Originally Posted by
BuzzBox
It depends on the airline, but most have a strict seniority system where new joiners are hired at the bottom of the seniority list at the most junior rank. If the most junior rank is Second Officer, then that's where all pilots would normally join that airline. Qantas is one such airline.
A number of very senior pilots who either lost their jobs or resigned during the pandemic have ended up as junior pilots at other airlines. Many more decided it was all too hard (and quite frankly a slap in the face), and either retired early or found careers in other industries. The airline industry has lost a huge amount of experience as a result. Unfortunately, that's life in an industry where highly trained people are treated like commodities and experience counts for five-eighths of f@#k all if you change employers.
Wow. I am not an airline pilot. I undersatnd seniority but I thought logically, one should / would join at the most junior of the rank that they currently hold (i.e. most junior Captain). But to kick them down to SO is a little bit rough? I thought that a SO cannot takeoff/land the airplane. So you could have a situation here where your SO on the plane, could be more experienced than the Captain/FO. Or a 15,000 hr SO on par with a guy just out of a cadetship...