Gulf Air
 

Anyone know about Gulf Air in Manama, Bahrain.?

A320 direct entry program.?

Thanks

Do a search for it, it has been discussed quite a bit.

They just bought a bunch of 787's. But who knows. It sounds like it has not been the best place to work for pilots for quite some time.

Gulf Air is an airline in decline and has been for years. The airline used to be jointly owned by Bahrain, Qatar, Abu Dhabi, and Oman. One by one all the others have pulled out to concentrate on their own airlines. Now only Bahrain remains. The airline has recently made orders to replace ageing aircraft, but there is no real growth planned. It loses money continuously and has for years.

If you need to use them as a stepping stone for bigger and better things then it isn't a bad place to work according to colleagues who came from there. Notice the main point of that last sentence. Guys who were there for over 10 years and were 767 captains left the airline to come to another as first officers as they saw no upside in remaining.


Typhoonpilot

Thanks for the insightful info.

Gulf Air
 

I was stationed in Bahrain during the First Gulf War. When the war was over, we were allowed to go off-base to Manama, the capital city.

Bahrain is not a bad country for being in the Middle East, or at least, it wasn't bad then. Great restaurants, some beaches, scuba diving (but lots of sharks), horseback riding, a horse track with gambling (first-rate), and legal ALCOHOL (although very expensive). For shopping, a majority of the shopkeepers speak at least some english. Women can drive and don't have to wear a pillow case. Unfortunately, lots of fundamentalist trouble has been brewing there for years. I went to a military conference there in 96, and when we showed up, the other conferees were astonished that we drove a plainly military vehicle in military uniforms through downtown. They said we should have been warned that such a move would almost certainly bring us under attack.

Lots of expats live in Bahrain; mostly Brit, and they mostly work for ARAMCO, the oil company.

The other large Brit contingent is Flight Attendants. Women I knew in the military referred to the Gulf Air F/As as "Gulf Air Matresses." They had quite a reputation for sleeping with any wealthy Sheik. A new A-320 F/O wouldn't get such preferential treatment. They do tend to be very attractive, however.

Accomodations, at least on Bahrain, were first-class. I stayed once or twice at the Gulf Hotel on Air Force business, and ate in their restaurants; the hotel chain is (or at least, was) part of the Gulf Air op.

Gulf Air will probably always stay in business, as it is a matter of Arab "pride" to have an indigenous airline.

Gulf Air crashed an A-320 by flying a perfectly good airplane into the sea about 3 or 4 years ago at 250 kts. Spatial misorientation. Nether the Capt nor F/O was an expat. Other than that, I think they have a decent safety record.

Good intel UALT38...
thanks

The Gulf Air girls will be quite nice to you as long as you do NOT refer to them as "sky mattresses". I was younger and single and had no problem with them at all; dated a number. Since this appears to be one of the main points brought up, and since I just don't like my old friends being referred to as anything derogatory by a bunch of stuffed shirt army women, I figured I'd comment.

Also, most of my FO's were Arabs and they were great guy's; always invited myself and the rest of the ex-pat pilots out if we were cool with them. Military people have made a number of comments on this site with regards to safety and the way they were looked at by the locals, with negative connotations. I don't argue with that. Be cool and be nice, it's their country after all, and you will have a great time.