Ex Pat and GG,

The insurers are the effective controlling body. Their actuarial statisticians and analysts will give an enthusiastic thumbs up to a Lufthansa and an effective no, through pricing, to another flag carrier. They will even go to the extent of accepting cadets but only with the quid pro quo of insisting a set minimum proportion of ex pat left seaters (and even sim trainers for some companies) which covers the situation OXP mentioned.

In some cases this is masked from us by the intermediary effects of leasing. You get your new airframes but pilots from the builder arrive with the airframe and stay for many months. In other cases I know of ETOPs flights have only been initiated with senior pilots from another company with proven, long term experience in the jumpseat for an initial period.

Given the changes apparent to many of you I'm suprised by absence of comment on the bootstrap effect this will have over time regarding terms and conditions in GA. I can only assume the 'conditioning' and paucity of expectation is very deep rooted. One way or another operators are facing extra costs whether increased premiums and training or keeping the best. They will, however, try to dump those costs on you for as long as they can get away with it.

Rob

And we have the equally crazy situation where FOs who have more than 5 years of High-Cap time cannot ever be issued with a command in that aircraft/company because they don't have the required command time. Even more ludicrous is that if they went down to their aeroclub and did the required command time in a two-pot bug smasher in the circuit, they could get their High-Cap command immediately.

Another reason why the MPL (in Oz anyway) is a joke.

Haven't a few "ICUS experienced" FO's killed themselves doing exactly that?

Currently, in Oz, a bare bones commercial would cost north of 60K ish.
Assuming that the MPLs will need more than the Kmart endorsement on a jet ( 8-9 sim sessions for 35k ), you would think this MPL will have to be a fair way north of 100k maybe as much as 150k knowing Alteon.

Who the hell is going to be able to afford this or want to pay for this when a ( roughly ) 50-60k a year job is waiting at the end :confused:

I really don't see how this MPL is going to help anyone, ( inc the airlines ) apart from a few rich brats getting a bee-line to the right seat of a jet.

As mentioned previously, pilots will not hang around or go to an outfit in the first place, unless they start getting looked after.
The highest bidder will end up with the safest, most EFFICIENT airline, for all of the reasons allready mentioned.

Simulators?
 

Are there enough suitable simulators in Australia (or nearby) to train lots of mpl's from scratch?
How much will it cost, and who pays?

About a year ago, I spoke to a man who had "purchased" 300 hours of Boeing time with an asian airline. He actually had 350 hours of Boeing time in his logbook, and was looking for a job flying pistons in Australia. He said they were all looking for at least 500 hours heavy time for an airline job.

Just like GA.

desmotronic,

Could you provide examples please. I'm talking about FOs who have 5 years plus experience in the right hand seat of a Hi Cap aeroplane. Who of those have killed themselves?

yeh, good point direct :eek:

Thanks for that Rob.

I accept that but, even with those insurance provisions, why couldn't it potentially set up the situation where a long-haul ETOPS flight effectively becomes a single-pilot op?

Capn Bloggs,
You are right i think they didn't make five years.

"Airline Pilots out of a Box!" - Just add Bullsh!t
 

It's rather alarming and more than sobering to realise that insurers, statisticians and actuaries have more commonsense than Air Regulatory Authorities and Airline Flight Operations Departments.

Is it any wonder that accountants run airlines? We professional pilots seem to have given up any moral right to ensure safe flight operations, and we should be rightly and eternally damned for relinquishing this public safety role to mere bean counters.

We should hang our heads in shame.

Are you implying that Alteon and Boeing Seattle who provide type ratings on jets with a training syllabus of 8-9 simulator sessions are nothing more than Kmart endorsement providers? Thinks- must alert CASA to this..

Yes I agree Flexible but welcome to the world of not only Aviation, but Hospitals, Universities, Police Departments, Fire Departments, Ambulance Departments etc in all of Australia. Welcome to the Liberals world. It's a 20's something accountants world and they are dictating the rules of all of us!

Take heart that regardless of the fake licence known as MPL, all of us here reading this will have a bright future! Because it means a shortage of pilots! But we should continue to fight and campaign against the fake license known as MPL.
:E

Flexible response is spot on, take the legal profession for example, just because you paid for expensive bit of paper from a private university doesnt allow you to practice. You still need to pass the bar exam which is administered by the profession itself.