How many Captains in the company now? I guess 1200? for 150 aircraft and 1200-1300 First officers?
250 aircraft in 10 years would mean 2000 Captains
Average Captains from now until 2021 =1600
Retirements/resign/fired = 5% per annum = 80 captains need upgrading
10% fail or are not ready for Upgrade = 160 bypassed
10 new aircraft delivered each year = 80 extra captains each year.
Total of the above=320 Captains trained/bypassed/processed each year
If there are 1200 First Officers in the company now divided by 320 = 3 years 9 months until Captain upgrade?
Do these figure sound right? No one seems to include retirements and failed upgradeswhen trying to guess how long a pilot will stay an First officer, and in fact I believe the failure rate is probably higher than 10% anyways, which could make upgrade times faster.
So those who say 10 years to a command are way off the mark. My math aint so good but logically 4-5 years still seems right