It is a reasonable assumption that the trainee must have been at a reasonably early stage in his training otherwise he would not have needed a safety FO.
As a fare paying passenger surely I would be entitled to expect a fully trained competent first officer to be flying a passenger jet. In addition I thought the whole idea of very sophisticated and hugely expensive flight simulators was to train pilots to the required standard before they are licenced to fly as second in command of passenger jets.
Given that expectation, how come airlines are using revenue flights for trainee airline pilots to practice on. The obvious answer it saves money. Isn't it about time that airlines come clean on this "training" of new pilots with passengers, and dedicate a real aircraft to undertake non-revenue practice for trainee airline pilots until these "trainees" reach the same handling skill standard expected of captains - particularly as they are theoretically licenced to take over control as Second in Command in the event not only of the captain becoming incapacitated medically but, according to airline SOP, to take over control from the captain in the event the captain is intent on pressing on with an unstable approach. (the mind boggles over the brawl in the cockpit as the captain is "pursuaded" to meekly relinquish control to a frightened second in command who is only trying to follow his company SOP's)
Either these trainee airline pilots are receiving less than adequate instruction and hands on practice in the flight simulator - or they are being pushed into revenue flying with a low standard of flying skill. Both examples are close to the truth in some airlines.
Judging from the initial reports on the Turkish Airlines crash, the glaring gap between automatic pilot push button monitoring skills and hands-on flying skills is getting ever wider. It seems inevitable in the future, that accidents involving poor flying skills coupled with blind use of automatics from take off to landing, will continue to increase.
Trainee first officers (or should they be called trainee captains in view of their grand appointment of Second in Command) - who are graduates of the Multi-Crew Pilots Licence - and whose flying experience in even a light single engine aircraft is less than minimal - are in the invidious position where they proudly display the three stripes of second in command, but in reality are quite out of their depth in terms of real flying experience, when the out-of-the ordinary event suddenly occurs (737 stalls at 2000 ft IMC and with closed thrust levers descends out of control).