Pontius Pilot

Recency of experience?

To keep their skills sharp?

To keep up hope?

Just in case.

To justify their jobs.

To get rid of the 10,000 business cards they have.

Recurrent training.

To keep them from going stir-crazy.

That's just a few of the reasons I can think of. None of them justify the expense of sending people out to job fairs when we are not hiring. Maybe they think people will forget about AE. I have no clue. It doesn't make any logical sense to me.

Mason32

You hit it on the head right there. The word is the schoolhouse put 21 or so instructors back on the line and told them not to even think about going back until Fall...

As for people being hired with low low time and trapped 5-9 years in the right seat.... that is exactly what they DON'T want... they learned that over the last two years. They want people to stay 1-3 years so they can keep a steady supply of cheaper labor in the right seats.... and that is the folks with 1,000 plus before hire.

FL450

I agree they don't wqant the 500 hour wonders who are going to be stuck there for years, however they have this funny policy about retraining current type rated pilots to their way of flying... Some one needs to tell them that you can teach an old dog new tricks

Pontius Pilot

If I were a betting man, I'd put money on that being a very likely thing to happen. The terrible F-word may rear its ugly head.

Although, with what I'm hearing about people unsatting their probie rides, maybe not. They may clean a bunch out that way.

PolishPilot

I am curious about one thing. Last year and the year before that, during the hiring boom, there were a lot of pilots applying. At first it started with instructors being hired, and they all had 1000hrs, or more. Then as time went on and the regionals needed more pilots, instructors were hired who didnt even get to 1000hrs, so they started to lower their minimums. Obviously it got to a point where having a pulse was enough to be in the right seat. Before I go on rambling, my thing is, when people say furloughed pilots are a sure bet, that they already passed one training so they must pass the next one. What about those hundreds of 300 hour wonders? a lot of them are flying the lines now arent they? Im not saying they all passed and are great pilots but to me, it seems that even a 300 hour pilot CAN be taught how to fly a regional jet. I completely agree that a pilots with prior 121 experience are probably less likely to fail out of training, but you cant say that about all pilots. Can you? It seems that when airlines need pilots they dont really care how many hours their pilots have when they are hired, the airlines will spend money to train them. I guess now when airlines start hiring it will be the furloughed pilots first, then instructors with tons of dual given hours and eventually it will go to freshly commercial rated pilots. (sorry for the ramble)

meeko031

They may close the LAX base before they do that, but then again it's a possibility that they may do both at the same time...I just can't wait for us to start wearing those bright vests while walking on the ramp.

RJSAviator76

If that's the case, I find that to be the biggest bunch of unethical sh*t! If those probies truly suck, it speaks poorly of Eagle training program which I find difficult to believe as it has the reputation of being one of the best.

Otherwise, to let people go by screwing with their records and employability is grossly unethical and wrong.

Flyby1206

Didnt they stop approving LTLOAs?

Pontius Pilot

A long time ago.


What's the story with the bright orange vests? Did I miss something? Are we getting a new addition to our uniforms (or are we going to have to do ramper work too)?

withthatsaid182

i am usually a glass half empty guy and kind of half expect furloughs but i have these arguments in my head and they usually sound like this:

the northeast is terribly understaffed (well ORD and DFW are overstaffed so one big displacement will solve it)

we're getting 25 more RJs (haven't we been telling ourselves that for years now?)

weren't we still understaffed when we stopped hiring? (the reductions solved that)

the northeast is getting 1700 hrs in the spring (are we really though?)


sitting ready every day and never getting called is continuing to worry me though...i really don't know what's going to happen anymore....i heard there will be a pilot staffing meeting on the 26th????