Three failed check rides @ Xjet?
 

Rumor is that Xjet will now offer interviews to applicants with three failed checkrides, providing ONE is the CFI. Anyone heard this?

Haven't heard this, but I can email DR if nobody else has heard.

Not worth it. Sure, you go out and bust three rides so you can get an interview at XJet.

But what about all the other airlines out there?

I'm not sure what you mean. You mean even if you get to Xjet it's hard to get anywhere after that?

Am I alone in thinking that anyone who's failed three checkrides should maybe take a strong look at why they are interested in a career in commercial aviation?

The way I read it, it sounded like you need three busts to get an interview. I know that's not what he meant and I forgot to add the smiley. :D

At the Delta-owned puppymill where I got my ratings, busts were only bad because it cost you another 350 bucks. Nobody mentioned they would haunt you forever.

Instructors were graded by how many hours their students were taking as well as their failure rate. As long as you were averaging a 70% pass rate, the push was to get them done.

There are plenty of people out there who have failed three checkrides who have gone on to have successful aviation careers. There are plenty of factors that go into initial pilot training. I have see plenty of bad CFI's lead good students down the wrong road because they were mentally checked out. This is not a market that companies can be picky about checkrides anymore. Well maybe they could be they won't find a lot of younger qualified pilots without a few blemishes on their training history.

The school I worked at (while not a pilot mill) had a similar mentality. Everyone (all in house examiners included) kept up with the "it's a part 141 school, checkride failures here do not count." Recently that mentality did start to change now that people who graduated with several "Stage check" failures were having hard time getting jobs.

Back then a bust didn't haunt you forever.

I distinctly remember an FAA inspector telling me before I even finished the training I was going to bust my CFI ride. It was the norm. No one passed the first time.

:o
Historically if you had more than 2 failed checkrides you could not interview at Xjet....Now rumor is that those with 3 fails can now get an interview.... providing ONE of the 3 was the CFI checkride. They are overlooking the CFI bust because approximately 70% fail the CFI ride on their 1st attempt. That's what I meant to say.

If you have a stellar resume outside of your busts then you still have a shot. If it was a long time ago and you have since progressed in your career (passed a type ride, been hired and passed training at a part 121 or charter dept) you should be ok. If you are a flight instructor with three busts it will definitely hold you back. As far as I know they are not hiring people with three busts unless they are exceptional candidates in every other way.

JA saw you as his personal walking ATM

If you are a pilot who failed some checkrides, it does not matter that you actually passed them (because otherwise you would not have you licenses).
You are grounded for life, you need to change your career and forget about flying.

Is this the same America where the school system does not let my wife (primary school teacher) grade kids below a certain percentage? Which means no matter how bad one kid does, he/she will never get less than the minimum to pass the test/work. This is done so kids don't have to face failure, "Oh my God how are we gonna fail the kid, they all should have the same opportunities and chances in life".
I am against this. I believe one should have the chance to fail. However, I also believe one should have the chance to succeed.

On a checkride you have to demonstrate you meet certain standards, if you make a mistake (are we not humans?) then you have to re-train and re-take the checkride to demonstrate you have met those standard. Right?
The important thing is that at some point YOU DID MEET THE STANDARDS.

Wait, so if you failed a checkride it tells the airline you are applying for that at some point in the past you did not meet the standards? SHOCKER!!! No one ever met the standards at birth, hence the fact that you failed checkrides does not tell the company anything they didn't already know. The important fact is that, since you have your license/ratings, you DID pass the checkride.

Apparently pilots are not human, they can't fail. If you are a pilot and fail the first time you take a test/ride, it does not matter that you passed it the second time, you obviously are not a real pilot since pilot's can't fail, you are just a human who dreams about flying and there's no place for you in aviation.

"I've missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. Twenty six times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed." - Michael Jordan

I have 5000 tt with 3500 jet, typed in CL-601 and EMB-145. I failed my instrument checkride twice and my CFI the first time, never failed one since. Do I quailfy for a interview?

That's a BS statement. There are plenty of crappy CFI's out there who don't know their backside from a hole in the ground and don't teach their students crap before signing them off. Plus, you know as well as I do that in aviation (as in many things in life) there is more than one way to skin a cat. I have seen people bust checkrides because the examiner didn't like the way they did things but they were taught that way by their CFI. If there are pilots out there with a clean, unblemished checkride record then more power to them. Howeveer, I think those pilots are an exception to the norm and a lot of pilots have more than one bust.

Blame our court savvy society. No families are coming after Jordan for a few million because he missed the game winning shot and 50 people died.

All you say can be true, and there can be others who shouldn't be behind the controls of an airplane carrying paying customers, but because of that same system that you complain about in public school, if you have enough money to continue to train, then you too can eventually succeed!

Liability is a dangerous animal in our legal system.

USMCFLYR

I'm beginning to think I'm the only guy to make it through a 141 program without failing anything.

Knowing my maturity level at the time...I call it luck.

Outstanding.

3 checkride failures shouldn't be acceptable for a professional pilot. I'm sure a lot of guys don't agree with that for whatever reason, but the fact of the matter is standards must be maintained. 1 failure is understandable, 2 is unfortunate, by failure number 3 you should be starting to get the hint that you're just not cut out to fly at a professional level. There are no excuses. If you had other things going on in your life at the time that led to you failing so many checkrides, then you should have put your training off until such time that you could put your full focus and energy into attaining the correct standard.

Too many people think that attaining a professional flying licence is just a case of jumping through hoops. It isn't. There is no barrier to entry these days other than one's ability to pass checkrides and later on, the airline interview.

The standard to pass these checkrides isn't all that high. If you can't meet the standard on three different occasions, then you shouldn't be flying people around for money. Of course failures happen occasionally, but three failures should be a major alarm bell that should prompt you to think that maybe you just aren't cut out for professional flying.

What you are saying would be correct if there were an equal standard of examiners and all examiners performed to the same level. Where I instructed we used several examiners. One we called Santa Claus. He was the one every student wanted because he failed NOBODY. He even fell asleep on a couple of checkrides. We had another examiner who was ex military and a real hard @ss. He probably failed 60% of the applicants the first time and scared the hell out of students. So nobody wanted him, and would only fly with him when Santa Claus was booked. Are you telling me the student that busted three rides with MR Hard @ss was not the kind of professional pilot as someone who went on all their rides with Santa Claus? We had students that would wait for weeks just to get their rides scheduled with Santa. I call BS on this one.....once you get to the 121 world if you are busting checkrides its a different story. But the 91/141 world is so subjective it is hard to judge by failing rides because of the examiners. The CFI ride is the closest you can come to the 121 world because most of the rides are adminstered by the FAA, or examiners the FAA considers to be the best.

THe 3 checkride failure is just a way for Expressjet to weed out applicants and cull the applicants. If the pool gets too small, they will start cutting back on this. Its all supply and demand.

Don't forget the 121 check ride at the end of training to start actually flying, and then IOE, and then probation for a year, and then the probation check ride.

Anyone ever fly with a guy in the 121 world that had 3 check ride bust when he was learning to fly that was still a "horrible pilot"?

Rebecca did.

That is an amazingly succinct way of saying what a lot of us were thinking.

A tip of the hat to you, sir.

Pretty cheap shot! No wonder you are stuck at Comair for 9 years as an FO. Also, you will be a lifer as FO for the rest of your life.

Btw, Rebecca didn't fail three rides. Must get your facts straight mate!

That's not what he said. He said she flew with a guy who had three failures.

Sorry if you feel it was a cheap shot. The quote was:

has anyone flown with a guy in the 121 world that failed three rides and was still a horrible pilot...

and Rebecca did fly with that guy.

I don't understand this statement. Could you elaborate on what my post has to do with Delta grinding Comair into dust?

Ummm......Not sure if serious.

I thought the guy she flew with had 5 failed check rides among some 121 issues? So the question still stands.

And bs on that one. Depends where you did your training. I had 3 fails all under 141 training. I instructed 61, and my students took check rides with DE's. I even added my mei with a DE. A cake walk compared to 141 rides. Got hired and 3 type ratings later, I'm here to tell you it's not a career ender. Yeah I wish I had a perfect record, but I don't. But Im not an idiot. And the label of you're not worthy is a load of crap. I fly with fo's who have a perfect record, and sometimes, their lack of knowledge of basic far's, and other things is astounding. So it really depends on where you trained, and how much time and effort you put into it. Shelling out $$$ to a DE, who gives 30 minute orals, and let's get this check ride over with, doesn't make you an ace pilot?

No Sir you are not...

Part 141 rides aren't counted as failures by the FAA. This is why you should always do part 141 training over 61. People can ask about "failed" stage-checks but there is no paper trail so you can always say you've failed none and nobody will know.

I am not going to debate the question of whether or not three checkride busts is too many. What I do have to say is that there is a complete lack of standardization among checkrides. I know 141 guys who failed a checkride and had it changed to a training mission on their syllabus. I know some 61 examiners who say that the FSDO starts to get cranky when their pass rate goes above 80% and the flight schools, that provide the bulk of their business, do the same when it falls below 70%. I dont believe that there are very many illegitimate busts out there, but I do believe that there is a significant amount of passes where the examiner gave an extra long leash to the applicant. The point being is that a guy who failed three times may have had the unfortunate luck of running into a couple of buzzsaws, while the perfect record applicant may have floated by because the examiner at the time either changed it to a training mission or gave the guy additional leeway.

At a cost of it ranging from $60,000 to $200,000? (ERAU). No thanks buddy. Even as a student pilot back in the day I had enough confidence in my abilities to succeed and to tell these schools to ****** off even though it was a more difficult route.

And by the way, my employer has been faced with nothing but problems with pilots from part 141 schools, so much that their starting to take a closer look at where and how applicants received their ratings, regardless of how glamorous their resume looks.

I was a check pilot at a 141 school and did stage checks. You are right that stage checks won't count against you but checkrides will. The problem is the End Of Course EOC exam at a 141 school with self examining authority. If you are taking a checkride for a license or certificate and you fail the oral or flight portion it will count as a failure on your Oklahoma City file. It is the same as taking a ride with a DE but you are doing it in house with the same reporting standards.

If they ask if you have ever failed a stage check on an application and you say no. They will glance through your logbook and read the descriptions of your flights around your stagechecks. It is usually pretty easy to tell if they goofed it up or not.

In regards to evaluation a checkride says that on a particular day, with a particular examiner, and a particular set of environmental circumstances you met the standard at that time or did not. An examiner gets a fraction of a snapshot to determine a pass or fail.

Years ago, I was in favor of eliminating the DPE system and allowing instructors of a certain experience level to "self certify" the applicant. In other words, I've spend 40+ hours with this person, and I'm in the best position to judge competency. Not a DPE who may or may not have a financial conflict of interest. Never worked out the kinks in this but my belief is the applicants would actually improve as the CFI is "on the hook."

As a side note, when I took my CFI initial in 1991 in the Detroit FSDO all applicants for CFI initial were required to test with the FAA. The DTW FSDO would not allow DPEs to do the exam (that has subsequently changed). Although the failure rate was high, it was not impossible to successfully complete a CFI initial with the FAA (case in point).

If this is the case then it must have changed. It used to be a part 141 school would either recommend or not recommend a person for a rating. If you failed everything only the school would know about it and only the faa if the requested access to your file. The only way a fail would count with thee faa was with a de or a part 61 ride.

Are you sure you are not confusing a part 142 school?

No dude, He is not confused about anything. A in house Part 141 EOC that is going to result in you receiving a certificate, or ratting after successful completion is just like going up with a DPE. If you fail it you may not get the pink slip but it will go on your record at OKC and can be easily looked up. Of course "stage checks " don't count against you because its the equivalent of just going up with your instructor for a another lesson in the PT 61 world. Thats why you saying doing your training 141 is better than 61 solely because of that fact that none of your training can go on your record is stupid/false. BTW I did training both 61 and 141.

When I was a flight instructor there was a student at the school who was working on his CFI and failed 3 times before he passed. The examiner at the FSDO was known to be extremely tough. However, I don't think that examiner felt failing a checkride meant you were a horrible pilot/applicant it was a chance for someone to vette you and correct any deficiencies so you were just that much better when you passed.

We also had an instructor at the school who signed his students off for a total of 8 checkrides and they failed every single one. He was constantly concerned about money and only wanted to get his flight time in so he could get to Eagle.

So I agree standardization would help a lot, but there's plenty of guys out there who failed because they had a lazy instructor who wasn't really concerned with their success but rather about getting to fly that shiny jet. So I don't think it's fair to assume anyone with 3 failed checkrides is a total failure at aviation and should go get a job doing something else.

There is also that quotient of examiners who give passes away like candy, and also some that are totally unprofessional and fail people for ridiculous reasons.

So those of you out there with a perfect pass record try not to thumb your nose too hard at the guys who failed a few checkrides.