Originally Posted by
DrongoDriver
I totally understand your point and am sure it will be a great career move for you but you’ll be “proving” the strategy that so many CEO/CFOs have used to wreck legacy airlines.
There are two case studies (that I can think of right now) of this happening in Aus already:
1. Seaplanes. Even though minimums have gone down for almost every low hour job (one of our hangar rats just got a night IFR job with 250TT), most seaplane jobs down here still require 25k hours with 17 million water landings and 10 hours in the space shuttle. Why? So they can then turn around and say “we can’t find qualified candidates here so can we hire guys from overseas?”. It’s quite common to be in a seaplane doing a scenic over Sydney harbour and hearing a Canadian/American voice from up front. As such there are almost no junior seaplane pilots anymore.
2. Parachuting. Not so much the jump pilots but the instructors and tandem masters, the money makers. 10+ years ago there used to be 5 clubs per major city doing drops and teaching instructors/tandem masters. Now that a certain million dollar corporation have come in and use foreign tandem masters, there’s no need for those clubs. So from 5-6 planes needing 5-6 jump pilots, we now have 1-2 planes needing 1-2 jump pilots.
From your previous post I believe you’re Canadian? If so I’m guessing you went through (or are still going through) the hard yards in their GA industry too. I reckon you’d be pretty ticked off if Aussies started coming over and taking all the 1900/King Air/Caravan/Dash jobs leaving all the Canadians stuck on old Never-gos and the like.
If I were you I’d head to Sunwings or a LCC in Europe (where they’ve already killed their GA industry), get a command + few thousand hours on a 737/320 then go after a lucrative commuting contract in mainland China.
Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had the pleasure to fly with some foreign crews and they’ve all been top notch. I just don’t agree with them taking full time jobs until all the local boys have filled those positions (without having to adher to fairytale minimums).
One small problem with that. Two, actually:
Foreign pilots get paid the same as every other DHC-8 pilot, so your assertion that foreigners are a ploy to keep wages low is faulty.
How many Australian pilots are flying in the US on E-3 visas? Any move to bring them all home to protect American jobs?