The young looking First Officers

[C]

It is now, and has always been quite normal for those in the right hand seat to be quite young (certainly in the short haul world). Having an ATPL now before the age of 20 is not uncommon, and with more and more low cost airlines and aircraft, they will look to hire a cheap people as possible - and the person straight out of Oxford/CTC etc will often be that person.

Long haul I doubt there are that many under 25 or 30, but it isn't unheard of. For example a chap who joined the RAF at 18 could leave after 12 years (30) and go straight into a RHS of a BA long haul.

[RitterKreuz]

here is the inside scoop, hope it enlightens you  :D

The demand and supply for qualified airline applicants fluctuates frequently, one decade the market is flooded with pilots making the job field very competitive, the next decade there seems to be nobody out there interested in doing the job at all which means they will hire virtually anyone.

Right now we are experiencing what has been called a "critical pilot shortage" in the USA. Though there is some hiring on the major airline level, there is a lot of hiring on the regional airline level. Therefore many of the regional carriers are fighting for pilots. a majority of the pilots hired are "lateral moves" ie. pilots who have already been employed for a few years at one regional and decide to try their luck with another company. other new hires are coming directly from out of school some airlines taking them with as little as 300 hours total flying experience with as little as 50 hours in multi engine equipment. The minimum age never changed at my company... still have to be at least 21 to take a position as a first officer. but you have to be at least 23 to make captain.

Some applicants don't have a college degree, but are given a case by case consideration based on how many college credit hours they have, or how close they are to finishing a degree, usually these pilots exceed the minimum flight time requirements by a large margin.

most of these new "hundred hour wonders" have come from civilian flight schools, and we have had very very few military applicants

When i was hired i was 26 years old and had 2100 total time with about 200 multi engine flight time (slightly more than the advertised minimums), and i barely got an interview. its amazing how rapidly things can change.

Its interesting how young a person can look and actually be a little long in the tooth, i flew with a 40ish year old captain the other day who didn't look a day over 25! people would look at us with wonder "are those children working my flight?!" little did they know that he had been with the company for about 12 years and had several thousand hours of airline experience, and ironically, since he is a fairly new upgrade who had never flown this particular type of aircraft before he upgraded to captain... our "equipment experience" field on the flight crew list shows me as having nearly 4 times more experience on the particular aircraft than the captain did! Because the upgrade system is based on "seniority" it is possible (though rare) that the first officer has more total flight time than the captain, or more experience in the aircraft than the captain.

So you just never know by looking at the guy whether he is a "hundred hour wonder boy" or he is an "ace of the base" with many years of experience

[RitterKreuz]

our planes are red white and blue like a big Tylenol, but with a red and blue eagle on the tail  ;D

[a1]

American Eagle?

[RitterKreuz]

american connection AKA Trans States Airlines the eagle on the tail is all blue

A1 gets the door prize  ;D

[FLYING_TRUCKER]

Good Afternoon all....

When you look at Air Canada you are looking at a military flying club.  I know quite a few Captains and First Officers that still fly Military Reserve and I am sure that is the same in the United States, Great Britain and Europe as well.
Why not, they have the training and education to back themselves up and if we ever did get ourselves into another World War you have the qualified guys to fly the heavies.
And, many Commercial Aircraft would go into military service with qualified crews.  In World War Two they did the same thing with aircraft and ships.
Look at the age of the lads that flew the World War Two four engine bombers, the yanks carried two pilots but the RCAF and the RAF only one pilot, most were not even old enough to shave, they weather, duration of mission, night missions and formation flying took nerves of steel and this doesn't even mention part of it like flak and enemy fighters.

Many of us old fellas laugh our asses off when we hear:
-your too young to drink
-your too young to drive
-your too young to hold a Private Pilots Licence...etc

Wait until the first bullets start flying and then watch the regulations change, it happens every time.

Pilots like doctors or any professional calling, I think they run in circles, you either have a shortage this year or way to many next year.  

Cheers...Happy Landings...Doug

[RitterKreuz]

your absolutely right sir... youth is not always a desirable trait for a pilot because people identify youth with inexperience. which can often be the case... but who is to say that a 21 year old FO has not been flying since he was 13 years old?

you never know.

[RitterKreuz]

thats because American Connection was incorrect.  :-[

American Connection is painted on the side of trans states airlines planes (they have nothing to do with American or American Eagle) ... their "tail chicken" is all blue, ours is blue/red... per our contract, American airlines is not supposed to "hire" any regional airline for connection flying other than Eagle... but, somehow by having all trans states "american connection" flights originate and terminate in St. Louis without connections through DFW there was some sort of loop hole. Most eagle pilots will claim that American Connection has thus stolen some of our jobs, but this was before my time so i cant really comment on all the "facts"

i came close to working for trans states, but they pushed my class date back 3 times and then offered me a job at a spin off carrier i have never even heard of. as a result of this i told them thanks but no thanks - im going elsewhere. i heard from several people that this was the right call to make.

its a dog eat dog world