Flight Time Qualifications before employment

[Bueno Hombre]

Fake Pilots have claimed Command time in their application to Cathay when in fact it was only first officer time. CX, for example, need to either die or sharpen up on their recruitment investigations

[anxiao]

And this refers to which century? Tell us something new, even Pontius had stylus hours...

In the last century when HR took over all pilot recruitment CX recruited some amazingly qualified pilots. Luckily there were still a few FLT OPS managers left who had the cohones to stand up to DHR and point out that their logbooks were fiction. A couple of new recruits with appalling Parker 51 hours did get as far as base training before being discovered, and fired.

It happens in the best airlines, but it is much rarer in 2021 than the press would have you believe. It is a small world in aviation, and as long as you leave the final recruitment decision with FLT OPS they can always pick up the phone to old friends in airlines and training schools around the world and ask unofficially to verify details. Not legal to do that in many countries I know, but as long as you know the rule you are breaking the risk to ensure the quality of your recruits is often seen as worthwhile.

[Landflap]

anxiao : Agreed. Tough call at the selection stage but the Parker-51 brigade , mostly, fall on their own swords during training. Inevitably, a minority scrape through all the hoops.

[Flex88]

And dear "Bueno Hombre", please advise what difference your assertions make re "need to die" when MOST of the recruits in the past 10 years have been ZERO TIME at application entry cadets many with near ZERO solo time ?

Feeling safer now ?

[doublelift]

It is all about integrity. For those zero hour cadets, at least they have all the training record well kept, both good or bad record. They are not trying to fake their hours. For the guys trying to fake their hours, god know they have faked their license record, check record, ground school exam etc. I personally would put my family on cadet entry captain plane then a liar's plane

[Curry Lamb]

I personally would put my family on cadet entry captain plane then a liar's plane

GOOD LUCK :rolleyes:

[ACMS]

Mmmmmmmmm the famous Parker 51 time.......they get found out sooner or later.......India or Pakistan anyone?

[Flex88]

Start now !!!

https://fci.aero/?utm_source=Q1+Newsletter+2021&utm_campaign=c12b583cf6-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2021_04_08_12_10&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_546528ba02-c12b583cf6-436742474

[controlledrest]

A few years back CX interviewed about 30 pilots out of India. FOP had serious doubts about many of the logbooks. In the end offered employment to one pilot. He turned CX down as the conditions weren't good enough. POS18.

[anxiao]

I've quoted this before but controlled rest refers above to a time when I wrote a letter to the DFO after he started the worldwide search for pilots from developing nations. I included the phrase, "...you do not go to Nigeria for your banking nor Bangladesh for your dentistry..."

:hmm:

[Sleepsleep]

Can someone explain what is up with all the hate towards pilots who entered the aviation industry via a cadetship? I have been lurking in this forum for a few months and is still baffled about the hate and stigma.

I feel the need to ask this question considering there was just some hate a handful of posts back, by Curry Lamb and Flex88. Sorry if I annoyed you :(

[LongTimeInCX]

There is no hate.
From those who joined with merely the hours and the experience they gained from the cadet course, they were welcomed into the fold, and were accepted as part of the future.
Most of the cadets were line that, they wanted to learn.
There were some, who believed the hype that they were gods gift to aviation, that were part of the greater localization policy, and genuinely thought they were significantly better than they were, despite no real world flying experience, they were a pain in the ass to fly with.
That minority garnered a reputation that unfortunately tarnished many of the good ones.
Most were good, and very pleasant to fly with.
And those who made it through the (unnecessarily hard) command course, I would happily put my family on an aircraft under their command.

[LLLQNH]

Sleepsleep

Whilst I would say hate is perhaps the wrong word, perhaps if there is any animosity it would be out of jealousy. The vast majority of us had to work our behinds off to get into CX or KA suffering great financial, personal & professional sacrifices to get there. Still many pre-qualified and experienced pilots tried and never even got an interview!

Yet cadets just walk into the job without paying any dues or gaining experience before being given the keys to a modern aircraft and quite often complain about things such as a 4 year upgrade from SO to JFO or how hard they have it taking the bad rest, or that they shouldn't be on the 747 and deserve the A350 with the fancy layovers! Comments like that or attitudes like that from fresh-upstarts certainly won't get you very far with those who have paid their dues in this industry!

[Flex88]

Sleepsleep

It's really simple, it's about dumbing down an industry/occupation to get cheaper more obedient workers.. The POS on the 9th floor with the spreadsheet fighting for a bigger year end bonus says so...

[Curry Lamb]

And not only at the CXi circus:

Redundancy Controversy Leads To Wizz Air Operations Head Resignation
https://simpleflying.com/wizz-air-flight-ops-head-steps-down/

[Sleepsleep]

I get it now, it is generally disgruntle over how random secondary school leavers or university graduates are being given everything because they passed some interviews while everyone else (non-cadets) worked their a$$es off for it and the arrogant attitude of (some of) the cadets adds (lots of) insult to injury...

To those who don't like cadets because of their arrogant attitude, you are not alone. I read some blogs from a local CX captain about a certain SO with a vERY gOOD attitude and he is complaining about that in some of his (pre-Covid) blogs and the comments were like "oooh this is why the FAA rejects P2X time I know now".

Thanks for letting me have a better picture of the industry that I otherwise won't know about from google searches.

[controlledrest]

Sleepsleep

It isn't hate, it is fear.

When I was a F/O I twice had to intervene to prevent a cadet-Capt from killing me and all on board. Now as a Capt, it isn't unusual to have to take over on landing from a JFO.

Most of the cadets are good guys with the right attitude, but they just don't know much and time as a S/O or Relief Commander only goes so far. In the past only experienced pilots were recruited by CX. Then for racist political reasons we started to take cadets. Now due to fundamental flaws in the way managers are rewarded for cost cutting we don't even try to hire experienced pilots. So those of us who have been around for a while, have worked for other operators and who have been involved in training and / or testing fear CX will crash an aeroplane. I believe it is only a matter of time.

[Curry Lamb]

It isn't hate, it is fear.
I believe it is only a matter of time.

Let’s hope and pray old doublift‘s family is not onboard when the inevitable happens :eek:

[veritas777]

When I was a F/O I twice had to intervene to prevent a cadet-Capt from killing me and all on board. Now as a Capt, it isn't unusual to have to take over on landing from a JFO.

A whole two anecdotes... pack it up folks, conclusive evidence that only white people can fly aeroplanes

Then for racist political reasons we started to take cadets.

Racist reasons such as wanting a country wanting it's citizens to be employed before temporary visas? You're right, how dare they...

[Sleepsleep]

controlledrest

While I completely agree that there is only so much you can do with a few hundred hours of training, thinking Hong Kong people who live in a place with no general aviation industry don't deserve to become pilots is pure racism. Considering how saturated the GA industries of countries with well-developed flight training systems such as Australia is, a cadetship is the best bet HK people have to fly. Governments have the right to protect local people's employment rights, so why is taking in local cadets racist and politically motivated?

[main_dog]

Nothing wrong with taking cadets, in fact assuming you have a valid training system, you get a chance to form them from the beginning. Plenty of successful and safe airlines such as KLM/BA/AZ etc have always done so.

Throw them in with a good mix of ex-GA (who have survived the bush, or PNG, or students trying to kill them) and ex-Military (who literally had to survive people trying to kill them) and the resulting stew is quite solid, with everyone ideally benefitting from the variety of everybody else’s background. Who gives a toss about where they’re from, I’ve seen excellent (and marginal) pilots from everywhere, it’s a matter of aptitude and attitude.

Even better, ensure their career follows a logical path: start off as longhaul S/O, followed by cutting their teeth on a 320 shorthaul into China and SE Asia. Then, after a suitable period of multiple sectors a day in all sorts of weather and plenty of hands-on exposure, back to longhaul as an F/O.

This would all be perfectly possible and ideal from a safety/quality perspective, unfortunately in the modern corporate environment cost-saving tends to trump everything.

[Whiteteanosugar]

Hong Kong was a place like no other for expats, especially in the 80s and early 90s. After the handover, a lot of the colonial mindset was still in place, within individuals and within corporations. I believe that a lot of the sentiments felt by some of the expats then are stemmed from that mindset.

Some may have had one or two bad experiences with local captains and use that as their forever mouthpiece, without looking at any statistical evidence. If one look at “significant events” in the last 20 years, almost all of them involved expat captains. With regards to demotion (either from captain to FO or taken off training), I can think of one local guy and 8 expats in the last 10 years. Which statistically is the proportion of local vs expats captain.

Everyone has good days and bad days at the office, it is about working as a team to manage any events. When there is a typhoon the company doesn’t roster only expats for the flights (though some individuals both locals and expats are known to call sick for those). Let’s just get on with the job and stop the divide and hate. Let’s be nice to each other and be less :mad:

[anxiao]

main-dog, correcto mundo. That is exactly how it should be.

I always learned something useful about aviation from pilots who came into the airline world in the many different ways, different from my route.

The diversity of CX was superb as a learning environment, with a beer in hand at the end of the day listening to PNG, RAAF, RAF, Arctic Circle twins, GA hanger sweeper, LCC or Adelaide, all had their stories that contributed to the saying that you learn from other peoples mistakes, as you won't live long enough to learn from your own.