I know many are not involved in the scheduled world of aviation, but it's been interesting the last year or so and it might interest you "old" folks (old in this sense just referring to those of you with umpteen thousands of hours) as well as the low timers like myself... Minimums at regional level carriers have been dropping like rocks.
There seems to be quite a number of carriers out there now on a national level that will hire anyone with a commercial/multi engine and able to hold a medical. American Eagle wants to hire 800 pilots this year. I don't know where they will come from. Mesa wants 500 and they are having trouble just finding people to interview (probobly because they have a pretty bad reputation as a company to work for, or so I hear).
I got an e-mail Tuesday from a company here in Alaska that I had e-mailed just asking about minimums over a year and a half ago when I was searching for a first job. I never really heard anything back and then they e-mailed me out of the blue asking if I'd like to interview. I honestly didn't even remember sending them anything and was trying to figure out when they got my resume (eventually deciding I must have e-mailed it to someone). Not one to turn down a possible gift horse, I interviewed with them today... much to both my surprise and their's as they assumed I was still in Georgia as a low time pilot and I didn't expect them to say "can you do it tomorrow?' when I responded yesterday and noted I was already in Fairbanks.
Anyway, this company normally has minimums in the 3,000 hour range (they won't even interview someone at less than 3,000 hours), they also have a low turnover because they treat employees well with good pay and benefits. There are actually a Jet Blue captain and USAir captain among the current applicants but even this company is starting to run thin on resumes on hand to hire out of.
Which is another interesting point. I was trying to figure out when they got my resume... the reason for my confusion was that they *didn't* have my resume or know anything else about me other than that I had a pilot's license and had been looking for a job. Which is a pretty big change for a company that just last year wasn't even looking at applications with less than 3,000 hours... and they start most people out as flight engineers. Keep in mind they assumed I'd have under 300 hours with negligible multiengine experience.
Meanwhile, I also talked to our chief pilot today and asked him about the number of people we have leaving currently. It's a small company and it's pretty obvious when one of the 12 1900 F/Os in Fairbanks is leaving. He said that for the last few weeks we've been losing a pilot a week. We have well under 60 pilots with the company, that's an amazing amount of turnover right now and it's all pilots getting better paying jobs elsewhere. In fact, my favorite captain to fly with is going to Air Canada in a few weeks.
A number of airlines are starting to have problems replacing captains, not because they don't have F/Os to upgrade, but because their F/Os don't have ATP mins, so they can't upgrade. I've heard that Trans States is telling new hires that they will be upgraded as soon as they have ATP minimums ( C310Rcaptain, that sound about right?). One of the guys that started the same time to me just went to Big Sky as a street captain because they don't have enough F/Os with ATP mins and I've heard that others are actively recruiting street captains as well.
Note: A street captain is a new hire that is hired directly into the left seat, bypassing the seniority system for upgrades.
I've heard a rumor that Comair is about to the point of lowering mins to a commercial/multi engine as well, and just a year or so ago they were *the* place to be among regionals.
There are a lot of "if's" and "but's" in here as well. When the age 65 rule is passed (I've all but given up on hoping it won't), retirements will drop off for a 5 year period (not stop as some guys won't want to fly past 60 anyway), essentially allowing pilot ranks to build up for 5 years before the hiring really has to resume. The question is how much of a drop off there is and how much expansion will be continued in the meantime.
This also seems to hurt military recruitment. Air Guard units, which for the last few years have enjoyed being highly competitive are starting to notice they are getting much less so as the number of applications drops. I don't know if active duty will see any similiar action as they already had started to be seen as needing a commitment as a career rather than as a boost to an airline. Many guard units enjoyed recruitment because pilots wanted to get into their aircraft and then fly scheduled on the side using the stable guard position to build time and ensure a job. With the current atmosphere of hiring, it seems that there are fewer pilots thinking they need the guard flying and they are now deciding to just stick to the airlines.
Sorry for the rant... but this week really has gotten me thinking about it.
