When I read this mail first, I was happy to get something of value in this thread. But a friend suggested that I read it 4 times a day. This is a nice post and has its own merit, but I will comment on this to tell why some of us are so in awe of this post, and why this post is not an unbiased one.
Still it seems people are missing the point, well in my opinion......
The expats become so angry for their own reasons, alien to the locals. The expats have the hindsight of working at airlines where stringent standards were maintained, where bribery and corruption is not the norm, where an FO could speak up against a Capt and not be belittled or risk being fired.... They are not used to flying with FO's who are unable to hand fly and aircraft, plan a 3:1 decent profile, fly a raw data approach in Cat I min conditions and 20-25 kts x-wind. So, when they see and hear and experience first hand arrogant brats saying that they are just as qualified to do their job, they get angry.
The expats like this paragraph because it sings paens to thier background. The locals will hate this post because all have been painted with thick brush of arrogant-brat and without any debate author has declared that the LHS job is an expats right.
One doesn't need to be a literary genius to note the bias. On the other hand rdr's post is much less biased, but I promise I will come back to that in another post.
Many came from doing it "tough". Yes, that involved cleaning aircraft, sweeping the hangar, cleaning the cabin of their 4,6, 19, etc seater... (including the vomit), doing their own flight plans from scratch, weather, etc without the aid of the internet. It taught (us) so much from the ground up. We learnt through mistakes, by getting a call from ATC as to "where do you really want to go?" due an incorrect flight plan, etc. That was part of the "apprenticeship" I suppose. After 1000 hrs on a C210 you might get lucky and fly a light twin, then after 500 hrs PIC of that light twin and with perhaps 2500 hrs total you'll get a job on a turbo prop.
An overwhelming number of local brats surely didn't have it this "tough". I am maintaining the quotation marks because I have a gut feeling that neither I nor toptup feel that such a task is actually a tough task in the real sense of the word. But I am sure of one thing, the tough task was a paid task. And the pilot were paid at least half of the per hour flying pay for such ground tasks.
In India on the other hand in one tenth of the hourly pilot wages you can hire full time staff to do that cleaning and sweeping job for 9 hours a day.
So I guess in current economic conditions pilots in India will be bereaved of this dignity of labor which most expats experienced during their early career.
Student pilots at aviation academies in India don't even push back the C-150 into the parking slot. Before startup they have left wingman, right wingman and one fellow with fire extinguisher ready. Before parking they are marshalled back into parking space, the student and instructor exit the aircraft and the "other" workers push back the aircraft in the parking lot. These "other" workers are usually the would be aircraft maintenance 'professionals' on an unpaid apprenticeship.
Judging by these practices even early career in flight schools and/or charter companies is never going to be "tough" for the local pilot. Any one in with sensibility will understand that I am not bragging here, I am just presenting what surrounds the 'life style' of 'local' pilots.
The socio-economic conditions in India will guarantee that a working pilot will not get a tough initial career. This doesn't mean that there will be no good pilots in India.
Now, ask me would I like to do it all again if I were offered a 777 FO slot straight from flying school? HELL NO! I too would jump at it!
BUT! What I would EXPECT would be to be trained to the standard required. That DOES NOT happen from what I witnessed. In any decent and professional airline a pilot that crashes the sim, not once but twice, is suspended and given extra training. The training dept are called in to see how did they let this pilot down. If the pilot cannot be bought up to speed he/she is let go. For his/her safety AND that of the public. This is NOT the case at AI! I have the evidence to support that! In the same example the said pilot was given a check0ride to DXB 2 days later, his "batch mate" passed him and I was reprimanded and told to change my review.
The intent of my asking that question was to establish that safety is not achieved merely by relying on individuals to take decisions with safety as first priority. Pilots and other aviation professionals like every other individuals live in a world of material, and there are going to be times when the consideration of safety is going to take a back seat. It must be a goal of a safe airline or efficient regulator bring in policies which increases the likelihood that safety become first priority in as many decision making processes as possible.
While you may have the expectation of reasonable training by company before taking the RHS seat, several of your school mates may not have the same expectations. You do not represent all expats just like the arrogant brat doesn't represent all locals.
So, that is why the expats get angry when they hear brats like yours truly (above my post) believe it is their God-given right to pilot these aircraft and to hell with standards and expertise. They don't want to look elsewhere for a job flying. As one father told me with 2 children out of work with CPL's when I asked if his kids had sort employment as a instructor or anything else in GA such as freight or meat bombing (parachute ops), "They shouldn't have to fly a piston aircraft!!"
That father had spent around 100,000 USD on training his kids, he must be having another 100,000 USD ready to pay in bribes for paying to the HR/Trg Head/Ops Manager, it doesn't make any economic sense for him to expect his sons flying for piston engine operators in Africa.
Lets get a practical perspective on this. Lets think of two 250 hrs wonders Cpt. A and Cpt. B.
A and B both got their training from USA, both came back to India and got their licenses converted. At the end of the training both of them still had 40k USD each in their savings accounts.
Captain A choses to get a GA job in Africa, flying piston engine twins on survival wages. B on the other hand chose to stay in India, and after six months he got hold of agents to get him a job with say Indigo as f/o on A320 by emptying his bank account.
B was happily flying the twins in scenic Africa after two years his contract was over, he logged 1500 hours flying time and got himself an ATPL. So he is back home with 1500 hrs and an ATPL.
Then A & B compare their bank balances, A had around 45k, while B had around 30k.
Unfortunately industry is down and none is hiring. Its difficult to find agents who can get B a job in any airline as an F/O even for a 60k bribe.
Even if B can get a job in Indigo, he will be much down the seniority, despite his ATPL and excellent general aviation experience.
Who took a better career decision?
Having said that if the 250 hr wonders were not subjected to employment barrier in USA/Canada/Australia, they will still be choosing to go for the general aviation job, because not all of them at the end of the CPL training are left with 40k USD in thier bank accounts.
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Now, the locals are angry as they believe the expats are occupying the seats they should be in. In some ways, they are right. But they are not equipped by way of skill, maturity (as this forum can testify to!), experience or knowledge to do that job.
Those talents MUST be taught to them since for whatever reason they are unable /
incapable of getting that experience as (we) once had to. So they see an expat bad mouth a local "250 hr wonder" and react angrilly. A natural instinct. The expats are just as guilty at not seeing the cause of this FO's inabilities as they are themselves. The SYSTEM that is supposed to teach, nurture and train them into competent heavy jet transport pilots has failed them! And they know no better. Again, the expats have the privilege of hindsight from other walks of life in other airlines in other countries. They do not. That's a fact and can't be argued with.
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I just hope the choice of word 'incapable' was an accident. Because if it were not an accident the bias is obvious.
So as per my previous post: go and start lobbying that despicably corrupt DGCA for the training and rights you are supposed to receive! Or, have none of you worked it out yet? How many pockets are being lined by the recruitment agencies? How many DGCA officials, AI officials, etc are on the take? (I heard of a certain AI head of training who just purchased 6, I think, apartments for $250k each. His wife happens to be head of ops and recruitment. The other snake in cohorts in charge of expats also seems to be doing exceptionally well for himself!)
As soon as you can see the barriers as they are AND are able to do something about it then not too much will change.
It will only be the really foolish or the really innocent ones who can't see these barriers. You were once inside the system, being a TRE how much dent could you make into these barriers, and how much do you expect the 250 hrs wonder to make while he is still outside the whorehouse, and desperate to get in. I and many others successfully bypassed the despicably corrupt DGCA and training industry in India and got ourselves good initial training. There are thousand shortcomings in Indian aviation, which one if any should we tackle first should be our prerogative, and we thought tackling the falsehood of promised-expat-phase-out will be best for 'us' (the unemployed 250 hr wonder). Then why do you direct us to expend our energies in lobbying DGCA to remove other 1000 barriers. If there is corruption in expat hiring shouldn't the expats be lobbying for it. If Air-India has poor and corrupt training practices, shouldn't the existing AI pilots be lobbying for better standards.
So, when / if you do get your "birth right" job and are meant to be in the sim for an 8 am start (7 am briefing) but the instructor decides to arrive at 8.45 am, has a coffee and talks crap.....when you ask what profile you are doing and he says "I don't know. What do you want to do?" and when you see your DGCA stamped instrument renewal already completed before you walk in yet do almost none of what has been pre-ticked off, will you question the standard of training you are receiving?
HELL NO! You'll be happy with your "
[email protected]" email address and the fact that you never had to wash an aircraft.
Would I have been the same? Don't know.
I hope not. I was lucky to have been trained in an uncompromising system where fail meant fail, where opening my wallet to turn a fail into a pass would have meant never flying again. After all, that TRE was really only protecting my own life and that of the public.
Hello no! I will not question the standards. The guy who can pass you without doing anything, can also fail you when you do everything. What the TRE did was a display of power. He just said "you can't touch me, take your IR/LR and go fly." I will do what you did, you complied. You did it by resigning and I may not have an option to resign immediately, but yes after a few years in AI I can quit too, can't I.
In the quoted paragraph your bias is shown by your assumption that
You'll be happy with your "
[email protected]" email address and the fact that you never had to wash an aircraft.
You were or may be even now are a TRE, 'lack of prejudice' is a professional requirement from you, it is at topmost level (5th) on Maslow's Hierarchy along with morality. I and other 250 hr wonders are struggling at the second level for employment, we may have to forgo morality to push our selves to higher levels and hopefully will keep some seed of morality to build it up again at 5th level.
That I can fly the 777 raw data within +-50 feet is not going to get me job, what is going to get me job is the corrupt AI Training Head, may be he needs money to furnish the new apartments, may be he can make good use of the 40k USD I have in my savings account.
