The federal government is considering banning air carrier operations that diverge from the model of American Airlines, United, and Delta in order to operate niche service from small cities and private terminals. And the only reason they’re doing this is as a concession to lobbying by unions and an incumbent airline – groups that don’t want to compete with more pilots and innovative business models.
The FAA is considering requiring carriers currently operating as scheduled charters to instead operate as scheduled air carriers, effectively putting upstarts out of business. The loudest lobbying voice with the ear of the powerful wins?
The 1,500 Hour Rule For Commercial Pilots Is A Joke
No one actually believes that the 1,500 hour rule for commercial pilots has anything to do with safety. For the past dozen years commercial airline pilots have had to have 1,500 hours in order to fly, though military pilots can have 750 hours; those with a B.A. in aviation can fly with 1000 hours; and those with an Associates degree in aviation can fly with 1250 hours. That was an increase from 250 hours.
Forcing pilots to build up hours means clear air touch and go landings in a Cessna, flying through the same airspace and in and out of the same airports. It’s lazy flying, not real world flying experience relevant to life in the cockpit of a commercial airline. Pilots aren’t dealing with stalls, storms, de-icing, or numerous other problems that you want a pilot to be experienced in during this training.
In fact airlines have to re-train the bad habits out of pilots that were acquired during this phase of their experience.
No other country in the world has adopted similar standards, because they do not improve safety. In the U.S. they were adopted in response to a need to ‘do something’ after the 2009 Colgan Air crash where the pilots had far more than 1,500 hours (the captain had 3,379 hours). Congress needed an action, and the Air Line Pilots Association had its hobby horse that would limit entry into the profession, improve their bargaining position and drive up pilot wages by creating scarcity.
European aviation is just as safe as U.S. aviation without this rule. So is Canadian and Australian aviation.
And U.S. pilots do not fear flying over Europe, where most pilots around them haven’t trained under these requirements. Nor do they fear flying in the U.S. where foreign pilots are allowed to operate their airlines’ aircraft.
The FAA itself says that the 1,500 hour rule does not promote safety.
The FAA was unable to find a quantifiable relationship between the 1,500-hour requirement and airplane accidents and hence no benefit from the requirement. For most accidents reviewed by the FAA, both pilots had more than 1,500 hours of flight time and for those SICs that did not, there were other causal factors identified by the NTSB.
And the NTSB doesn’t think pilot hour requirements prevent accidents, either.
We’ve investigated accidents where we’ve seen very high-time pilots, and we’ve also investigated accidents where we’ve seen low-time pilots. We don’t have any recommendations about the appropriate number of hours….
We may see pilots flood the comments here who want to defend their financial interest by maintaining a moat and keeping people out of the profession, and who don’t want to admit that training they’ve had to go through and spend richly for was wasteful and counterproductive.
Not All Air Carriers Are Subject To The 1,500 Hour Rule
Scheduled air charters, where one business sells tickets and pays another to fly, have been able to operate outside of major commercial airline rules for pilot training, among other limitations. Contour Airlines and JSX are examples.
JSX has senior captains, recently retired from American and Southwest, mentoring co-pilots who can have fewer hours like in most of the rest of the world. This is a way to train the next generation of pilots under real world conditions, enhancing overall system safety, and allow pilots to earn a living doing so rather than going into six figures of debt.
The FAA has not expressed concerns – let alone safety concerns – over any of this. Each carrier operates legally, and has been subject to safety oversight. By all accounts the FAA has been happy. It’s only once special interests began making noise that they agreed to open a regulatory docket.
When regional carrier SkyWest proposed to operate a subsidiary, SkyWest Charter, under these rules on small community routes ALPA balked and began lobbying to have the rules changed. (They also pushed cities to reject the service in favor of inferior products.)
The Biden Department Of Transportation Says They May Change This
To the Air Line Pilots Association, the 1,500 hour rule was a hard-won victory and is sacrosanct. But they’ve seen an increase in flying, and in proposed operations, exempt from the rule. They didn’t realize the extent of the carveouts in the law they’d helped to pass. And they were livid.
After intense lobbying by ALPA, joined in by other unions and by American Airlines (which faces competition from JSX, both based in Dallas), the Biden Administration is considering putting smaller carriers benefiting from their exemption out of business – requiring them to follow the same rules as major airlines.
The FAA has published a “Notice of Intent to Consider Revisions” to Title 14, Code of Federal Regulations (14 CFR) part 110.
The FAA is considering issuing a notice of proposed rulemaking that will seek comment on removing the exceptions for part 380 public charter operators from the definitions in 14 CFR 110.2 and delink FAA’s safety regulations from DOT’s economic regulations. If the FAA were to remove the exceptions, operators would then conduct public charter flights under the operating part applicable to their operation based on the same criteria that apply to all other non-part 380 operators, including the size and complexity of aircraft they operate and the frequency of flights.
Were FAA to amend its regulatory framework, some operators conducting public charter operations would need to transition from operating under part 135 to part 121.
This puts new air carrier models out of business. It raises their costs and makes them no longer viable, operating small planes with a limited number of passengers. But it puts a lid on competition for major airline union pilots, and competition with a better product that American Airlines doesn’t want to see.
“One Standard” Compromises Safety
The Air Line Pilots Association says they believe in “one standard” for aviation, that all pilots should be subject to the same rules. This isn’t actually true because they haven’t expressly lobbied to ban most private aviation, where the rule doesn’t apply. To ALPA, private-style aviation is fine if you’re wealthy but shouldn’t be available to everyone else.
Just as there are different standards for individual drivers licenses and commercial drivers licenses – driving big rigs and school buses – it’s also not appropriate for every commercial pilot to have the same level of experience. You don’t need the same experience for short hops on a 50 seat regional jet as you do long haul international flights on a Boeing 787 or Airbus A350. The union actually agrees with this assessment and is one reason that seniority dictates eligibility for widebody aircraft flying at major carriers.
Requiring small operators to abide by the same pilot training rules as major commercial carriers doesn’t improve safety, since the standards themselves don’t. It’s also one reason we’ve seen a disappearance of small market air service.
A pilot with sufficient training to work for a major will go do so, unless they’re paid as much at the smaller airline. But it’s one thing to amortize the cost of a $200,000 – $500,000 per year pilot across 150 to 300 passengers per flight. It’s another thing to spread that same pay across 25 passengers on a half full regional jet. It’s a major reason why “American, Delta, and United together ended flights to 74 cities between 2020 and this May.”
ALPA wants to see all flying done by its members, and flying only done by those at premium pay. But that means that some flying simply will not happen. And that’s what we’re already seeing today. This compromises safety.
Fewer flight options (and in some cases no flight options) out of small airports means that potential airline passengers either make hours-long drives to a larger airport or forego air travel entirely in favor of cars. And flying is much safer than driving.
The FAA Should Focus On Real Risks, Not Get Distracted By Fake Ones
In response to union lobbying, the Biden Administration is considering shutting down innovations in air travel and limiting air service to small cities. This limits consumer choice, and compromises safety.
The FAA needs to address real threats to air system safety in their own back year, like shortfalls in their own air traffic organization, not fake threats conjured up by interest group politics.
There is a vast difference between a 250 hour and a 1500 hour pilot. Even if one could afford 1200 hours of “lazy flying” in a Cessna that is valuable time; it builds not only skill but judgement, patience and a larger perspective. Recognition of a situation into which you should not fly comes from that experience, often by making a mistake and living to tell the tale. It separates casual pilots from aspiring professionals. And you are incredibly wrong to think that GA does not involve experiencing stalls, storms, turbulence, deicing, failures and emergencies. Regionals don’t like the time requirements because they can not pay pilots a pittance for the privilege of building hours. A regional in 1996 paid $7.50/hour. That is FLIGHT HOUR. Pilots squatted in abandoned airport buildings. That needs to be over, forever.
1996 pay rates are not relevant.
Hours alone are not relevant and Europe is safe with 250 hours.
Focused training programs not stupid hours may offer value and should be a focus. But they are not because ALPA’s goal is making it costly to be a pilot, keeping people out of the profession. And no one should be hoodwinked by what is going on here.
Amen, Gary.
I find AA’s opposition a bit odd since they benefit from their interline with Contour.
In any case similar career stage pilots now have a lower wage than in 1996. They used to get paid, and now they have to pay.
I do not know Gary, I am sure he is a good guy and I hate to always insult his writing…but he knows when he writes this garbage, its coming. This article is an ABSOLUTE joke. I could not imagine a 250 hour pilot in the right seat…do not care what they do in Europe…don’t give. S***. they do a billion written tests instead of time in aircraft..good for them. Do not take articles about aviation written by people who are not directly in the industry with any kind of seriousness.
At 1500 hours here is the experience I had.
600 Hours Cross Country
2 rather serious emergencies.
Time flying professionally with other crew
150 Hours in the clouds
900 take off and landings
275 Hours night flying
775 Hours dual given (teaching)
At 250 Hours I had
NONE of the above…maybe 10 hours in the clouds and 50 under the hood.
Does anyone expect anything different from this administration? It’s all pay to play for the “friendlies” and weaponizing the legal system against anyone else.
The actual benefit or detriment to the typical consumer isn’t even an afterthought.
Well written Gary. Mostly In agreement.
We live in a time of crony capitalism – unions and bosses conspire against consumers. Thank you Gary.
Dear Gary Left(winger),
All the data post Buffalo crash supports the US model. The 380 loophole exposé’s opportunities for terrorism to circumvent pre-screening and run amuck. Simply put you are wrong, classless & ignorant!
I like this thoughtfully written article with relevant quotes.
Just when there is too much TikTok articles, you come with one that sets you apart, and keeps us hooked.
You are not qualified whatsoever to make any recommendations at all regarding pilot experience requirements, safety statistics, or anything related to the profession. Stick to your area of expertise, credit card offers and what food they’re offering in first class because these articles embarrass your blog.
It’s just as I hinted, we’d see comments throwing barbs here without any substance whatsoever. @PHLPHLYER can’t identify a single thing wrong that I’ve written, so he casts aspersions at me. Were members of Congress qualified to mandate the 1,500 hour rule in the first place, then?
@Rimo “All the data post Buffalo crash supports the US model.” The Colgan Air crash had nothing to do with 1,500 hours. There have been huge continuous advances in safety in the U.S. in Europe, and it is simply not true that “all the data” supports 1,500 hours, in fact the data doesn’t support this at all (since Europe is included in all of the data, and a great deal of improvement has nothing whatsoever to do with training hours for new pilots, as both the FAA and NTSB – who have looked at this data – conclude).
@Gary is wrong – you reveal your bias “don’t give. S***. they do a billion written tests instead of time in aircraft..good for them.” 30,000 hour veteran American/Southwest captain in the left seat and these are the safest regional jet flights in the world.
PLPPLYER, no one’s making you read the blog. If you have some relevant, fact-based counter points, we’re all ears.
Let’s be honest, opposition by the pilots has nothing, or a close semblance of nothing, to do with safety. The thing that galls me is that no matter how much pilots are compensated, while working or in retirement, they are never satisfied.
And no other profession came anywhere close to getting the per person Covid handouts enjoyed by pilots.
Great article Gary! As a recently “forced to retire” at age 65 AA B777 Captain I can assure you this is just politics and an attempt to stifle competition while using “safety” as the excuse. Neither AA nor any of its affiliates flies out of Dallas Love field. Southwest, which started their life flying from DAL to HOU, doesn’t seem to have a problem with JSX flying the same route.
The experience that low-time pilots get flying with retired airline Captains in jets into and out of major airports is exactly what the airlines want in a new-hire pilot. Wouldn’t you know it! Every airline, including AA, grabs up the pilots from JSX as soon as they have their 1500 hours. They love the pilots from JSX, but claim JSX isn’t safe? There’s a disconnect there. Does that mean the pilots they hired from JSX aren’t safe?
There’s more I’d like to write, but the FAA would t listen anyway.
Hey Rimo, public charter 380 is a result of deregulation. Are you saying we walk that back? Having been a flight instructor in Florida during a busy hurricane season, flying for one of these 135s kept me and my family off public assistance. I got the experience of flying with retired American, US Air and United captains. I have yet to hear of any of these carriers causing a problem for anyone else in the air, traffic control system, or even sliding one off the end of the runway. I still had to pay my dues in order to get my ATP, and now I’m at a legacy Five years later. The smaller companies pay well and provide medical benefits. As long as they’re in operation, there’s one less pilot collecting public assistance. But it’s not lost on me that would give you one less thing to complain about.
Gary, I agree that many of these people throwing spears at you aren’t providing any hard data, so tell me what you think about these data points (sourced from the NTSB; let me know if you don’t think that’s a valid source of information):
Part 135 Fatalities in 2019: 32
Part 135 Fatalities in 2020: 21
Part 121 Fatalities in 2019: 1
Part 121 Fatalities in 2020: 0
These are US numbers only, not worldwide.
Remember that Part 135 flies fewer total hours, so the fatality per flight hour is much higher with Part 135 than with Part 121. Part 135 commuter operations saw a 46% decline in operation these two years, which may help explain the reduced fatalities (NTSB).
If you ask me, this would indicate that your chances of a fatality are higher with a Part 135 operation than with a Part 121 operation.
“Europe is safe at 250 hours.” That’s all good that they don’t require more hours but the average new airline pilot in Europe has 3000 or greater hours or military training. Article written by a passenger not even a aviation expert. I’m done with this website.
@Brennin – most pilot mistakes aren’t fatal, and none of that says anything about 1500 pilot hours, remember that we see part 135 carriers with 30,000 hour captains. They train first officers in the right seat who move on to the major airlines, promoting safety.
Attributing lack of fatalities to first officer training hours is asinine. Attributing fatal accidents *to part 135* is dumb, NTSB data shows that in a majority years there are zero fatalities in part 135 operations.
and in any case these aren’t part 380 carriers.
Gary. I no longer fly and my children never took it up, so I only care about my passenger experience.
I flew well over 30,000 hours from 1973 to 2022. I’ve flown taildraggers to 747’s in more countries than I can remember.
First, the FAA hasn’t decided anything yet you claim they’ve caved to unions.
You mention they don’t want to compete with more pilots. However, they haven’t tried to stop any 121 carriers, even if they are non-union. And when they ask for flight time limits the unions are accused of wanting more jobs.
Regularly scheduled charters are flaunting the regulation. Your argument that it is not cost-effective to offer this service as Part 121 should not be in the equation and as a passenger I never want anything to be changed because of cost.
All commercial licenses have an hour requirement, even in Europe. Are they arbitrary, sure. But from what I know, even with the lower hour requirement, an EASA license is more difficult to get. And the FAA recognizes that all hours are not the same. That’s why military pilots are credited differently.
The comment that the NTSB doesn’t think pilot hours prevent accidents is false. This report was one year after the Colgan accident. And they said they didn’t have a recommendation for the number of hours, not that it wasn’t safer.
Lastly, you mention how experienced pilots can mentor new pilots. True, but they need to be at a point where they are ready to be mentored. And interesting that you think experience matters when talking about mentoring. If hours really didn’t matter as you say, how about we put two 250-hour pilots on your flight? Would you go? Not me.
@DA Pilit – “the FAA hasn’t decided anything yet you claim they’ve caved to unions.” they caved to ALPA in opening this rulemaking, wouldn’t ever have happened with out alpa lobbying.
“If hours really didn’t matter as you say, how about we put two 250-hour pilots on your flight?” The military does all the time, but that’s not permissible in scheduled 135 operations.
@Brennin Colegrove – Are there stats that parse out fatalities under Part 380 since Part 380 more closely approximates Part 121 operations?
As “ one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel” maybe you should stick with what you know. Aviation safety doesn’t seem to be something you burden yourself with but this is irresponsible ”journalism.” Not sure who is finding this hack job but this type of thinking from people who have no actual experience is shockingly unsafe.
The fact is, the US aviation industry is the safest in the world and any change undermining that could have fatal consequences.
@Gary. Re: “If hours really didn’t matter as you say, how about we put two 250-hour pilots on your flight?” The military does all the time, but that’s not permissible in scheduled 135 operations.
This is apples to oranges and shows you don’t understand the difference. A military pilot with 250 hours has had way more training than a civilian with the same number of hours. This is why an ab initio training allows for reduced flight hours. The 1500 hour rule is not a magic number, but it has to be something reasonable to insure safety. And you do know the military accident rate is much higher than civilian? Again apples to oranges though.
@DA Pilit – no, you’re making my point when you write “A military pilot with 250 hours has had way more training than a civilian with the same number of hours.” Hours for hours sake are garbage! A meaningless metric.
First, (having flown both) the military has a much higher accident rate than airline flying.
In humans, experience leads to better decision making and fewer mistakes in every endeavor. “Good judgement comes from experience. Unfortunately, experience comes from bad judgement.” Dr Kerr L White
General Aviation (GA) typically has a higher rate of mishaps or accidents compared to commercial airline aviation. This is due to several factors, including the diversity of aircraft types, less stringent regulations, varying pilot experience levels, and often less sophisticated infrastructure and support systems. Commercial airlines, on the other hand, adhere to strict safety standards, benefit from advanced training programs, and operate with larger, more technologically advanced aircraft, which collectively contribute In humans, experience leads to better decision making and fewer mistakes in every endeavor. “Good judgement comes from experience. Unfortunately, experience comes from bad judgement.” Dr Kerr L White
General Aviation (GA) typically has a higher rate of mishaps or accidents compared to commercial airline aviation. This is due to several factors, including the diversity of aircraft types, less stringent regulations, varying pilot experience levels, and often less sophisticated infrastructure and support systems. Commercial airlines, on the other hand, adhere to strict safety standards, benefit from advanced training programs, and operate with larger, more technologically advanced aircraft, which collectively contribute to a lower accident rate compared to General Aviation.
There are studies that have shown a positive correlation between good judgment and experience, particularly in fields where decision-making is crucial. Experienced individuals often develop better judgment and decision-making skills through exposure to various situations and learning from their mistakes. This holds true in professions like medicine, aviation, and management, where experience allows individuals to anticipate challenges, make informed decisions, and navigate complex scenarios more effectively. General Aviation.
There are studies that have shown a positive correlation between good judgment and experience, particularly in fields where decision-making is crucial. Experienced individuals often develop better judgment and decision-making skills through exposure to various situations and learning from their mistakes. This holds true in professions like medicine, aviation, and management, where experience allows individuals to anticipate challenges, make informed decisions, and navigate complex scenarios more effectively.
What would prevent a new network carrier from adopting this model? If jsx can circumvent faa rules, no matter how good or bad they are, what’s to keep any carrier regardless of plane flown from circumventing the regulations like this?
Jsx’ nice product vs any other carrier is a different topic than whether jsx should be allowed to circumvent the faa rules by operating scheduled service under the guise of charter.
Every carrier in America should move to this model if jsx is allowed to. Why would you not?
I enjoy your blog, Gary. But the angst about jsx product being taken out of the market seems a bit placed. This doesn’t have anything to do with their product but whether any carrier be it JSX or Delta should be able to operate obvious scheduled service under part 135 when it defies the entire intent of the law.
I don’t think 1500 hours is the right number. Though frankly, I’m not well placed to offer judgement on the topic but I don’t understand these latest articles on this topic when it has nothing to do with product or innovation but rather everything to do with the future of the airline industry. Every carrier would operate like jsx if they could and this kind of allowed exploitation should make it obvious that they can so long as they have separate companies doing the schedule from the chartered flying
@ Gary:
no, you’re making my point when you write “A military pilot with 250 hours has had way more training than a civilian with the same number of hours.” Hours for hours sake are garbage! A meaningless metric.
Correct, that’s why it takes 1500 hours of “anything” (or garbage as you put it) to equal 750 hours of military time. You are in favor of lowering the hours, but allowing “garbage”. I am not. As I said, an ab initio program allows fewer hours and I’m all for it. This is structured training and I think the hours can be cut from 1500 if this approach is taken. The 1500 hour rule is for pilots who don’t fit into any other category.
Wow. How much did A4A pay you to write this cherry picked, badly misinformed article?
@DA Pilit – “You are in favor of lowering the hours, but allowing “garbage”. I am not.”
I have written extensively that we should reform pilot training so that it is focused and not junk hours, I do not get where you are suggesting I want to allow garbage when I am criticizing garbage. Here I’m criticizing the FAA for wanting to go further down the garbage rabbit hole.
@Experienced – A4A? The major carriers don’t want part 135 competition. You’re badly misinformed. And as far as I know, I have never spoken with anyone at A4A let alone taken money from them.
But once again, just as I said would happen, it’s an attack on me rather than making any kind of case that I am mistaken. You say this is “cherry picked” but never identify anything here that is, let alone offer a shred of evidence to the contrary. That’s sad.
@Gary
You have said many times you want the 1500 hour rule lowered. It actually already is if you do the right training. The 1500 hour rule allows those who don’t want to do structured training the opportunity to still be able to qualify to be a 121 pilot. I don’t agree that these are garbage hours, but certainly less valuable than other training.
With what I know and have seen in the industry, I’m not in favor of lowering standards. These aren’t bad people, but this job takes a lot of skill and to be able to make good decisions takes experience. And even experienced pilots need a backup when they have a human moment.
I don’t think we will ever agree on this.
My 1500 hours were built as a CFI, CFII, and MEI. I flew in all kinds of IMC, taught students how to avoid, recognize, predict, and get out of Icing, storms, 45 kt surface winds, you name it and I took them up in it. All over the USA. I wouldn’t sign a student off for an instrument ride unless they had 15 hours in actual IMC at minimum. Perhaps the 1500 should require more complex hours, but it already does have some additional requirements, such as night flight, good time, XC time, etc. The best thing for students is to fly in unfamiliar areas over long distances that requires some serious weather and contingency planning. If anything, CFII’s and/or MEI’s should have lower hour requirements than a VFR only single engine CFI. But looking back at myself before getting my 1500 hours (now as a 4000 hour 121 jet pilot), I would NEVER recommend letting 250 hour wonders fly for any airline out there. The things you learn between 250 and 1000+ are astounding. The cycles of the 4 seasons, etc. If anything they should add MORE requirements to fly to other regions (A CFII from Arizona who has never seen a cloud shouldn’t be a CFII!). They already watered down commercial maneuvers and lowered real world requirements for multi engine time. Responsibly Taking things to the limit is and learning how to deal with those limits is what makes good pilots. (With no one else at risk). That’s why they do upset training at 121 airlines now. Every commercial pilot should have to do this training and spin training as well (not just CFI’s or ATPs). Some part 135 guys who got lucky after commercial with a jet job never did any of that training. Let’s increase the safety, not lower it. 1500 hour rule should stay with more specific requirements within.
This author is “asinine”. Click bait at best and just throwing a tantrum that he has less connections to catch and has to spend more money. He doesn’t understand anything about safety, mentions 135 flying like he understands it and leaves out the numerous crashes each year in corporate flying on jet aircraft, which is where a lot of junior inexperienced pilots end up. It amazes me. But I’m glad we all know where this one passenger stands? I won’t let the door hit me on the way out.
I always thought the 1500 hour came from the fact that the big boys
(UAL, DL, and AA back in the day when they got 10000 applications for every pilot opening) was because they required an ATP just to look at your resume. Not true anymore?
Pfew.: crony greedy corporations have been thwarted, notwithstanding Gary here being a paid mouthpiece.
There are ZERO studies that a lower number of hours increases safety (or doesn’t decrease it).
And if one wants to reform student training (good idea), you (1) first reform the training, then (2) monitor the first batches of pilots are under the training, (3) study the appropriate number of hours based on observed data and (4) make an informed decision of changing the number of hours. You know, science 101, akai you first aim then shoot, not shoot randomly, which is what’s proposed here.
@Jake – you are lying.
@Jeffrey Billon – why are you talking about crashes of corporate jets? totally inapposite.
It really isn’t Gary. Pilots need the same certification to fly corporate jets, and many of those corporate jets are 135 operations which kind of deflated your other argument and 135 “safety record”. I mean your credibility couldn’t be lower as it is but you can keep digging, that would be fine.
Gary, we aren’t looking at the right issues; here’s how to end the pilot shortage and the lack of training for new hires; if you’d care to report on this and champion it, that would be helpful. Pilots are mandated to retire at 65. Why? What if we made it a choice? Be interesting to see how the pilot group would vote esp with ALPA fighting that vote. But ALPS is there to do the best for the pilot group, right? or themselves? If we made it a choice then the pilot can Retire just as is now, or continue flying by undergoing quarterly physicals. 65 is the new 50. Why have an age limit when you can have a quarterly physical that says you are in good shape and in good health? As a retired Captain I would have stayed longer as long as it was fun, and I was helping the new generation. And with staying I bring exceptional experience forward while continuing to bring along new hires in their training that is so critical. Experience is everything. I’ve been thru Sully bird strikes that took out all 3 on my engines on a 727 and many more experiences I can pass along the experience of how to calmly focus and handle them. Why do we hard stop all the amassed experience learned from experience over years of flying…IF the pilot is healthy? There would be no pilot shortage. It would end; and it would stop taking the experienced people away from the regionals as fast as is now occurring. Experience wins out for everyone, and a quarterly physical will determine when it’s time to retire.
Statistics speak for themselves. Number of accidents are down, and if you look into it fatalities is way dow . https://www.airlines.org/dataset/safety-record-of-u-s-air-carriers/
135 operations with less experienced pilots have significantly more fatalities with significantly less passengers moved.
There are more important things pilots could do to get experience but who is going to come up with those methods and who pays for them? By statistics alone experience counts for something. Sorry for your troubles Gary.
@Frank
I don’t remember any 727 triple engine failure landings. Maybe you can give us the details.
As far as age 65, my personal opinion is that quarterly physicals would ground at least as many as who stayed past 65. I agree that at 65 some are very healthy, but I’ve also seen unhealthy pilots in their 50s. And realistically there would have to be cognitive testing.
Great article, good to see at least a few people see what is going on. Should have mentioned the difference in pay between US pilots and other countries, that’s what it is all about. Or how unions have secretly fought increasing CVR time even though the NTSB has been recommending it for 30 years. 2 hours is a joke. The unions have fought cameras in the cockpits every time it comes up. There is still no max number of hours commuting before reporting to duty, even though it was a leading cause of the NY crash. Pilots get to determine if they are rested, imagine if they could do the same for alcohol use or issue their own medical? If anything the unions have become anti safety oriented to protect members. They created a shortage by the 1500 hour rule and pilots that would have been reprimanded or fired in the past are now free to fly because of the shortage the rules created. Interesting to read the comments from high time pilots on here that are very defensive, makes me question their CRM skills in the flight deck if an FO says they are doing something wrong? You know there is a problem when a united Airbus has a tail strike that does massive damage and the aircraft flies 8 more flights before it is grounded. A 777 gets within 800 feet of the ocean before egpws goes off and the pilots finally react. Or a 777 crosses an active runway and almost causes a crash then continues on to the destination like nothing happened. None of these had CVR for the NTSB to examine. Sounds like the 1500 hour rule made things very safe. The real reason safety is so great is technology and training. Hours have a lot less to do with it.
Let’s be clear here. Even before the 1,500 minimum required by the FAA was instituted (ignoring the lower hour requirement for military and structured training pilots), no one was getting hired by the majors with less than 1,500 hours anyway.
As to 250 hour pilots, that only allows them to sit in the right seat–not act as a captain–where allowed, e.g., the U.K.
Gary points to Europe and claims 250 hours is safe. But let’s look at Asia which also allows 250 hour co-pilots and their accident rate is significantly higher.
In 250-hours of training for a commercial aircraft operation, one is only learning how to push buttons–not how to fly an airplane. When on the line, with the auto-pilot flying the plane 98% of the time, they aren’t learning much more.
Three critical words: stick and rudder.
250-hour pilots are clueless at it.
So, Gary, what EXACTLY do you propose should be the mandatory minimum training required to pilot a commercial aircraft? And let’s separate that between captains and co-pilots.
Or are you OK with 250-hour captains?
Captains are not baby sitters for low time first officers. Every pilot hired at a major airline is hired to be a Captain.
I am a 25 year Captain at a major airline. During a recent flight it was the First Officer’s leg and we experienced an emergency due to an engine overheat. That highly experienced and qualified First Officer gave me the ability to allow him to continue to fly the airplane so I could manage the emergency. A 250 hour First Officer degrades that option regardless of the size of the airplane or length of the flight. Emergencies don’t wait for Senior pilots.
I’m sure CHAT GPT could do a better job than you writing an article on this subject or any other at a much lower cost.
I love to debate Gary on alot of things but there is nothing to debate on this subject because he nailed it.
The Biden Administration is bowing to ALPA at the cost of small cities.
When dozens of cities have lost air service and the regional airline industry has not stabilized, this is a death knell to the regional airline industry that needed the Skywest model to sustain small city service but also to provide a pipeline for young pilots.
FAA approved university pilot training programs are pumping out thousands of students per year but they generally graduate with about 250 hours and then have to flight instruct or fly flights that has little to do with airline or jet operations.
Let’s also be clear that ALPA regretted the day they ever allowed regional airline codesharing and has been hellbent on eliminating it at every turn. The latest pilot shortage just makes it much easier to kill the regional airline industry.
And let’s also be honest that alot of small cities could have air service on regional airlines if medium sized cities weren’t connected to major hubs with regional jets rather than mainline flights. Delta realized that the economics of regional jet flying was changing and started changing the model by adding the B717 over a decade ago and the C Series/now A220 more recently, something neither AA or UA have done but which has shifted regional jets to other markets. Still, all of the big 3 plus AS still use regional jets on alot of routes that could be served by mainline flights if at a much lower frequency.
Let’s also not forget that the Biden administration is deadset on regulating the H out of business but their own functions, including ATC, are completely understaffed, have archaic, illogical workrules, and failing at what they are supposed to do – but since they can never admit they aren’t doing their job, they just blame someone else, which in this case is the airlines.
I live in a city that has abundant air service and has very little regional jet service but I pity my fellow Americans that will lose air service as small towns dwindle.
Let’s get to the political motives of all of this. First, don’t discount that these policies aren’t part of this administration’s green energy motives – the fewer planes in the sky – unless they are the ones they fly around – the better.
And small towns don’t vote for their party. The more they cut off those towns, the greater the shift the demographics will be to their failing cities.
This is indeed shameful but it isn’t a surprise when you have a party that is more motivated by remaining in power than in doing what is best for all of America.
The argument for lowering ATP training requirement standards by pointing to military military training is specious and misleading. If the 121 and 135 carriers had anything remotely approaching the mishap and fatality rate of military aviation, they would all be out of business. Simply put the military accepts a much, much higher level of risk in its aviation enterprise than commercial civilian aviation.
What does apply to this discussion is the quality of the flight time and training military pilots receive compared to civilian pilots. No offense intended, but there is no comparison between the two worlds. It seems bizarre to have to point this out, but it is this concept that is at the heart of the 1500 hour rule.
It is much more likely that a pilot will experience emergencies, navigate difficult airports while taxiing, and through challenging terrain on approaches, and generally figure out how not to kill themselves in 1500 hours versus 250 hours. The first time a pilot has to deal with a complex engine out terrain avoidance procedure cannot be with paying pax in the back.
I don’t read the blog enough to know, or at all really: does they author have.pilots license of any type? His argument seems to be more anti-union and anti-labor than safety related.
1KBrad,
Gary can pipe in but there is no problem in my mind with restricting young pilots to just the right seat.
But the exemptions should also be just for small city service; cities that already have scores of flights do not need exemptions other than to be connected to major airline hubs.
and since you mention Asia, tell us how many of the pilot incidents involved young pilots. Tell us how junior the pilots were on the Asiana 777 that flew the plane into the ground.
Gary is right that there is a difference between training and experience. Simply slapping a high number of hours as a requirement without providing a pathway for how to get pilots from FAA approved university flight training programs to commercial airline cockpits is the missing link in the pilot supply chain and it MUST be fixed.
Allowing ALPA to dictate that everything they can’t control has to be eliminated must not be allowed.
This author has no idea what he’s talking about, and doesn’t know a thing about safety. Ask anyone who’s actually in the industry or touched the controls of an aircraft.