SAA recruiting

[Goingdownagain]

Just picked up a magazine called Aero Africa with a piece about SAA recruiting 737-800 pilot. Bad news is they got them from Argentina. Does anybody know the full story with this one?

[skyvan]

1 August, 2001.
Andre Viljoen, SAA President and Chief Executive Officer said the pilots were brought to South Africa to relieve local pilots while they undergo an intensive “conversion” training to fly Boeing 737-800. This conversion takes about four weeks to complete. The Argentinian pilots will be in South Africa for about eight months.
“Once a pilot has obtained some experience on a Boeing 737-200 he/she is given a different course which allows him/her to operate a Boeing 737-800. This course takes a total of eight days and focuses primarily on the differences between the two aircraft. The primary difference being the instrumentation as the Boeing 737-800 is a new generation aircraft and is equipped with digital instrumentation,” Viljoen said.
“In the interests of flight safety SAA, like most other international carriers, trains its pilots to fly only one type of aircraft at any particular time. During this transition period and to allow for the rapid expansion on the domestic and regional routes, SAA has found it necessary to employ contract crew to operate some of its domestic schedules.
“When a pilot’s position in the Company or the Company’s requirements so dictate, a pilot is given a full conversion course which will qualify him/her to fly another aircraft type. This allows the Company to train its pilots to the highest internationally accepted standards,” he added.
SAA pilots are accustomed to flying Boeing 737-200 in domestic and regional markets.
“In order to maintain the highest safety standards, a decision was taken to only employ crew who were accustomed to working together. After an extensive search through a recruitment agency, Argentinian pilots were employed. These pilots are highly experienced, with some having flown an average of more than 9000 hours each. All have considerable experience on the Boeing 737-200. They will only be utilised by SAA to operate the Boeing 737-200 and will not operate any other aircraft within SAA,” Viljoen said.
Viljoen said the airline has been slowly replacing its ageing planes with the new Boeing 737-800. Since February 2000 SAA has phased out 16 short and medium range aircraft and will introduce 21 new generation 737-800 to its domestic fleet.
“At the same time the domestic and regional market expanded considerably. To meet this demand for additional seats, SAA had to increase its frequency of flights to certain destinations,” Viljoen said.
“Concern has been expressed that the employment of these pilots will delay the promotion of pilots already employed by SAA. In practice the opposite is actually true. By employing the contract pilots, SAA pilots are freed up to be placed on conversion courses which would otherwise have had to be delayed in order to provide sufficient flight crew to operate the expanded flight schedule,” Viljoen added.
END
Try flysaa.com for the way it is, rather than misread magazines.