I see someone has mentioned RTP pilots, does anyone have any input on direct entry captains or forcibly upgraded captains? I'd imagine CNN could put out another hit piece about how Envoy was upgrading first officers against their will back in 2019, even going so far as to implementing a LoA that forced near-minimum time FOs who were trying to avoid the upgrade by simply not getting their hours.

Not saying they're responsible for the letter, but the idea of forcibly upgrading people to the left seat made me question how safe they would be as PICs at the time.

here’s some input on that.. towards the bottom

https://www.flyingmag.com/story/news...oy-air-safety/

While some of the issues of people avoiding upgrades by not flying may have been not feeling ready for the upgrade, you don’t get the experience you need by NOT flying. A lot of those trying to avoid the upgrade had to do with not wanting to change aircraft (which certainly doesn’t help with feeling ready), but more with QOL issues of being forced to commute or a longer commute or being stuck on reserve for eternity.

But I’m certainly not condoning a forced upgrade. Whether or not a lot will admit it, there’s a lot you just don’t get to see with someone else that has more experience if you move over to the left seat with minimum required experience. There is a BIG learning curve.

At some point the FAA may tell the company no more forced upgrades. At some point it becomes a safety concern and for the pilots who are forced into an upgrade class the odds increase of a negative PRIA result.

Maybe they should tell the company to stop mid-day rest layovers when there are reserve pilots available. Or when you have a long sit in another base and want to burn a commuter hotel for a day room but they don’t let you because “there are adequate rest facilities in the crew room.”

Double-edged sword.

You can argue that forced upgrades put people in the left seat who don't want to do it and maybe aren't up to it.

But you can also argue that forced upgrades put the most experienced pilots (on average) in the left seat, rather than letting them bypass and pushing upgrade further down the list to less experienced (on average) pilots. AA mainline had a mandatory upgrade policy for a long time... you upgraded when a few people junior to you took it.

And fundamentally, airlines hire people to be CA's... they shouldn't be hiring anyone knowing he/she is a career FO. And you shouldn't take the job expecting to be a career FO either... odds are good you can do that if you want but junior-manning happens sometimes.

If you wanted to mostly ignore seniority, you could come up with an arbitrary junior-manning scheme which prioritized pilots based on their experience... TT, 121, turbojet, etc. So instead of upgrading a CFI at legal mins because his number came up, you could instead upgrade the guy with 10K and previous 121 TPIC, etc. But again, seniority.

Is there a requirement that you have to be a Capt to flow?

Yes, one year.

yet they still do.

Does anyone else think that TC is the one that leaked the FAA investigation documents to CNN?