V1Rotate

I'm currently a First Officer at a US regional airline. However, I'm interested in perhaps going to work for an Austrian or New Zealand airline in the future and immigrating there. Do those countries face similar levels of pilot retirement as US carriers? If so, would they be willing to hire American pilots?

galaxy flyer

I think you meant to write "AUSTRALIAN", Austria has very little potential for pilots. For that matter, unless you have the right to work in Australia, no terribly much potential there, either. Pretty advanced aviation community, civil and military, and boatloads of Aussie expats to prove how limited it is there.

GF

The Dominican

Very large Aussie and Kiwi ex pat community and although there are some opportunities opening up, there is plenty of guys with a lot of heavy time available to take a job back home and of course there is the issue of the legal right to work. There are a lot of opportunities right now for ex pats (Americans included of course) but these jobs are for experienced pilots, the average hours on guys that I have been in contact with that have gotten jobs at places like Qatar, Korean, Vietnam, is about 6,000 hours total time with 2,000 jet pic in CRJ's and above, people with that experience and above are the ones that seem to be getting calls for interviews and such. I don't mean to be discouraging in any way, I'm one that always tell people "apply and see what happens" I'm just stating the average experience that I have observed

Typhoonpilot

It's a tough nut to crack, not impossible, but tough. Hopefully Korupilot will come along and tell you how he did it. There are also a couple of other members here who have done it, both were ex-military and married to Oz/Kiwi women. Search this forum for the threads and you'll see there is plenty of information here already.

Here's one: ANZ


and here's another: Oz




Typhoonpilot

The Dominican

Network is a great way to get into any job really, who you know is almost as important as what you know. Jetstar is hiring many guys from Oz but they are also hiring guys from other places to be based in Singapore and the upcoming Jetstar Japan venture. Legal residency can't be obtained as a pilot but if your wife has one of the professions that are sought after like nurse for example, you could get residency that way. Jetstar Asia might be a good way to get into the network that will eventually land you a base in Oz! who knows? Kiwi land is even tougher than Oz in my view

Good luck

Tweet46

I've been trying to crack the Air New Zealand nut since '08 when I retired from the AF. I've got my NZ residency thourgh my Kiwi wife and it is still slow going. Koru is a great source of info, he's sure to be along soon.

Typhoon thanks for digging up that thread...lot's of memories there

Cheers,
Tweet

Kenny

I made the jump from a US Regional to Virgin about 18 months ago and the grass is not greener on the other side. As long as you have the right to live and work here, you're good to go. My sim partner in the 737 was an ex-US Navy F18 guy, who'd married and Aussie. Here are the pro's and con's as I see it.


Pro's.


There is going to be a fairly large shortage of qualified pilots here, over the coming years. So much so that Virgin is starting a cadet scheme on the ATR and flow through to Virgin. The ATR's are going to be flown by a regional here called Skywest.

It seems to be a far more stable industry, compared to the US.

Money is better.

More respect.

4.5 - 5 year upgrade onto the B737.

Con's

It is by far the most expensive country I've ever lived in. (I've lived here, Asia, Europe and the US). Rent in SYD is about $2000-2500 a month for a 1 bed apartment.

Groceries are obscene. I haven't eaten a banana in over 6 months because they are $15 a kilo.

Walk out the door and you'll have your hand in your pocket paying for something. You get nickle and dimed, everywhere.

Flying in Australia is an exercise in extreme patience. Everything is different, from the radio calls and airspace to the regs and procedures. It's almost as if you have to learn everything from scratch and they are extremely anal and pedantic about it.

There is no training culture here, it's a checking culture and you can fail a PC for things that would be a debrief item in any other country. One of my friends failed a pc for lack of support, because the Captain had a hard time flying a single engine ILS, raw data down to mins.

Australians are hardly the laid back bunch we've always been known to be. After 16 years away, I've found that they have become so obsessed with appearing laid back, that they've actually become quite uptight.

I thought that this move would be it for me, but it won't be.

Oh, and forget QF. They are in such a mess right now, that they probably
won't survive another 2 years in their current form.

KoruPilot

Yup, Kenny pretty much nailed it. I'm with the Kiwi version of his employer, same planes, same uniform, different pay-scale. We're kind of like the a Mexican Australia in NZ (appologies to Mexicans as I love the place, but you guy's get payed like us, which sucks).

To get down here? Marry a local.

Currently my employer is referred to as Pacific Blue, but will be Virgin Australia as of December. . . as I understand it. The plus however is that if you show up here with reasonable jet time you can be looking at a quicker command than in Australia. The downside is that as a Kiwi skipper you make less than an Oz based FO. We're working very hard to change that and are in negotiations at the moment, but as it stands it's not great T&C. Crews are fantastic and routes are great however, so I have very high job satisfaction. Our checkies are also not quite as pedantic as the Aussies. . . very realistic and reasonable on the whole.

If Kenny thinks Sydney's expensive, try Auckland. I frankly do not know how most families do it here. Jetstar has been advertising like crazy as they are desperately short of crew, but their pitch for taking an underpaid position is that you 'get' to live in NZ. Gime' a break. On the high side, the pilots here are sick of it. Most just go to EK but we are now trying to change it form within, which will be better for us and the company. . . but enough propaganda.

So Virgin Australia (New Zealand) and Jetstar (New Zealand) are both hiring. You can work for either with a permanent residence visa. Both require one to pay for all or part of their training. Jetstar is hiring DE commands and we are not, but we do upgrade very quickly if one has previous jet experience.

As for Air NZ at the moment, that whole mess is an entire thread on it's own. There are people there in management who I have a lot of time for, and then there's senior management and the board. NZALPA has a massive rift as well due to some sneaky working's of the over 65 year old pilot's (again, a total different thread). Basically, not a happy place, which is a shame, 'cause it should be great. It's not. If I was a young pilot here I'd head the Virgin or Jetstar route.

Tweet bro, come on down anytime and we'll get you into this outfit. . . lot's of fun and great crew's. You'd have a command in 24 months.

Kenny, I'm in SYD this week and next. Let's do beers eh. If it's nice I'll be down Bondi surfing Thursday and Friday.

Best of luck to all. Sorry for the short post but it's a busy afternoon. Any specific questions ask away and I'm sure Kenny or myself will be able to fill you in.

Kenny

Koru,

Incoming PM....Beer is long overdue.

USMCFLYR

A very informative post Koru and Kenny - thanks for sharing the info, but the bolded part above is the only thing that stuck for me.
I should have taken my shot back in '95! She even worked in Marketing for Ansett Australia (which I guess is now gone and buried?)

USMCFLYR