I did 135/91 for a year and 1/2 and hated it... The flying was fun, weird destinations and the Lear is freaking rocket (I loved that thing)... but I hated not having a schedule and being in Stby all the time. Plus I felt like I was living in the airport waiting for passengers that would just show up whenever they felt like it, then we had to carry their bags to the airplane and do all the ground work (fueling, flight plan...) 16 hour duty days with 1 hr flight time was very usual...
Of course I blame all these to the company I was working for... no respect or work rules for their pilots.
I think under the right $$$$$circumsntances$$$$ this could be the best job ever, unfortunately I had a bad experience.

 

The California bases are super senior, and really tough when you do get it because you are on the bottom of the list for a long long time. SLC isn't too bad because of all of the growth, but you can expect an ORD or MKE base if you get hired at this time. Most of the people in ORD are just waiting out another base, so if you can live there you will hold a good line very quickly and have a rock star schedule in a year.

The environment at SkyWest is a lot better than my last job, and the pilot group is really great. SkyWest also has the growth potential to keep upgrade times low and domicile movement free, so QOL stays good because you don't spend a lot of time at the bottom of the totem pole. As has been mentioned before we got a memo in the company email with the hiring schedule, and we are planning on hiring a lot of pilots in the spring. They quit upgrades this fall because they were unable to cover flights with FO's.

As far as pay goes $19.25 is lower than average, but to compare I was paid around $22.40 at my last job but because of the way SkyWest pays you (full deadhead pay, higher daily guarantee, higher monthly guarantee) my checks have actually been a little bigger after deductions and everything than they were at my last job. You can't just look at the hourly rate to compare what you will make at an airline job. That said bonuses shouldn't be considered part of the compensation package when comparing jobs either because you can't be certain that you will get it. It's all a crap shoot in the end but IMHO SkyWest is a safe bet.

 

...and because we are stocked up on captains at the moment.

 

Two years could be reasonable if more growth arrives. Otherwise I'd guess 3-4. years. Your time is typical for a Skywest new-hire, except for the turbine time. Unfortunately it won't give you an advantage because of your lower total time...

To upgrade you will need 2500 TT, so you would need close to two years online just to get to that, less if you pick up extra flying.

You also need 1000 hours turbine CREW time (solo metro, caravan, etc doesn't count). If you had high total time AND turbine crew time, you could probably upgrade early by bypassing more senior FO's who don't meet the experience requirements. But you still need 1300 hours TT anyway, so even if you hit the turbine requirement early, you'd still need more total time. By the

 

did you guys get the kansas city base yet?

 

power of grayskull?

 

Don't know were you pulled that out of, but that's the funniest thing I've read in a LONG time!!!!!

 

he-man...great cartoon...i even had a he-man big wheels

 

wow, these new FOs get younger and younger...

 

No MCI base yet.