Six months on from Sept 11th
At the time I advised delaying major training investment for 6 months. After that period a much more sensible assessment of the state of the market could be made. Those 6 months have now passed.. .. .Since Sept11 about 400 IR's have been issued by CAFUU. Assuming none of these have found work, and that there were 200 unemployed pilots already out there with low hours prior, at the moment the queue is about 600 long.. .. .I think most of the experienced pilots who lost their positions at Gill, Virgin, Air2000, British Midland et al have now been soaked up into new companies or their old ones. Not all though and some are on temporary contract for the summer only.... .. .The large and small professional FTO's seem pretty full. There certainly was not a wholesale loss of business following Sept11. There is something like 230 pilots under training due to get their CPL/IR Frzn ATPL in the next six months.. .. .I am for the time being ignoring pilots from abroad able and willing to come to the UK for work.. .. .Most airline hiring is now either announced, complete or under way for the summer 2002. There has frankly been only a tiny amount and I doubt that more than a dozen low time guys got anything. Which means that when the Autumn hiring season comes around for low time guys there is going to be something like 820 in the queue.. .. .In the very good years when things were really booming there were perhaps 400 airliny jobs available each year. There is therefore something approaching a good 2 years backlog that will probably take 4 years to clear completely and return us to a 'good' hiring market.. .. .I would guess that BA will start sponsorship again within 12 months and that the smaller players will follow cautiously the year after.. .. .The actual industry will recover quite strongly. Many airlines over reacted to Sept11 and cut capacity a little too far. Finding staff travel or standby tickets on a great many flights is nigh on impossible... The UK economy has weathered the threat of even a mild recession very well. The rise of low cost airlines is growing the market for air travel at a rate that has not been witnessed since the birth of the inclusive tour jet package holiday to the Med in the 1970's.. .. .War in Iraq could spoil the whole party in a big way but speculation about that is too wide a topic to tackle here and by me.. .. .On the GA front things are pretty miserable. Flying Instructor jobs just have not happened this year. The mags should be full of ads for summer instructors but they aren't. For every slot I have heard of by word of mouth there have been a dozen over qualified applicants within 24hrs. Too many PPL's are going to the USA still, too many are taking the fully integrated courses rather than modular and not many people want to learn to fly as an idle curiosity post Sept11. In addition there has been a marked spike in the number of FI ratings issued as many low time graduates faced with no airline job tried to dive into instructing.. .. .This has resulted in a drop in the terms and conditions for many instructors at the bottom of the food chain. You will not make back the cost of your FI rating this summer and possibly not the next.. .. .If I were considering a CPL or an IR right now I would advise myself (!) not to bother.. .. .The PPL and some hour building in the US might be fine. Starting a distance learning package for the ATPL exams might also be a reasonable move.. .. .I would stay/find as well paid a job outside of aviation as possible and build up my training fund for that IRT fail. I would bide my time. There is no sense rushing to join the back of a massive queue when the annual fee for being in that queue is something like £2000. . .. .Another 6 months will tell a lot.. .. .What are peoples thought?. .. .WWW