Avroman

Or they could spend 6 months in the industry, see what a farce Delta is peddling and put out an app at several other quality companies and be gone long before finishing playing Delta's games. I guarantee other major airlines know that they will be dealing with an ever tightening supply of pilots for the foreseeable future, and they are laughing at Delta as much as the rest of us.... well except United, but that's a whole 'nother joke going on.

GuardPolice

What's the farce being peddle here? It's a miracle they've done this much and it's a tacit admission of how the supply of pilots will be "tightening" as you say. If the 42 month timeline holds true, show me a path to another major or legacy that beats that. Right now nothing does.

As a reminder, Delta doesn't want people who don't want to be here. That's why any Propel student can leave the program without jeopardizing future employment with the company if they feel Delta isn't a good fit for them.

Mesabah

The issue will come three, four years from now, when the massive hiring begins. You need to take these pilots, and hire them at Delta right out of college, bypassing DCI completely. It will cause all kinds of issues sending them to DCI first. Simply put, we can't replace a Propel pilot when they leave, we need pilots with 1000hrs of 121 time. The experience they gain at DCI is so they can upgrade at DCI.

GuardPolice

Propel will be around for a long time. As these students move onto mainline there will be a continuous supply of new pilots behind them. At the same time, DCI will be hiring OTS and from their own initiatives.

RJ4LIFE

I don't know how much more "massive" the hiring is going to get. Delta has been hiring over a thousand a year the last few years but our mandatory retirements will never reach that number, even in the peak years in the middle of the next decade. I suppose some of the other majors (specifically UAL) haven't been at to their max hiring potential but they all have been steadily hiring.

I honestly don't know how much more significantly the hiring practices are going to change from where they are now. The most common background of Delta new hires seems to be 4-year aviation college, CFI or other time building, a few years at a regional, then hired relatively quickly after upgrading (or even prior to upgrading in some instances). With the increasing enrollment numbers at aviation colleges I don't see why this isn't sustainable. There are very few other careers where you can get a BS degree from a non-Ivy League college and have a very realistic chance of making six figures only three to four years out of college.

Long Landing

Delta alone has stated they need to hire at least 8,000 over the next 10 years to keep up with growth and retirements. While Delta has been hiring a fair amount of pilots in the past 5 years United and AA have not. In the next 10 years 25-30k mainline hires wouldn’t be surprising between the big 6. And with JetBlue and Spirit getting better contracts it makes those places career destinations now too. You won’t make WB CA money there but you also might never make WB CA money at the big 6 either depending on your seniority and personal reasons. The hiring has just begun and it will continue barring another catastrophic event for the next 10+ years.

TalkTurkey

you guys are overthinking and overstating the crap out of this. Now I have stopped giving Delta updates, and that will stay that way, but I will say this. If you can get out of 9E and get to any major airline including LCC which for the most part pay great money now, DO IT. if you're at 9E in hopes of nothing more than moving to Delta, I retract my statements of 1 and 2 years ago, and replace it with; you'll be here a very long time.

Casualinterest

Oh the foreshadowing...

To your underlying point, I agree that we all need to be taking control of our own destiny. If you can get on with a major or lcc on your own, do it. When people start leaving because they don't want to wait for the Dgi, they'll be forced to make improvements. Every Captain with 6 months in the seat or more should have an app out at DAL, SWA, and JB. Just in case

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Avroman

The problem is they will upgrade to mainline instead of the left seat here. We will run ever shorter of captains HERE. Yes we have a lot of lifer captains, but there are also many of us looking for any reasonable path out. With the way propel is set up, there will be nobody to replace us captains that leave.

GuardPolice

You must’ve missed where I said above that Propel Pilots will be expected to upgrade at their DCI carrier. Delta hasn’t set a minimum turbine time requirement (beyond the 1000 121 turbine) before they go to mainline. So, Delta doesn’t have to accept them at mainline without what they consider to be adequate experience.