angelorange, you are spot on with your comments. And in the end, this IS about money, (making a profit), not qualifications and creating the best pilots. That is the way our aviation system has evolved since the '70's, under de-regulation. One way or another, it must be re-discovered with every new generation's entry into aviation - it can't be done cheaply. There is always a price to pay - what the last thirty years has been about is shifting, "who pays", not "if".
Meeting the bare minimum for such a licence is not the measure of "success". While teaching a cadet how to manipulate the controls of a modern airliner is relatively easy as the tragic lesson of 9/11 demonstrated, the job of "airline pilot" is not primarily about flying the airplane, it is about decision-making such that the employer runs a safe operation while making money.
I said, as many observers were saying years ago, that if the industry, meaning the accountants and CEOs, continue to desecrate this profession and this career as they have over the last twenty years, smart, capable young people who would make fine airline pilots will choose another profession.
Those chickens are coming home to roost right now. The "best and the brightest", in Captain Sullenberger's words, are no longer coming to the profession. Earnestness and keeness do not always equate to capability. The cadet program such as it is, is the industry's solution to this shortage.
While a 250hr brand-new pilot is capable of handling a big jet, usually those with such low time and no commercial experience in real life aviation sat in the Second Officer's or today the Relief Pilots' seat for a few years and essentially observed how it was done. Seasoned professionals who know this system will already know that the safety factor was higher because of the third set of eyes, because the "newbie" was familiar with company procedures, was trained in practical, real, under-pressure CRM decision-making and so on. This inevitably made a do-able, realistic transition from the back to the front seat for a low-time pilot and it worked - seen it.
Today, airline managements have been sold the bill of goods that today's airliners are so automated they, "fly themselves". I suspect such leaders, including MBA's who know more about cost-cutting than aviation, hopefully are even now learning that this is not so and that they now have a problem on their hands because the airline-pilot pipeline is no longer full of eager candidates. Certainly, training and experience have come under the microscope, and deservedly so, and the "newbies" and the MCPL "solution" are not the place to focus our gaze...
I don't know what the FAA or Transport Canada oversight is regarding schools which hand out MCPLs, (I suspect it is minimal but who knows) but aviation has always struggled making a decent return and is constantly a prime target for a cost-cutting accountant mentality.
This all seems black-and-white thinking and of course it is, but this is a forum, and isn't a place where extended dialogues can take place without putting most to sleep. These notions are now front-and-center in most serious industry discussions which now include the FAA, (though not Transport Canada...yet), having been highlighted by the very incidents and accidents that many feared would occur when lack of experience and low qualifications began entering the field.
When we have at least five if not six fatal aircraft stall accidents in the last few years* by professional airline crews there is something amiss and it is not just with individual pilots as the Colgan case highlights. Each of these cases has differing circumstances and it can always be argued that the stall resulted from other factors - that is exactly what a stall is however, but the aircraft itself doesn't know that. These aircraft stalled and pilots aren't supposed to allow that to occur - all the rest are details.
Higher pay, better working conditions, suitable fatigue-risk management, a decent prospect for retirement and a focus on the principles of aviation do not in and of themselves guarantee a safer aviation industry but it is a proven fact that these conditions contribute significantly, all other factors being equal.
The industry has "solved" the traditional causes of aircraft accidents such as weather, navigation, mid-air collision, CFIT, mechanical failure, engine reliability; automation has contributed measurably to such safety levels but is at the same time, our nemesis. Today accidents are about people and organizations and the management thereof.
So far this can be viewed as a blip, not a trend. Let us hope that recognition of this leads to appropriate solutions.
PJ2
*Recent accidents which resulted from stalling the aircraft:
-One-Two-Go MD82 @ Phuket, (stalled due go-around thrust not applied);
-Spanair MD83 @ Madrid, (stalled on takeoff due zero-slats/flaps t/o);
-Turkish B737 @ AMS, (stalled on approach);
-Fedex ATR42 @ Lubbock, (stalled on approach - non-fatal);
-Colgan Q400 @ Buffalo, (stalled in icing);
-AF A330 over the Atlantic, (impacted fully-stalled, we don't know why yet)
Last edited by PJ2; 5th Jan 2010 at 19:00.