im hearing that the faa is over(kinda) jaa. my CFI friend is helping someone to get his commercials, and then the student going back to south africa to fly A320. the kid bearly has 400hrs tt!! is that possible? is this the main reason the alot of international students come to the US to get trained, and then go back to fly airliners? talk about skipping regionals...

Yeap! I flew my last 5 years in India and Jordan, and I never met a FOs with more than 4000 TT. Mostly they had around TT to 1000 TT. Kingfisher and Royal Jordanian.

Happens in the US too. Spirit had a program a while back for hiring low time pilots if they met certain criteria. Of course when the furloughs happened, wasn't much one could do with just a commercial with less than 500TT and no CFI.

Don't forget that in the 1960's US major Airlines hired pilots with 200 hours or less. My father is an aerospace engineer and was relentlessly pursued by major airline scouts because he has a private license in addition to his engineering background.

I had a NWA jumpseater who told me that he had 200 hours and no college when he got hired at NWA.

Skyhigh

When those guys were hired in the 60's they worked the panel for years before they made it to a window seat. It isn't quite the same sitting in the front seat of an A320 or 737NG.

Not only that but you could be fired for some much as farting near the Captain. You were walking on egg shells and had BETTER perform.

There also weren't the puppy mills we have now cranking out kids willing to fly RJ's for pennies like a freakin factory.

I agree but when they reached the right seat they still only had 200 hours of hands on flight time. I suppose that flight engineer time helped some but I can not imagine all that much. Often a decade could have passed flying sideways without ever actually flying a plane before upgrading to FO. In addition a 727 is not the flying computer that an A320 is.

One of the Mythbuster guys was able to land an A320 in the sim with minimal instruction.

Skyhigh

In the late 1980's through mid 1990's it was common for sponsored pilots to join BA (and others in Europe - Lufthansa etc) with under 300TT straight onto B737, B757 and A320 aircraft.

It still is today, although nowadays many sponsor themselves to an fATPL/IR and join Easyjet or Ryanair, sometimes paying for their own TR etc.

Going back to the 1960's, BA (or BOAC as it was then) had B707 skippers in their late 20's (as did BEA - shorthaul in BA with skippers on the Trident [think B727]).

The system has worked for BA and LH etc, not many burning holes in the ground.

I joined BA with about 300TT, but not as a sponsored cadet, on the B737-200 striaght after my IR which was on a GA7 Cougar.

I gained my B737 with 3200 TT and flew with guys who had been laid off for 3 years and kept their hand in with the occasional sim detail. They were absolutely fine.

It is about the quality if the training rather than the hours.

If you want to see someone fly a sim like no one's business, watch a sim tech do it - many of them can absolutely nail it. As you well know, that doesn't mean they are qualified to be an airline pilot. There is little doubt that with enough intensive training, most people can be taught to fly an approach or whatever. It's the years of experience that set apart those who should be in a -121 seat. The guys who spent 10 years or more on the panel before moving to the right seat were acquiring that knowledge and experience while on the panel. Also they were being mentored by Captain (and FO's) who had been there a decade or more. Hardly the comparable to the pilot mill grads of recent years...

BA Pilot,

Those are fighting words for many here at APC.

Skyhigh