Can I get any recommendations....or advice on how to compare airlines? I've had CommutAir recommended....ideas?

 

Expressjet based in Atlanta or PSA bases in Charlotte... Drive to work...

Welcome to the world of military transition. Lots of stuff to consider...

Aero Crew News has an app (ACNNewstand I believe) that publishes monthly emags that provide airline profiles and general overviews and occasional interviews on hiring trends. They cover majors and regionals- might be a good place to spend the next week reading through the last year of issues (I believe it started in March 15).

Regionals will probably get you to the majors the quickest, provided you can stomach the paycut, and have a clean record etc.

Many guys can't, or chose not to take the paycut to go the regional route and get their start out in ISR... They pay about what you make now, and let you live anywhere you want. Trade off is you're gone half the time in 60 to 90 day blocks. Lots of guys have been leaving ISR for AA and United lately... SWA has been scheduling interviews for multiple guys as well in recent months. I've had a hiring helper at AA, and another at DAL recommend the ISR route as a viable path to their companies as well as the regionals.

If you can retire in December you may want to apply to the ISR companies this week since they can do phone interviews and make hiring decisions without making you fly from Oki to interview in person. I've heard some regionals are doing phone interviews as well, I'm just not sure if Expressjet and PSA are. If you get hired on by a company you can always cancel if you get a better gig lined up. We had 3 pilots no show to my ISR class and a class or two behind me one of the guys got a call from AA while he was in sims... Needless to say he didn't stick around.

 

Looks like ExpressJet pay is almost double PSA. ExpressJet in Atlanta is looking like a smart move for me. Not sure how hard trading for Atlanta would be. I'll spend the long weekend with Aero Crew News. Thanks.

 

It all depends on your goals. For you, you with military flying you want to get in, get current, upgrade and get to a major ASAP. If there are flights to Ewr or iAd regularly I would look into Commutair and also piedmont since you can get to phl. Both offer a growing company, very quick upgrade.

Commutair pays a little bit more, the health bennies are better at pdt.

Third and forth would be endeavor and republic, pay is more but upgrade is much longer than the two above. Good luck.

 

MKUltra,

I am current right now. Not sure I understand why I care to upgrade in the regionals if my goal is to quickly move to the majors. How does the growing company help me? I think I'd rather find the easiest commute for the best pay, and hope to get the call inside of 12 months. Perhaps I should have put more of my stats in the original question. I am just shy of the 1500 total time, but I am a current F-15 pilot with over 1000 PIC, and an ATP due to the FSDO approving my personal logbook with 0.2/sortie. From what all the airline prep folks are telling me, I just need to get over the 1500 minimum, and I should be competitive for the majors. So, I literally just want the fastest 100+ hours possible, in a situation my family can live with...but with the possibility of having to wait patiently if things don't happen as fast as we'd like. Thoughts?

 

I'd say Expressjet would be your best bet as long as you can hold ATL out of training. PSA in CLT would be great except you'd have to start in DAY or TYS for two or three months on reserve. The PSA 15k bonus comes with the two year commitment but you don't have to take it, thereby allowing you to leave the moment you get 1500TT. The only problem is I don't think AA likes hiring pilots from the wholey owned regionals out of turn so you might lose the ability to go to mainline AA early by going to PSA, Piedmont, or Envoy. At least with Expressjet you'd be starting at 37 ish per hour and you can drive to work.

 

If you live in Greenville you know to avoid I-85 like the plague. I can't tell you how many times it has taken me 4+ hours to drive to Charlotte because northbound traffic is at a complete stand still due to accidents.

 

I understand.. current militarily is very different than current 121 operator. Toil be competitive to the majors once you get a 121 type rating done and some time. You'll be even more competitive for a major if you have part 121 PIC time. I am not a military guy but work with many, and they still haven't been tapped by a major yet.

Make a plan to be at regional a while and hope for a quick transition.

 

If you were CLT based at PSA, you could sit short call reserve at home as its a 2 hour call out. If you go to expressjet then you'd have to get a crashpad and sit reserve assuming their short call period is 2 hours too.

 

I got off active duty and moved to Greenville, been at PSA for almost 2 years. It's been good for me but you may have missed the window to get in good here.


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