So, you want to be an airline pilot..

Lol

 

It works in a number of ways but first, the pilots who work for regional airlines for the most part are not employees of the mainline carriers. So the majority of pilots that start off at airlines start at the regionals because no major will hire a guy with low time. So he becomes an FO then when his seniority can hold an upgrade he takes it to build PIC time. Most majors won't hire a pilot until he has at least 1000 hours turbine PIC. Sometimes if the pilot is lucky a major requires less time and will hire guys without a lot or any turbine PIC time. Captain pay at regionals equal roughly second year pay at a major. But to get to be a captain at a regional can take several years. So some guys with families don't want to leave the regional to take a one year pay cut and the risk being at the bottom of another seniority list entails.

Once at a major with multiple types of aircraft, you will fly whatever aircraft you can hold. Because everything is based upon your date of hire you can only hold the type and seat that is available and that every other pilot more senior to you doesn't want. (It works this way at the regionals as well) Pay is dependent on the left or right seat as well as the type of aircraft. So an FO on a 747 may make the same or more hourly rate as a Captain on a 717. However the 717 Captain probably would not have the ability to hold the 747 as an FO. Some of those guys are super senior and just like the schedule and trips on the 747.

So the long and short of it is you try to get the best pay or schedule you can hold or perhaps the type of flying ie international or domestic. Some guys like 20+ days off and will sacrifice captain pay and remain an FO for the quality of life. Others will take the first upgrade and fly a reserve or crappy schedule with only 12 days off per month for the pay. If you are at an airline like mine with only one type aircraft there are no FOs that make an hourly rate higher than the most junior captain. As a junior captain you have less choices and there are guys that have twice the seniority but stay in the right seat because they have their first choice of schedule every month. I don't have much schedule choice but I do enjoy the better pay rate. Hope that sheds some light on it, and yes it is union driven - even at non- union airlines.

And to whether one should go from the left seat on the 737 to the right seat on the 757 before going to the left seat, doing so might entail a $50 to $100 dollar an hour pay cut to go back to the right seat from the left. So typically you would stay on the 737 until you could hold the left seat on a plane that pays more from the left seat. And another factor is that it is a pain and a lot of work to go to school to get a type rating on a new aircraft so some guys just stay on what they know.

 

You should contact the mods and have this post deleted. Delete my post too.

Otherwise, the conclusion is that you are someone that is bitter with life and has little class. Flying a Baron is equivalent to a VW Jetta in the Airplane world. Maybe.

Airline flying might feel like the bus in the back, but you would be lost in the front and be behind the aircraft big time. Get a Boeing (not Airbus) type rating, and report back.

I fly for leisure like you. I did my ATP in a Lear 35A at Flight Safety in Tucson without any automation. It was interesting, but not difficult. I learned on Helicopters so "flying" was in my pants.

You come off as cantankerous in many posts, but I suspect your really a good guy. It matters how you treat others.

 

The post shouldnt be deleted......Good warning for new members on the kind of person he is. I simply cant stand arrogance like his....

 

+10000

 

As an ATP rated pilot (Citation V at Wichita Flight Safety), I too find Art's post to be rather obnoxious. My son is 6 years old and absolutely loves airplanes. I would be very proud of him if he were to become an airline pilot. I think it's a very respectable profession.

 

Well that's clear as mud then LOL. Makes sense I guess, but it would seem as though there is no real incentive to progress up the ladder to be the capt of the biggest best aircraft in the fleet if every two years or so you had to take a pay cut. As always comes down to personal desires and economics I guess. I had a neighbor in the UK who was FO on the Concorde fleet and was happy to stay there because a promotion to capt would mean he was flying at best the 737, and it would be 10-15 years before he got back to Concorde.

You say your airline has only one type, Southwest ?? There crews always seem the happiest when I fly so I figured they had their system figured out.
Thanks for the reply, very informative.

 

The whole airline bidding thing at a legacy carrier can be a science in itself. There are many, many variations, and the beauty of it is that you can customize it to what works for you.

Want to make a lot of money and work a lot? You can do that.

Want a lot of time off and willing to earn less? You can do that too.

Want to go to a lot of cool international destinations? You can do that as well.

Or anything in between.

 

Sorry if my post was somewhat confusing but the whole thing can be confusing. You have it right with your friend on the Concorde. Some would rather stay on a bigger aircraft as an FO or move to the left seat in a "less prestigious" aircraft. I would imagine the FO pay on the Concorde would be as much pay as Captain on something smaller.

As for Art and his ATP, flying a Baron versus flying and Airline Transport would be like driving a go-cart compared to driving in a Formula 1 race. It takes skill to drive both well, but it's a whole different ball game. The airplane I fly burns the max gross weight of a baron in the first 30 minutes of flight. That's not a slight, I'm simply pointing out the huge difference between the flying.

And as for being a great job and profession, an airline career at a non-regional airline is fantastic. There cannot be a better job in my mind. By the way I have been an attorney for 13 years, and I will never go back to practicing law if I have a choice.

 

It may well be, but with all the automation involved in the commercial planes, I think I'm right, and more importantly, the market place, in reducing their wages appears to be in agreement. Now, the guys who worked their way up, flying checks around, in junk, in terrible weather are another story. Most of them are gone now though.

As for the comment about fighter pilots being good transport pilots, I've got to disagree. I don't want a brave pilot. Nope, I pref those who are terribly cautious. Ask Bob Callahan about the Korean Air pilot landing he observed some years back. Classic example of someone flying with too much testosterone. BTW I've got close to a hundred hours in a C501 with the Stalion conversion. Easier to fly than my Baron. I fly the Baron because my runway is 2100 feet and its 5 minutes from my house. My usual trip is 300 miles. Do the math: quicker door to door in the Baron.

Never had a desire to pilot a commercial plane, know too many people who do, and most aren't happy campers.

Art

 

Art, automation can't replace judgement and experience. The aircraft will not automate itself out of a line of thunderstorms. Your denigration of one of the most demanding professions around is pretty petty and cheap. Apologize to those of us that have kept you and your family safe when you have ridden "the bus" as you so eloquently put it.

 

Ask the automation what happens when something goes wrong with the pitot static system. Garbage in - garbage out. Humans can go out-of-box.

 

AF447?

 

Read post #4 for denigration, which started all of this bickering. What you are really seeing is another group that takes offense over any slight of their profession. A little honesty and introspection can go a long way. I'm an engineer, have at it, won't bother me a bit. Would probably one up your stories with one of my own. It is always irritating after an accident when the ALPA immediately cast blame everywhere except where it lies over 90% of the time. I wonder how many Part 121 ATP's took their checkride in something similar to a Baron (or less)?

 

Precisely, and two pilots that were waaaaay to automation dependant. This is the future (a very unsafe one) if Art sees his dream of low paid bus drivers in automated aircraft.

 

Why would I want to denigrate your profession? It's a fine one.

Their is nothing honest or introspective about Arts rant. ALPA is a union, what do you expect them to do? A lot of NTSB reports that come out with pilot error do so with ALPA' s agreements and notations as to how to prevent it later. (No I'm not a member).

 

Unfortunately what you had there were frozen pitots and frozen pilots, courtesy Air France (lack of) training. Oh,,and,some dumb design choices on the A330. Sound the stall horn all the way down to 60 knots, then cut out as you slow down even further.... Then resume stall horn once you go back up past 60 knots... Add disoriented pilots, automation down, and then splash.

 

Airline Pilot? When I started flying I never really thought about it. I was young and just wanted to fly. It was everything I thought it would be and more. One thing led to another and the planes kept getting bigger and faster. Bandierates and Brasilias eventually led to 747s.

Funny thing, I have never really related my paycheck to my job. I get paid. I fly planes. They seem totally separate. I like that. Another funny thing, most guys flying the bigger planes say they had the most fun back flying the turboprops (or small jets). So the most fun was had when the pay was low and the work was hardest. Hard to say that about most jobs.

For the guy paying 200k in taxes, you don't have enough money to pay for my experiences. And I wouldn't trade them for the world.

Airline Pilot? Not for everybody, but definitely for me.

 

Automation. Good and bad. I'll try and dig up a landing report of a flight I flew into Chicago last year. CAT II weather. Visibility 1/4 mile...1200 ft. Full autoland. Triple autopilot. FAIL Operational....even with a failure and airplane should still complete the landing.

No failure occurred, or at least the airplane didn't think so. At 30 ft, power came to idle, and the plane pitched for the sky. Glad I disconnected the autopilot when I did. Otherwise I might not be here writing this.....

If I find the report I'll tell the story.

 

It's been said, ANYONE can be a pilot. That's true mostly.

But, you find out who the real pilots are in an emergency. The ones that make it usually are, the ones that don't might not be. The caveat is the recent 747 at Bagram. Sometimes, you might be the victim of something completely out of your control. The report isn't done yet on that one, but if it was load shift...

Personally, I've lived through - Tail rotor failure with hover level autorotation, in-flight uncontrolled fuel leak, pressurization failure, engine failure (on SE turbine Helicopter), Turbocharger failure, passenger induced autopilot disconnect with warning horn inop in IMC on descent for landing, while getting approach plates... scan...scan...scan..., ME aircraft engine failure short final. Maybe some more, but I've never dinged or dented any aluminum in 30+ years of flying.

 

My late friend who was a captain for many years for UAL told me about a trans continental flight DC-8 60 series from NY to SFO. SFO would be IFR when they were to arrive. The flight engineer told him that they would have only 13000 pounds of fuel when they arrived. My friend elected to land at an alternate instead of risking a missed approach and running out of fuel at SFO. His passengers were furious but as he said , " Still safe." I think that is what Pilot means. He had several incidents similar to those about which you wrote, Lou. He was always on top of his responsibilities as a pilot and taught me a few things when we flew his Monocoupe and C-185. Another old airline pilot said that he was one of a vanishing breed who could fly a 747 one day and get into a Bucker Jungmeister the next and do an outside loop, that I watched. I guess what I'm trying to say is that to be a pilot one must not only move the buttons and switches but to be totally engaged with flying the airplane and where it is going to end up at any time in the near future.

 

Read Fate is the Hunter if you want some more harrowing stories. I am amazed that guy survived as long as he did.

 

You've missed my point. Flying now is much easier than it was 20 years ago. And, it's going to get easier. While you are right about current equipment keeping the plane out of thunderstorm, I'm ot so sure about the future. Live pilots have flown into them also, especially when the radar masks their existence. New planes fly higher, and there are very few thunderstorms at 43k and above, at least in the USA, so they are generally seen only on departure and arrival. Again, automatism is going to solve most of those issues. Examples are: autopilots hold the airspeed in larger planes, hold altitude, go to a specific altitude upon request, and autoland, taxi, and perform a good many functions that once pilots did. Indeed, most airlines require use of the autopilot when over 10k, because it saves fuel.

We're ended up with pilots like those with the Air France plane, who really don't know how to fly because of the automation. Th airline pilot who's hobby is flying gliders is a rarity, not the average guy. That was and is my point.

BTW: If you don't like my bashing pilots, you must not agree wit those that bash lawyers, Right? Not!!

Art

 

The crazy part about Fate is the Hunter is that a lot of those stories are still perfectly applicable today. In fact, I think he had a load shift on takeoff in that book.

 

No I think you have missed the point. If you think flying is easier now because of automation you have been reading too much of your Plane and Pilot magazines...

First off There is no airliner that taxis itself Art
There is no airline that requires use of the autopilot except under CAT III APP requirements (look it up) and for RNAV departures from a busy terminal area.

Airspeed and altitude parameters are set by the PILOT, not the airplane.

Where do you get this ****? You really have NO idea about this job, this profession or these airplanes do you? Just a crackpot making completely unsubstantiated claims....