I’d say the risk is relatively low compared to the nightmare scenarios these guys are talking about. Take the time with your family, go into training with a clear head and you’ll be better set up for success. The bigger threat is being distracted during training. If your airline has good movement it’s maybe going to cost you a month or two of something you don’t want. That’s a small price to pay for making memories with your family. For every guy that missed an opportunity by one number there are hundreds that made it or missed it by a mile.

 

I agree. While the safest bet might be to take the earliest class... you sort of have to hope for another downswing in hiring or taking the earliest class will be pointless. If hiring continues at its current pace it’s not going to matter if you start class now or 6 months from now. The time it takes to hold a line, upgrade, etc. will be the same either way.

I value the time I spend with family more than taking a chance that an earlier class date will really only pay off if there’s another economic down turn. While that’s very possible, the flip side would be... I would hate to be a senior regional captain making 120k-150k a year, get picked up by a major, economy crashes while you’re still junior, then you’re furloughed on the street when no one is hiring. Where if you started later you’d still be a regional captain making 120k-150k. Best case you keep your job at the major, but you’re stuck on reserve for 5 years. Some guys don’t mind reserve but I hated it. Reserve sucks even more if you’re junior. If someone told me I’d be on reserve for 5 years making 200k at a major it wouldn’t be worth it to me. I’d rather be stuck as a regional captain choosing when I fly and knowing my schedule. Bigger paychecks don’t change the fact that your QOL will suck and you’ll have no family life.

In the end it’s a crapshoot. Again, the only way an earlier class actually pays off is if there’s an actual downturn in hiring. And even then, it could work in your favor or it could work against you. IMO, your seniority and how it plays out is just luck of the draw. Me personally, I would try to spend as much time as I can with my family. They’re more important than any paycheck. Regionals pay an actual livable wage now.

 

Everybody’s situation is different, of course, so there’s no one correct answer here. I had a May ‘17 class date and ended up delaying it for the maximum six months when an opportunity came up last minute to work on an America’s Cup sailboat in Newport, RI. I had a great time, met a lot of cool people and acquired great sailing experience. By some accounts here I screwed myself by delaying. Either way I don’t sweat it. My QOL was tremendous that summer and the contacts/experiences from it might actually benefit my QOL even more later down the road. Regardless of whether you choose the first available class date or delay it, living life constantly second guessing your decisions is no way to live. In the grand scheme of things, a high seniority number won’t, by itself, always make you happy. That family vacation might very well be worth taking a later class.

 

Bottom line is you can't control the future. You might have already missed that window that gives you the smoothest airline career ever, or you are just making it in by taking this class but now your family resents your career forever, or you wait and take the vacation with a later class and have a great time but your career winds up with rough patches, or you take the later class and the vacation which opens up an opportunity you never had. I could go on forever with how this all plays out. Choose what you feel is best for you and your family.
I am heading back after a few years break from flying. My wife isn't happy about it, but I think my marriage would be worse off with me resenting my family as the reason I don't fly anymore. My wife isn't happy, but she agrees. Do what is best for your situation.

 

You can’t predict the future, especially in the airline business. My newly commissioned (from cadets) grandfather was just completing training in the B-26 in Texas when the (BIG) bomb was dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Army Air Corps didn’t even wait for the formal surrender, they started processing people for discharge immediately. Gramps went into the reserves but didn’t actually consider flying for an airline until a decade later. He got hired by a legacy that’s still around today but was way down on the seniority list and spent years on reserve and was looking at a decade or two for upgrade. Then he got an offer to come work as a captain for another airline - a new startup - that also flew the aircraft he was flying as an FO. If he made the jump he was going to be in the top ten on their seniority list.

The prospect of leaving a legacy for an upstart new airline was certainly “iffy” to say the least. So he asked his stock broker about the new airline, if the management was good, if the economics made sense, etc. what he was told was something like this.

The management was probably OK but they were under capitalized. They didn’t actually own most of their aircraft, they were leased, and while they might actually make it if they survived their first three years, he thought the undercapitalization would probably kill them before three years were up.

Gramps stayed with the legacy, although he knew a couple of his fellow FOs even junior to him that made the jump. And of course the stockbroker was right, the new airline was undercapitalized and it did go under. Except this was back before deregulation and airlines were not allowed to REALLY go under. One of their competitors was “encouraged’ to buy them by the CAB. And in this case that competitor was the Legacy gramps worked for.

His company wound up repainting the planes and integrating the seniority lists. Those FOs junior to gramps who made the ‘boneheaded’ move of leaving the legacy wound up thousands of seniority numbers higher than when they’d left, and seat-locked as captains under the CAB directed merger.

And yeah, I know, the CAB went away in 1985, but it’s still the airline business and it’s still unpredictable and it may turn on you in a moment however much you try to hedge your bets. Aviation will never love you but if you treat them right your family will.

Don’t short change your family for something you have no real control over anyway.

 

Most majors have reserve rules that are better schedules than a line-holder at a regional. Major reserve can be good enough that the junior schedules on aircraft can sometimes be lines (IE the plug in a base is a line-holder).


For the OP, if possible I think the earliest class date is always best when possible. I say interview when it is right if possible if you have other things going on that could distract you, and the same with class. Make sure when you're in class you can study as you need. In my personal experience, one class was the difference between 5 years as a junior line-holder at a regional and being abused on reserve. When you start class has the potential to follow you for the rest of your career.