Very cool. The age limit of 35 was not so cool though (for some of us...).

 

Yea. That's out the window in today's world.

 

They were short on pilots. Couldn't hire military pilots since most of them were a bit busy in SE Asia, even though there were a lot more military pilots than there are today. That's what a pilot shortage looks like. Hire at the minimum legal qualifications and throw in perks like free training and good pay. We will likely see that happen again in the not-too-distant future, only this shortage is caused by the race to the bottom driving down pay and benefits with no guarantee of advancement out of the regional ghetto. The retirement attrition will change that through market forces. Pay and benefits will eventually improve when mainline management finally wakes up to the fact that they tried too hard to squeeze blood from a stone and broke the stone. RFPs for outsourced feed will be more lucrative, until eventually the cost advantage of outsourcing goes away and it becomes more cost-effective to bring the flying back to mainline. Won't happen overnight, but those of us who still have over 3 decades left before mandatory retirement are sitting pretty. I'm just being patient.

 

Not sure if this is new information or not. Seen on a Piedmont Ground Handling board in DCA.

 

That's too bad. The Republic E170 product is much better than the CRJ. I would've thought for such a high value airport they would've used the 170's.

 

Republic can't staff it.

 

Can't staff the big shiny jet

 

My father was an ANG pilot at the time and told me he seriously considered this. As a military pilot with a PPL, he was considering UAL and an aeronautical engineer position with the Dept. of the Army. He chose the Army and that turned out to be a prudent choice. He was grounded with high blood pressure and ultimately retired from the ANG. His unit was activated for SE Asia after his retirement. At that point in time high blood pressure (very high in his case.) was grounding no matter what.

 

I understand my grandfather had HBP while in flight training in 1942, was told he could be an instructor but never see combat...chose to be a waist gunner and radio ops on a B24...

HBP was a deal breaker back then

 

No kidding!! There is nothing that is ever going to happen that will cause airlines to come to that level.

They may of course stop hiring the regional guys to keep them there as long as they can. Maybe start a major airline MPL program to get around depleting their regional staffing.