by David Santo -

Airline Pilot Career Workshop – Career Difficulties

Paula Williams –

Great, excellent Yassine from Tunisia is looks like he’s having a career difficulties, and again I apologize if I’m pronouncing names incorrectly but apparently put a lot of money into an aviation education and is not having much luck. But I know we, we’ve talked about this a little bit before, but if you have any thoughts from Tunisia or that area?

 

Captain David Santo –

So I don’t know specifically about Tunisia. I will say that there are certain areas of the world, that there is not a huge amount of growth going on, in the airline industry. So you have to be willing to go where the demand is. And right now, there is a demand in Asia. There is a demand in central and south America. There’s some demand in Europe, of course. There’s demand in the United States but it requires. So don’t get discouraged. You didn’t make a bad decision. You’ve made a decision, and now, if you wanna pursue this. You need to look at where in the world best fits your experience and go there and apply.

One of things that I find, I get, you know, some blogs and some feedback from people that talk about how negative it is. I grew up in Phoenix, Arizona. There wasn’t a lot of jobs in Phoenix, Arizona. I love being in Phoenix, my home is in Phoenix, my mom and dad live in Phoenix.

I left and went to Michigan because that’s where the flying jobs were. And it snows in Michigan and it’s a lot colder than my home in the desert in Arizona, but I did what it took to pursue the job.

Paula Williams –

Right.

Captain David Santo –

So my question back to Yassine is, are you willing to do what it takes? And if you do, then turn the glass upside down you’ve gotten a lot of experience already. Let’s look at how you’re gonna make that next step.

Paula Williams –

Right. So it’s only a bad decision if you give up and turn a different direction and then you come all this way for no reason.

Captain David Santo –

That’s correct, you can’t get discouraged. So many of my friends and colleagues from Flight School, they did get discouraged. And what set them apart from, from me? I don’t have any skills that they didn’t have. What I did have was perseverance and I wasn’t taking no for an answer.

Paula Williams –

Here’s a, another similar one, looking for a first job. Has a type rating in a b737 NG. And in the, Ismail in the Maldives. So that’s what I understand a beautiful part of the world but there may not be a lot of demand there and you may need to move somewhere else.

Captain David Santo –

So that’s right. So again, same answer as before. I would look at where the biggest demand is and I would go after it. With a 737 type rating, that doesn’t mean just like any, just like getting your commercial, your multi-engine, your ATP. That doesn’t mean the jobs are going to come and look for you.

It just means you’re giving yourself a tool to advance your career by looking better in front of the, the pilot hiring committee or the pilot recruiter. You need to go out there and bang on doors. And I’m, I’m saying that fictitiously now because now it’s bang on email addresses I guess.

You need to be out here trying to get the job.

Paula Williams –

Right.

Captain David Santo –

You need to be out there showcasing yourself as a 737 NG type-rated pilot. And talk to them about how you’ve learned crew resource management, multi crew experience, jet time. What are we doing? And I would invite Ismail to, to contact me directly. He should have my contact information.

Let’s look at what you’re doing, I’m still here to help you. Just because you graduated and you’re gone, we still want to help you pursue your career dreams. So utilize the resources of AeroStar, call us up, let us know what you’re doing and we’ll do our best to assist you to take that next step.

by David Santo -

Airline Pilot Career Workshop – A Second Career for 55+ Pilots?

Paula Williams –

Fantastic. And Jim from Brazil says he was flying a B737. He’s a Hawker 400 captain now jet, jet transition instructor. Okay, I guess that wasn’t really a question, so we’ll move on. Let’s see, and here’s another one.

I’m 52 years old, I’ve always dreamed of flying.

 30 years ago I took some, took the theoretical courses in France. Today I train with the flight simulator, is it too late for me to make a career as a pilot now? This is Robin from Guinea.

Captain David Santo –

So Robin I never think it’s too late, the current retirement age is 65. I know that at my airline, we have hired new hires that have been 60. I don’t know whether there’s been anybody hired older than that, but I believe so. So, you really, you know, the, the clock is ticking.

So to get some years of experience in, you really need to do everything you can do right now to pad your logbook, build your time. But if you were hired by 55. So that gives you two or three years, of really getting all of your time built up, your experience built up, you will have ten solid years to work as a airline pilot.

Now after that ten years mandatory retirement at 65. As it looks today, and that might change it might go up. So, you could ride that, that bow wave if it does, but retired airline pilots, still have the opportunity to do things like ferry airplanes. They do maintenance flights, and they also become Sim instructors.

So, I would say absolutely Robin if this is something you wanna do don’t wait, come on over the water’s fine and I think you’ll have a good time doing it.

 

by David Santo -

Pilot Jobs – Moving Back to the US from Overseas

back to the us from overseasPaula Williams –

Great. Robert from Oklahoma has, is looking at moving back to the US from overseas, he’s rated in the B737 and A320 and looking to do the ATP on his Airbus certificate and get a job.

Captain David Santo –

So all great goals, and I think it’s I’d love to hear where Robert has been but welcome back Robert, it’s a good time to come back. 142 school like Arrowstar, can do your atp ctp the new prerequisite for the written. If you don’t already have it, if you already have the written. You can attend a typewriting course based on your experience, add the typewriting and as long as you meet all the prerequisites set by the FAA we can get the ATP certificate check done at the exact same time. That gives you for example in our program, if you attend a standard type rating, that gives you 28 hours of jet multi-engine instrument time, because we use full flight level D simulators.

So it counts as actual twin, counts as jet, counts as instrument, multi-crew time. That can go towards the new 50 hour requirement for your ATP. And we can do the check rides combined with no additional cost. So it’s a great way, to pad your log book with some extra jet time.

Get a type writing on your license, that never goes away. And add that ATP certificate that you absolutely need now to get a job in the US.

Paula Williams –

And save some money at the same time, so you don’t have to do those separately.

Captain David Santo –

Well, that’s right, I mean, I think a lot of people don’t understand too the fact that if you do a type rating and your type rating is $13,000, $15,000. But you’re getting 28 hours of twin jet time out of it. Take the amount of money it costs to rent a twin, if anybody will rent you one  And multiply that out. Pretty soon the type rating is a pretty cheap option to do, a time builder, to get a type rating that’s on your license that never expires and add your ATP.

Paula Williams –

Right here’s another one on the theme of moving forward to the US,what airlines running A320s would be the best to apply for overseas crew for their first USA based airline, with an endorsement

Captain David Santo –

So I, so first I would like to say that we’ve worked with a whole lot of pilots from Australia we’ve done a lot of training at Aerostar under Casa. And have done that very successfully. A lot of our Australian customers are affiliated with Tiger Airways which is an A320 operation in Australia.

So what airlines running A320s would the best to apply for overseas, for overseas crews? Well, to work in the US, you have to have a green card or you have to be a US citizen. So no US airline is going to be able to hire you based on the current laws, unless you have either a green card or you are a US citizen.

Once you have that almost every major airline in the United States operates airbuses. The only one that comes to mind that does not, is Southwest Airlines. But if you think of every other major airline in the U.S, they all operate Airbuses now. Outside the U.S. certainly Australian Casa-qualified pilots have been in big demand on the Pacific Rim.

So any of the Asian countries on the Pacific Rim. Big demand for Australian pilots.

by David Santo -

Airline Pilot Careers – The Time Building Conundrum Part I

low timeQuestions from aspiring pilots about the “Time Building Conundrum”

Paula Williams –

All right Eduardo from Spain says I would like to earn a B737 type rating. I have an an ATPL, well I’ll let you read all the letters there.

And I would like to know what is the best, easiest, and least expensive way to obtain the type with Aerostar.

Captain David Santo –

Okay, well and it’s not just with Aerostar it’s gonna be with any 142 school we certainly appreciate your business, but we want you to look at every other option and see what’s best for you. First of all EASA. You’ve had some wonderful training. EASA’s very well recognized as being a great organization for requiring a lot from their pilots.

The first step is to go to www.faa.gov and apply for validation of your current experience. Once you get your current experience validated, then you need to think about the written examination. Do you have valid ATP written exam results? If you don’t, the FAA has recently passed a new requirement for the airline transport pilot certification training program.

Very similar to the EASA Multi Crew Coordination course. You do need to take that course regardless of your experience. Right now, there is no waiver for it. So a 142 school like Aerostar can offer you that course. That then get you the prerequisite met to take the ATP written.

Once you’ve got the ATP written done, you’ve got your validation of all your experience, you’ve met all the logbook requirements for the ATP. Come over and do a type rating course with us. And out of that type rating course, we’ll be able to add the ATP certificate. And the A370 or 737 type rating are all in one one checkride.

 

Paula Williams –

Great. Here’s one from  Fourati from Tunisia as you know airlines do not hire any pilots with low hours and there’s a lot of jobless cadet pilots type rating costs a lot and is not terribly affordable profession must work on a solution.

So first of all, I would agree with you. I wish there was a better solution for the industry. Although this is an age-old problem. This is the exact same problem that I had when I was coming up through the ranks. Nobody would hire you without multi-engine time.

And nobody would give you multi-engine time to get hired. And yet, we all made it. So how did we all make the leap? If we all made the leap, you can make the leap too. Now first of all, I’m gonna push back on you. And say airlines do hire low time pilots.

If you don’t think they do, go look in Asia. Go look at VietJet. Go look at Indonesia. Go look at China. Go to the websites for the aviation recruiters, like Rishworth or VOR Holdings. For the first time ever, they’re starting to actively hire first officers. But in your particular region of the world, it may be true.

It may be true that there isn’t gonna be a low time pilot job opportunity. So what are you willing to do to pursue the career? Are you willing to go to Asia and fly for a while? If that’s your option, boy, I would jump on that. What a great experience, it’d be a great adventure.

And when you come back, you’re going to be the top of the stack. Cuz you’re going to have lots of experience. Do I agree there needs to be a better solution? I do. I don’t have the answer for that. I’m just trying to provide the solutions that work within the, the context of what we have in the industry now.

Paula Williams –

Right. So you just look at the cards you’re dealt and play them the best you can. And sometimes you have to go somewhere else to get better cards. [LAUGH].

Captain David Santo –

And, and, and I do wanna reassure, all of us did it. I had 250 hours once. Every single one of those airline pilots the 50 some thousand that we saw on the previous table, had 250 hours once. We all made the leap, and you can too.

Paula Williams –

Right. And here’s a real similar question 265 hours and a commercial ME and a Type Rating.

Captain David Santo  –

So what can you do? So Pablo, there’s a couple different pathways. Number one, there’s flight instruction, that’s the old proven pathway to build time is to get a flight instructor job. And the good news is, the schools right now are losing their flight instructors at an alarming rate So there are opportunities to go instruct. It’s a great way to give something back to the industry. It’s a great way for you to build your experience. And nothing teaches you how to fly better than helping to teach somebody else. However, if you don’t want to do the flight instructing route, there’s still other routes out there.

There’s banner flying. There’s towing gliders. There’s flying bank checks. There’s freight jobs out there in single engine and twin engine airplanes. There’s the commuters. Right now, you can’t get on with a commuter, by the way, until you have 1,500 hours, so you got to build some time to get to those.

The other thing is I was saying to the previous question. There are job opportunities outside the United States. And you should consider those. If you have the ability to travel to Asia and to work in the Asian market, you might actually be able to land a job flying an Airbus or a Boeing.

It’s not going to be easy. You’re gonna have to go beat on doors and make your own opportunities. But nothing worthwhile in life is gonna come easy. It’s all gonna take a lot of effort and work, so keep your options open. There are a number of venues out there, there are a number of avenues out there to build time.

The first thing is build your single engine time to get to that 1,500 hours and get your ATP. Once you get your ATP, I really think you’re gonna be snapped up very quickly by the commuters.

by David Santo -

UPS Feeder Route to Jet Job Without a Pay Cut?

Paula Williams – 

Right. Jesse from Ohio says, I’m making $300 a day, 7 days a week on a UPS feeder route. How can I move into a jet job without taking a pay cut?Aerostar UPS Feeder to Jet

Captain David Santo –

Well, first of all, Jesse, I flew 206s and 207s. Flying bank checks for a company called Air CSI out of Phoenix, Arizona. And so I understand in fact, there was a point in my career where I thought the 208 caravan was such a cool airplane that I would never make it there, so you’re in a good position, the pay is awful, this is a stepping stone job.

You need to be applying to a twin. You need to build that multi engine time. Even though the Caravan is a great airplane and it’s turbo prop, need to try to make the next move into the regionals, and that might be a pay cut. I don’t know the answer to that.

But it’s gonna be a worthwhile pay cut if you can build up some multi engine time. There might be some alternatives. Maybe on the weekends you could go get a job as a multi engine instructor. Or you could find a, a job working as a first officer flying a twin.

You might even look at a company like Cape Air. Where you might be able to make a move fairly quickly from. Right seat to left seat. But the regionals need you. If you have 1500 hours and you have an ATP and a multi-engine instrument rating, you are needed by the regionals.

But you may have to take a pay cut to go over there and get some jet time and some twin time. I would bite the bullet now, take the pay cut, so that you can make a huge leap in your career.

Right, sometimes it’s a short term versus long term strategy. Like chess you know, sometimes you go back to move forward.