days don't count towards the twelve days required for the monthly bonus. They also tend to schedule a full work-month for captains who take vacation. These two practices are shady. The $1000/mo bonus is paid out twice per year in January and July. Taxes are withheld at about 25-30% for the bonus payments. So if you finish IOE in mid-January for example, you will get about $3500 out of the $5000 "moving expense" bonus. You will be getting paid at the base salary until you get your first bonus payout sometime in July again for about $3500 (because you didn't qualify for the bonus in January as IOE days worked don't count towards the bonus). Your next bonus (and first full bonus payment if you worked at least twelve days per month) won't be until the next January. So you have the potential of going an entire year working with only $7000 of bonus money in your pocket. They don't tell you this when you sign up and it is important information if you are taking on the expense of moving to Hawaii.

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Correction: it's a "sign on" bonus, not a "moving expense" bonus.

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Any idea what the cargo lines are going to look like, and how many you will see in a month? Do you bid your schedule at all, it is it assigned to you?

You give your preferences and then a schedule is assigned. We haven't bid for a line pretty much all year because you have to have a special qualification to fly into JHM and not everybody is qualified...

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Any idea what PIC hiring looks like? I’ve heard window hiring and I’ve heard continuous hiring for PIC. Just wanted to get a real deal confirmation. Thanks!

You looking for Ohana or Fedex side?

Sorry I was talking about Ohana. Seems they can't hold onto PIC and just wanted to know if they hire PIC in windows or at will.

Nope we are hiring as fast as we can becuase we can’t keep em. Word is we had a class of one recently.

They have scheduled class dates that they look to fill. Hiring has been slow due to being at/over budgeted staffing numbers.

How often are there openings in GEG for the ATR captain positions? I’m looking to get out of he desert and Coeur d'Alene is top on my list of relocation spots.

GEG does not see a lot of openings, maybe 1-2 a year. There is a Home Base option.

Does the floater capt. get airlined home every weekend? How much is the regional incentive pay and extra work adders? And do you take home most of your per deim?

The floater does not get airlined home every week, it is a 2-week commitment (they can jump seat home on their own).

Regional incentives are an additional $50 to $125 per week, depending on location.

Extra work adders also vary (working over 17 days a month, working 6 days, TDY, etc).

Can a homebased guy transfer to a base? Any idea if/when AFW will open up again?

Yes, you could bid for a direct base at any time. I believe that we have an open AFW spot or (if not) we just filled it.

Thanks Baja.

Can anyone share what it’s like at SBA? How much flying time in a month and what the schedule looks like?

I’m interested in ‘Ohana, but I’m not sure when there will be an opening for FOs and am considering starting at SBA and moving to ‘Ohana later.

Follow up question: will the credits of 2:1 for TT and PIC time flown at SBA apply to ‘Ohana for upgrading?

Thanks.

Was recently offered DEC ATR based position, which I ultimately did not accept. Thought I'd add my experience here to supplement what has been said.

My application was for a fixed-base position, but upon further negotiations it was clear that Empire wanted the option to float me when convenient for them. Although not opposed, I wanted some sort of guarantee that it wouldn't happen often, but they pushed back on any specific language regarding my floating and, if floated, any compensatory time-off. In the course of trying to work this out, I suggested I re-apply for a formal floater position which would clarify how I would be used. The company balked at that since they now knew I lived in base. Ultimately I felt the unknowns were too great, and I pulled my application.

A take-away, at least for me is that they would like the flexibility of floating people, but don't want too many full-time float pilots on the payroll. I understand bases like KTUL are horribly understaffed, but since applying for a PIC at my home would have fully staffed us here, I didn't want to get shipped off repeatedly to another town. Their unwillingness to clarify how you will get used is an impediment to recruitment if my experience is any indication. Frustrating is the word I would use to summarize the entire rodeo. To answer an earlier question regarding transfers, I know it is done on the FedEx side, but don't know how a lateral to Ohana would work.

Plan for about 25 hrs a month in SBA. Its a Monday evening through Saturday morning run flying to ONT. Hour credits should transfer between ohana and FedEx. If you are junior in a well staffed base you will be traveling a lot.

Any guesses on when Ohana will be hiring FOs again?

Lots of surprises in training within the first month. I decided it wasn't worth sticking around to be surprised any more.

Can you elaborate at all?

I’d like to know as well. I just checked their website and it looks like they just stopped hiring captains too.

Is this for the Ohana side or Empire?

I believe that they are thinking about an Ohana class in February or March.

Nice. Do they have a pool for this or will they accept apps next year?