high turnover at the regional level is a good thing. Keeps labor costs low. Regionals won’t hesitate to hire furloughed major pilots. LCCs and ACMI, however......will.

I don’t know if the LCC’s or ACMI will be looking at furloughed legacy pilots this time since they will have recall rights and definitely leave. When I was furloughed after 9/11 there were plenty of furloughed legacy pilots, but the regionals all went on a hiring and expansion frenzy. The only regional pilots that my company hired were those looking to get some global freight experience and a bigger check than a regional. I wasn’t hired because they like legacy pilots, I was hired because they needed people who could be successful in a very old school pass or you’re fired training program and potentially upgrade quickly, and the bulk of those who met their qualifications were furloughed legacy pilots. Today, the market will be flooded with high time regional pilots. I think the most attractive applicants will be highly experienced regional pilots with no degree. Unless they get the degree before the legacies start hiring, they are basically unmarketable and won’t be looking for the door starting the first day of training.

In a normal economy with demand high, I’d tend to agree. However, as with most companies one of the most expensive expenditures is turnover. It generally costs more to train a replacement, given the actual investment in training and the time/work lost by the departing employee. Especially true in our game when in takes three months and lost of override pay to train someone new, regardless of experience level. I’d have to side with hiring the CFI in this case, given the probability of the duration of their employment. Sure, there’s a chance you may have a few needing additional sims, but I’ve been through two regionals now and had new jet guys/gals/CFI’s who were hot with the stick and had no problems. IOE is where most people have issues needing extra days/trips. But the money on average spent to train a new to 121 pilot potentially needing extra time in the airplane is far less that to hire a replacement when the recalled mainline pilot jumps ship back to their glory ride.

This is widely believed. Clearly an airline with a lower longevity workforce will have reduced payroll expense. Training costs however, are not negligible. I wonder what the break even point is and what level of turnover provides optimal longevity control / training costs.

Let’s articulate this policy clearly, “We prefer it when our most experienced pilots leave so we can save money. We value cost savings over the mentorship they could provide.”

So pilots looking for work should remove their degree from their resume? You are probably correct, Frontier at least is well known for trying to weed out applicants with aspirations beyond Frontier.

This industry is comically irrational. Let’s articulate this policy accurately as well. “We hire the best pilots we can find provided we believe they are not good enough to leave here for a better job.” It’s maddening.

The degree doesn’t define the best pilot, it is a tool to weed out the stack of applicants. Most of the long term pilots that I flew with at the ACMI airline that I worked for didn’t have a degree, and they were probably the best pilots that I’ve ever worked with. They go places that most people have never heard of with no company support network, and their training is much harder than what I have found at a legacy. Pilots at my current employer would stop the sim and call the union if they had to take a check ride similar to what we had. Being a pilot is far less demanding when you are spoon fed everything and everywhere you go has an established support network in place. Based on my experience, working for an ACMI company is infinitely better than flying for a regional, but it is a part of the industry that weeds out the weak with brutal efficiency.

Yawn. There are experienced jet guys who need extra training and 1500-hr CFIs who don't.

You guys all seem to be forgetting that we have pilots that will be unemployed from other regionals. C5 does not have to hire the Mainline pilots or the CFI's. There will be enough pilots from other regionals including those that flew the 145 that can be hired.

The company no longer has to hire those guys that have been out of the industry for over a decade, low time PIC hours, odd personalities, those that were asked to leave other training programs for odd reasons.

It has changed from the time where the regionals were scraping the bottom of the barrel just a couple of months ago to being able to get the cream of the crop.

You seem to be arguing that the company will have to take either one, when they will probably not hire either one because no one is talking about the third choice.

From what I hear, C5 has a handful of candidates that are in the hiring pool. They were the next class right before everything shut down. And they have been contacted about possible classes coming up. Anyone know anything about this?

Jack has a really good point. The hiring departments of every airline can be very selective now, and a candidate’s attitude will probably have more to do with it than anything else.

Can someone confirm this?