Noisy1

Understand that commuting to Sun Country is its own special type of impossible. While you might be used to a Florida to MSP commute with Compass, understand that due to the type of flying Sun Country does that the trips are not commutable in the same way another airline is. Much of the schedule leaves MSP early (6-8 AM) and returns very late (12PM-AM).

I know this has been said many times in this thread before, but with most airlines there is an improvement that happens with your schedule over time. Don't expect that to happen... Unless you are doing day turns (very senior 5+ year FOs, 25+ CAs).

Perhaps the 737 is blinding, but really everyone is try to warn people against commuting here for a reason.

Ask your questions here. We'll answer. Better that everyone else looking gets a glance inside as well if they are trying to make a decision to apply at Sun Country. This airline is a different animal and it is hard to get a grasp of what it is from the outside looking in. The flying and the schedules are quite unlike anything else.

tcraft

Why does it need to be in a PM? Ask the questions here so everyone can benefit.

Sent from my SM-G960U using Tapatalk

damnyourabbit

If any Sun Country pilots can chime in to this thread I made it would be much appreciated. I was invited to interview.

https://www.airlinepilotforums.com/m...-regional.html

How long is captain reserve? And how many hours a month are reserve captains flying? That would be a big factor I think in determining whether I should leave the regionals.

beech1980

PLEASE! Do not get your answers from the recruiters, management or anybody else that is not a line pilot. Just like what was said. The commuters that come from Florida and there are a few. Spend a lot of time away from home getting to and from work. There really are zero commuter lines. You still start early day one and end late the last day. So your 5 day trip that pays maybe 25-27 hours is a 7 day trip and takes your 15 day off month down to more like 10.

Reserve days are basically stuck on your schedule unless you try to Give them away but you will lose 3.5 hours for every day you trade to a line holder in open time.
Until ownership and management treat the pilots better and address the pay and contract they will continual struggle to find pilots to come and stay at Sun Country Airlines.
I would stay away as in the last 3-4 years many airlines have received contracts that far and away blow sun country out of the water. Don’t buy into their empty promises.

mrgoodguy

Add another one to the statistics.
I was terminated just before completion of training (type rating)
After being 10 years in AQP environment the SCA training was "unexpectedly full of tricks and omissions" and not within the spirit of what AQP is supposed to be. Actual flight experience worked against me, and not for me, because I was expecting "regular" AQP experience instead of trickery and SRM (as opposed to CRM) during training and check rides.
Most of my class failed one portion of training or another, so I was not alone by far.
Their AQP program is new, so that may be the issue, and I don't think it's the fault of individual instructors, but the "spirit" behind the sim training program is not what FAA AC for AQP is all about.
Unfortunately for me, I talked about the training program deficiencies in presence of a check airman (I didn't know that at the time) and he complained to chief pilot who immediately fired me.
Be ware and keep your mouth shut during this stressful training time.

Riverside

Hmmm yeah, since you're on probation. I dunno why you're bad mouthing the training department. Especially on probation.

Mciflyboy

Each to their own. If 300 something other guys currently there can make it through , why can’t you? So tired of people bad mouthing training programs cause of their own mishaps. If someone is dedicated and wants something bad enough they can get through it. If you want to go into something with a bad attitude and laziness your setting yourself up for failure.

tolipenalpria

are you the UND guy?? i thought that story was made up, sorry bro. makes me fearful for the young people coming right out of flight instructing with the programs they are trying to set up with flight schools. last thing you want is a good training record and then come to sunny and struggle or fail. regionals seem better at training first time jet flyers.

damnyourabbit

Thank you very much for responding. Did this happen in the last few months? How many people were in your class and what kind of backgrounds seemed to be prevalent?



Can you give any specific examples of something negative you perceived during the training?

mrgoodguy

No. I wasn't bad mouthing the training department. Their AQP program is new and needs fixing. All the instructors I've talked to agreed as well. They are doing the best they can, but the whole program needs improvement.

Thanks for making this personal. I always had (and have) a positive attitude and was definitely not lazy under a stressful situation. The 300 people that are there did not go through the same program I have. Their AQP program is still new at this point and they are learning as they go.

No I am not the UND guy. I have 10+ years experience at the regionals. Their new training program is actually a lot better for people with zero jet experience than lots of experience. For someone like me that knows what AQP should be like and have experience with it, was precisely what was tripping me up. The "FAA-approved" AQP training programs should be similar from airline to airline but the SCA program is totally out of left field.

It seemed to me people with most problems had the most experience. People with fewest experience had the most to learn but the least to un-learn.