^^ He probably meant you are going to die sooner or later ..... so you really wont be able to make use of the money you make in the extra five years, not if you have invested wisely over your long career.

Unless u want to be like Saul and ensure that the last check you write, before you die, bounces

 

vishal7 got what I was saying. yes youre making money, but 66-70 is your retirement years (let alone 60-65). if you choose to waste it by working when you don't NEED to, youre basically working for free (goes beyond monetary)

 

Many of the 65-70+ year old people I've flown with already have TWO retirements under their belt and are collecting money from both. Maybe they like the paycheck, maybe they don't have anything else better to do, or maybe they want to get away from their wives as much as possible. I don't know. I hope to retire before I'm 60.

 

I work with guys well into their 60s who have dual retirement incomes and definitely don't "need" to work but certainly continue to do so. I am sure there are others who have taken it in the shorts from the airlines via furloughs and bankruptcies.... goodbye retirement, who have to continue to work!! I imagine if I were 59 or 64 and was in good shape, willing, able and fully capable to do the job, I would certainly hate to think that I had to go just because I was told that I'm too old.

Meanwhile there's the 35 or 40 yr old guy so out of shape that he probably couldn't fit through the cockpit escape window in an emergency or has just as high of a chance of dieing of a heart attack at the yoke.... or probably a higher chance of choking to death on a burger mid flight.

Fact is that some people actuallly enjoy flying and would continue to do it till the day they die... of old age and I personally think that is a tribute to how great our profession is. I've seen plenty of doctors practicing medicine into their 90's and no one seems to have a problem with that. After all plenty of pilots have died while in flight and the co pilot or captain was able to land the aircraft without incident.

for the record I am 44 and I hate to think of others not retiring holding up progression of my career but I also realize I will be that guy one day as well.

 

Oh, well in that case let's eliminate the age limit entirely; what's the worst that can happen? A few single pilot ops here and there, no biggie.

 

Was the concern safety or the fact that these individuals are higher in senoirity?

I am only pointing out that a guy over 65 in good shape is no more of a risk than some fat #$% that barely passed his medical.

I also have no problem with the airlines saying "when". There are always part 91 jobs for those that simply love to fly.

 

And a 90 year old with a sharp mind in relatively good shape is better han a 50 year old about to drop dead. You're dealing in non sequitors that border on outright sophistry when you say such broad things as that to prove your point. In the real world, there is and never will be one single way to absolutely check every single pilot with complete precision on a real time basis. The current medical check doesn't even come close, and even the EU style ones don't either unless you want to quantify how much additional erosion into the safety margin is acceptable and for what "gain". That is why there are age minimums and maximums for many things. There's probably a 9 year old "Doogie Howser, ATP" out there that could do the job as good as the worst middle aged pilot out there, but there is no way to reliably screen and vet everyone in a profession like this with no limits on anything.

I agree with the bolded part, obviously, and I think that 60 was where it should have stayed, but we should in no way think about raising it past 65. Unless you're going to give full blown health and cog evals on pretty much a weekly basis, you will be cutting into the safety margin and doing so just so that some guys that already got 5 years in the bonus round at the top of a seniority list because of age 60 can stay for more bonus round years with absolutely no risk and no downside. If they want to fly airliners beyond 65, the industry will be hurting for regional FO's at the bottom of the list. No more bonus round.

 

Boy, has this thread taken a nose dive! Who votes this thing gets unpinned! I keep looking at it hoping the conversation has gotten back on track... It hasn't!

Who is with me? Unpin?!

 

Par for the course in this forum.

 

Hired by UAL....mid Oct interview. Hoping for late april or early May class date. All Civilian, couple of job fairs, more than 10 letters of rec.