SrfNFly227

USA Today put out another article on the Regionals today. I am a little surprised that nobody had put up the link to it yet.

Pilots in crashes had failed multiple tests - USATODAY.com

gtechpilot

More trash - is anyone surprised?

SkywayExed

I read that this morning. Kind of makes me sick. USA Today paints the regionals as amateur hour. Hard to believe some of us are actually well trained and competent professionals who take our jobs seriously. I also didn't realize we used letter grades to rate our peformance.

xjcaptain

For once the reporting seems spot on accurate. I am suprised they connected the dots with Pinnacle and Colgan. It is is strange that they didn't mention the other fatal crash by Pinnacle (Express) in HIB.

We may not like the way this sounds in print, but it is accurate.

DeltaPaySoon

I heard someone else mention something earlier today and I agree. At least in Florida, failing students became BIG, BIG business for those "overworked" DE's in the early '90's. I knew one in particular that, I quit using immediately, actually tell us that he started failing for extra money since everyone else did twice as much as he did.

So, this artical about failures is only touching the surface about the truth behind failures and, IMHO, about how much money is in it for those "failing" the applicants. It has very little to do with overall quality of the applicant. Until the FAA rids the multiple sources of training, quality will forever be suspect. I'm sure many others can tell of similar feelings in other states that do mass training.

ashcroft

I went to get my atp in a '44 apache and when I talked to the examiner he flat out told me that if I didn't do so many hours training with a certain cfi (ready his buddy) and get a sign off he would fail me even though I didn't need a sign off or training for an atp check ride.

seven6

I saw the same topic from this article air on CNN this morning.

VideoGuy

I have a serious question. It is really easy to say that someone failed X number of times at something but to me, that is only relevent to the number of attempts and number of passes. Years ago, I read the statistics for Michael Jordan and how many shots he actually missed but was still considered great. JFK Jr. failed his boards to become a lawyer but eventually passed. I find it interesting how they never tell you what the total # was. If the total # of tests was 100, then the # doesn't look so bad. But if it was 10, well that's not so good.

Zapata

I failed my initial CFI ride in FL in the early 90's and there was no DE charge for the second attempt. Though I don't know if my case is the exception to the rule.
____________________________

This brings on another point. If one of Captain Renslow's failures was a CFI ride, it shouldn't count in the court of public opinion. However, realistically, I know that the public won't understand.

rickair7777

Pilot training tests (checkrides) are supposed to be passed. Unlike basketball (and bar exams) there is no expectation that you will take a whole bunch of them until you score.

In order to become an airline captain via civilian training, you would take these checkrides, usually in this order:

Training:
Private Pilot (Single-engine)
Instrument Rating
Commercial Pilot (Single Engine)
Multi-engine Rating
Flight Instructor (not required, but most pilots do it)
Flight Instructor-Instrument (not required, but most pilots do it)
Flight Instructor-Multi-engine (not required, but some pilots do it)

Airline:
New hire training and checkide
Annual Proficiency Checkride
Captain/ATP training and checkride

Most of these checkrides include a written test, and all include an oral exam in addition to the flight check.

It is not unusual for a pilot to have failed one, or even two of these events...stuff happens sometimes, just like a regular citizen might get an occasional speeding ticket.

But three or more failures starts to raise eyebrows, especially once you are employed by an airline. Initial training failures might be due to lack of effort, but once you are employed at an airline you are trying pretty hard.