Hiring SOs or FOs
Airplaneride,
Your post brings up the question, if it is smart to continue to hire SOs at all. Your post indicate that we should go back to straight seniority and hire only SOs.
Why not completely do away with SOs and have FOs as cruise pilot only?
I am not advocating neither but how do you think training would be at Cathay in times of expansion if every pilot had to be an SO before upgrading to FO. While I agree on your statement regarding a seniority based airline, I think the training department would crumble under the pressure of running everybody through SO training, FO upgrade etc. I think DEFO will still be around for a very long time. CX does not strike me as the company that will train 1 entry pilot and 1 conversion of a CX pilot if they could just train the new guy.
My 2 cents.
cider30