Originally Posted by
DirectAnywhere
He wrote a piece for The Australian last November entitled “Complications of crew life created heartaches” that makes him and most pilots sound like sexual predators.
It’s behind a paywall and I can’t be bothered finding it but it‘s pretty unpleasant and sleazy.
If that’s the mark of the man, then I don’t think I’d either like or respect him very much.
here you goEmirates is the world’s largest international airline. Based in Dubai, it has huge fleets of Boeing 777s and Airbus A380 and A330 aircraft. Last I heard it had nearly 3000 pilots and 20,000 cabin crew.
Emirates has a large human resources department because the great majority of staff are expatriates.
When I joined Emirates in 1988 it had two aircraft, a B727 and an A310. The 20 pilots were mostly Pakistani and the cabin crew Turkish. Emirates had ordered huge numbers of Airbus aircraft but was struggling to source pilots.
Salvation came in 1989 courtesy of Australian prime minister Bob Hawke and the pilot strike. Hundreds of ex-TAA and Ansett pilots suddenly arrived with all that experience and Emirates was on its way in the most rapid airline expansion in history.
Floods of European, Canadian and South African pilots soon followed, most of them aged 30-plus with considerable experience that could be upgraded to captain fairly quickly.
Emirates also sourced flight attendants from all over the world as its route structure would soon expand to more than 100 countries and nationalities as well. I am sure someone on the cabin crew selection panel had previously sat on a Miss World selection contestant panel. I was most impressed with the stunning Persian, Phoenician and other similarly exotic crew members. Emirates insisted all new pilots regardless of previous experience do the full aircraft type qualification and induction which took about six weeks. During that time the usually married pilots were accommodated in the many large luxury apartment complexes that Emirates had built to house the young female flight attendants who were on a three-year contact. The pilots on completion of the training and induction would then be assigned a villa and could then bring their family to Dubai.
Pilots are generally outgoing and friendly types and poolside chats with flight attendants on days off did lead sometimes to complications.
Then came the down-the-route layover problem which was often in luxury hotels that Emirates owned. When you have on a B777-300 two pilots and 18 cabin crew staying in the same hotel or resort it is only natural that pilots assumed the responsibility of looking after the young women, especially on nights out “on the town”.
Qantas avoided the problem by having its pilots stay in different hotels to its cabin crew.
When I left the RAAF aged 33, Qantas informed me I was too old for recruitment. I am so glad they did. On layovers you could always tell the Qantas technical crew in the hotel bar. One very senior captain, a middle-aged first officer, and two very young second officers. Emirates would have two very happy pilots ensuring the safety of eight or so of the cabin crew — young women who had chosen to enjoy a night out normally at the behest of the first officer, whose unspoken duty was as entertainment officer.
Emirates HR is very experienced in domestic problems as the divorce rate allegedly is over 50 per cent. I write from experience as I too succumbed to nature. My third wife was a beautiful Eastern European 23 years my junior.
Byron Bailey is a former RAAF fighter jet pilot and flew B777s as an airline captain.