In your own company what happened to the guys who were exposed as cheaters? Were they turned in to the FAA or did they live to cheat another day?

I am not a supporter of cheating but it is not true that they do not get ahead. It all boils down to how badly do you want the job and how far are you willing to go to get it.

The guys who get ahead in aviation usually do not let much get in their way. Friends, family, and morals are all on the table as things to be traded away.

Skyhigh

 

I agree 100% that people who cheat often get away with it. That "Cheaters never win" comment was my failed attempt a sarcasm. There were guys I worked with as a CFI that cheated on multi time to meet minimum requirements for regionals. This was back before Multi-Commercial with Instrument only, would land you a job. I was the schools MEI so I had no need or desire to pencil whip. I was getting about 15-30 hrs a month, which at the time was fine with me.

I guess to answer your question, they were not turned in. They didn't cheat to get the job that I worked with them at (although who knows), rather they cheated to move on to another job. None the less, it's wrong. When you instruct everyday in the same place with someone, you have a real good idea of how much time they have. When your social with these guys, you pretty much know exactly what kind of time they have. When they show up one day for work and say they got hired with 100 multi minumums, you know the books are being cooked. Not very discreet on their part, but there it is.

More back on topic, my last student was a multi commercial that I started on December 29th 07. The student had a one week window to complete it, so I asked him what the rush was. He said " I got hired by a regional last week, and they said I need to get it before my class date on Jan 7th. Talk about interviewing with low time.

True story. The regional will remain unnamed.

 

Very hard to do in the military since you don't keep your own logbook.
Now a form of pencil whipping that is prevalent in the military is only flying a 1.0 and logging a 1.3. This is easy to see when the IP logs a 1.0 for instance and the student logs a 1.3. I've had students go back down to maintenance and changed their paperwork. Also - adding that extra flight time drives the aircraft into scheduled insepctions faster and depletes the airframe life so the Maintenance Officer will be on your butt if he catches you fat fingering. My squadron CO gets a print out of every pilot's flight time every month and goes over it with the Operations Officer; so high and low times guys get a little more scrutiny. I take it from the posts that flight schools or Part 135 operations have fairly lack procedures in place to verify actual flight time logged? Does the professional pilot just keep their own logbooks?

USMCFLYR

 

I and most everyone I know keep our own logbooks. If an employer wanted to get suspicious, they would have to make phone calls to everywhere I flew and verify hours. Most places who keep paper records would be hard pressed to find every single hour I flew. Not impossible, but very hard.

 

I wasn't even thinking as much about the **next** employer as I was thinking about accountability of the **current** employer. I assumed that the business would have some ability to verify what you said you were flying while working for them.

USMCFLYR

 

There is virtually no way for someone to check to see if Johnny really flew from Silvis to Peoria on 15 July 1988.

Looking at logbooks is more like forensic accounting. If the numbers don't feel right, they probably aren't. I used to look for logical trends. If the guy says he flies 8 hours per day, I looked for some sort of repetative schedule (five days on, two off, seven and seven, etc.). I used to know the dates of all the hurricanes.... if he was based in Homestead and flew 6 hours the day after Andrew came through, something was wrong. Or if he was based in Bangor and flew his 152 100 hours in February, there was something wrong.

As for me, my logbook is as accurate as the Hobbs meter. (And I knew which planes' Hobbs ran fast and which ran slowly).

 

No, many folks would never endure the "sweat and blood". And that would thin the ranks and make those of us who remain all the more valuable.

One of the first books on commercial flying was about how to scrounge for a job. It suggested banner towing, traffic watch, aerial photography, wildlife spotting, ferrying, post inspection "shakedown" pilot, and dozens others. In the times when a pilot had to beat the bushes for a job, lots of people dropped out. Once one FINALLY made it, life was great. Now with getting hired so easy, most of the jobs are crap.

 

No, but all three could (if properly rated) log PIC.

 

He is trying to say that regionals back then were not the same as the regionals today. You have to admit that getting a major airline job back then was a lot easier then it is today. Now most regionals are major airlines with RJs and most major city pairs within 4 hours are flown by RJs. With an occaisonial 737 or Airbus sprinkled here and there on that said pair. The path to a pro job might have been harder back then but it's equally as hard if not harder not to ultimately make it to that dream job now because there simply are no more jobs and they will continue to be replaced by RJs, that is why he's saying people will not purse this job anymore. For the personal sacrifice we all take it's just not worth it.

 

Agree -again - looking at it from a new employer's point of view. But the compnay you are flying for currently ought to know whether Johnny flew airplane XXX from Silvis to Perioa on 15 July 08, and if the new compnay wantedto know badly enough - I would assume that they could contact said company and ask - did Johnny fly airplane XXXX on such date and for how long. I only have my experience to relate to but if you wanted to know if I really flew my airplane on a certain date for a certain amount of time then my employer (the squadron) has manny different ways to find out that information - rough flight schedules, smooth flight schedules, NAVFLIRS, maybe gripes written against the aircraft, 'Acceptance' sheet signed before I ever walked for the flight, etc.... I guess I am just surprised to find that other businesses don't have a more cntrolled method of logging the pilots time flown and leave it up to the individual. I would have thought it more tightly controlled.

I'm based in the central valley of California where the fog starts to roll in around the November timeframe and doesn't roll out until March! Luckily for me - we often pick up the squadron and move to the lovely deserts of Southern California for detachments where we continue to pump out the sorties.

Thanks for the info FlyJSH!

USMCFLYR