Originally Posted by ClearCreek

Can anyone shed some light on the Technical Assessment portion of the interview? Obviously know the profiles and call outs but how exactly does the whole thing go?

Originally Posted by beavf16

Here's a thing I wrote about my interview last week. Sorry for any formatting issues; I'm cutting and pasting with my phone.

Bottom line: I think anyone currently flying a crew aircraft will have absolutely no problems with the tech skills interview.

Fighter guys will need to do some prep. Message me and I'll send you a word doc with my inputs.

The technical skills interview will be with a current captain. *He sat on the other side of the table in a small briefing room with a TV on the wall and a couple of laminated cockpit panel pictures off to the side. *There were 2 IPads on the table. *The one you use is the United EFB which has all your flight pubs in the Jeppesen FD app as well as the Quick Reaction Handbook (QRH). *After he gives you a quick ROE brief you’ll pick a flight number from 4 choices on the screen. This will determine the routing for your flight. *Mine was Las Vegas to San Francisco. The next screen showed the weather and notams for LSV and SFO as well as the SID out of LSV and the STAR into SFO. The IPad was already set to the airfield diagram for Las Vegas. *You are the Captain and Pilot Flying for the flight. The Capt doing the interview said he was a new hire FO who didn’t know much.

Then the Capt pointed at a terminal and told me that was where we were parked and that we were cleared for the SID out of LSV. He told me to brief how we were going to get to the runway. *I gave my best impression of a departure brief and he then said we were holding short and ready for takeoff. *I again gave my best impression of a takeoff brief. *I selected the SID on the EFB for part of my takeoff brief. *The Capt asked me a couple of questions off the SID regarding the procedure. *The next slide on the screen was a copy of the grandstand view of the takeoff profile from the info packet United sent out. *It didn’t have any of the words on the page, just the picture of the airplane taking of and the dots that marked each place where there was a callout. *He then asked me to basically chair fly him through the slide. *I just spit out all the call outs verbatim.

After the takeoff he said that we were at altitude and we had an EP. *The numbers 1-4 were on the screen and he had me pick one. *The EP was an Anti-Ice overheat on the left windshield. I told him I would transfer aircraft control to the FO then started digging through the IPAD. I closed the Jeppesen FD app and opened the Content Locker which has the QRH. *I used the contents tab and the drop down menu as advertised in the info packet. *I talked my way through the EP which was extremely simple (turn it off/wait/turn it back on). *He said “ok” and we proceeded with the flight profile.

After the EP the next slide was the arrival slide from the info packet. The Capt told me that we were given the STAR and the ILS to SFO. *I went back to the Jeppesen FD and loaded up the STAR, the ILS, and the airfield diagram. I briefed the STAR and the approach from the plates. The Capt then asked me about my runway exit/taxi plan which I fumbled through. *He asked me a couple of questions about the STAR and STARs in general. I then talked my way through all the call outs from arrival all the way through the missed approach.

The Capt then said that the tower at SFO lost electrical power and was going to be closed for an hour. He told me we had 6,500# of gas. *I transferred aircraft control to the FO, told the flight attendant that we were going missed approach, and contacted dispatch for divert options. *Dispatch told me that San Jose was only 30 miles away, had United Service, VFR weather, and buses to take the pax where they needed to go. *He basically fed me all the info that I thought I would have to pull from dispatch. *I asked if there were any other diverts and dispatch said no, San Jose is the best option. *I asked the FO if we were missing anything or if he had any ideas. He said no. *At this point I felt like it was too easy and that I must be missing something. *In the ROE brief the Capt said he wouldn’t try to trick me so I took the scenario at face value and decided to divert to San Jose. *Contacted ATC for vectors, told the flight attendants the plan, and made an announcement to the passengers. *After that the Capt said that part of the interview was over.

Then next step was the CRM video. *For the CRM exercise you watch a short video then debrief the CRM of the flight crew. *Once again I picked a number 1-4 which brought up my CRM video. *My scenario was about 2 minutes long. It showed a view of the flight deck and pilots on an approach. *The auto throttles deactivated and the Capt started hand flying. CRM broke down, Capt got fixated on the throttles, got behind the jet, and got fast. He stopped making call-outs to the F.O. who started pushing the rope. Then they talked over each other some and communication basically sucked. At about 400’ the Capt was still fast so the F.O. said the approach was unstable and called for a go around. *The Capt scoffed, said they had 11,000’ of runway, and landed no problem. *The F.O. clammed up until they were just about to taxi clear when he started making calls again. As they were taxiing clear the Capt basically said I told you so. *After the video ended I debriefed what I felt were the obvious break downs in CRM. The interviewing Capt asked what I would do if I called for a go around and the Capt scoffed. *I tactfully said I would take the jet and go around. *Capt said that that part of the interview was over and gave me some encouraging advice on the HR panel interview.




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Originally Posted by iwannafly

This is about 2 years old, but as far as I know it was accurate back then... (and look I'm learning to search the forums!)
United New Format for Interviews

Originally Posted by ingleburg5

I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure they tell you the airport is closed because the tower lost power. Your technical interview is not the time to be cute with technicalities. Play the game and move on. Anyway, what if Airport Fire and Rescue lost some of their ability to be notified of an accident/incident because of the power outage in the tower. Not a great idea to land there when there are plenty of other better options available.