I knew a guy who went to work for UAL in the late 60's and sat side saddle for nearly 20 years before upgrading..... He retired now from UAL as a captain.... and loved that company even though it took him 20 years to move to the right seat.

I guess my point is that this business may throw you a curve ball and everyone has to decide to live with it or not..... Every flying job ( three ) that i have had, had pluses and minuses just like in the real world... it is what it is, either you stay in this business or you dont. The key is finding the niche in this business that best fits your life.....

Holy flying squirrels, Batman!! 11,000 pilots in 3 years?!?! That's about 4,000 pilots a year! They must be hiring like crazy as we speak. Uhemm....Anyone got info on Air India?? :D

I foresee these two countries contracting to American flight schools again. At our flight school alone a couple of years ago we trained hundreds and hundreds of Chinese flight students. In fact, we were training so many Chinese students on top of an already swamped airport with about four flight schools on it that KRVS got put in the top %10 of the countries biggest airports (Even today we are more than twice as busy as Tulsa International, according to the FAA anyways).

The flying club at LGB was loaded with students from China, Japan and India. I mean loaded to the rim! Rainbow Air was the same situation but with 4 times the students from those countries. All of them were on the career program on their own dime and wanted to go back home and fly for Air India, JAL, ANA, ACH, etc. They said the jobs were easy to get if you trained in the states; whether that's true or not, I don't know.

It's not Air India I would be looking into. It's the start ups, King Fisher and Jet Airways.

About six months ago, I was sitting next to a Legacy 777 CA about to retire. He had just interviewed for the Jet Airways direct entry 777 CA job. There were 3 or 4 other US legacy 777 CA's there with him he said. The pay package was pretty good, better than any US legacy just based on monthly gar X pay rate.

Are the crews required to live in India? If so, you might want to visit first.

I asked, he said NO. If it was, he would not take the job. I think he said it was a European base (ams, I think) with a pos space back and forth to the US with 9 day off gaps between work blocks. I believe he said the work blocks were 9 days as well.

As of that time Jet had no US destinations. He said if/when they do get them, it will be a ticket from your home to the US departure/destination point.

Home based with a ticket sounds like a very good deal.

Hey, AMS doesn't sound bad! I could sail the channel on my days off or go tour some of Europe. That would be a great gig for a while.

Well, when I said AMS, it was where trips org/term, not where he is based. It's where the airline has expat crew start/stop. Much like many US ACMI carriers commercial their crews to Europe to pick up their trip. To my understanding, they are not going to sponsor you for an EU work permit, nor right to abode in the EU. They buy you a ticket from the US to AMS to start/end your trip.

Now if you wanted to spend your off time there, then whatever. But as far as residing, see above. Or, you would have to do the whole leave the country, come back in, but stay less than 90 days thing.