What to do about an unsafe pilot. Politics
 

This is serious, and I will appreciate your help on this.

I fly a corporate jet. On a recent trip my company borrowed another company jet, and thier pilots to move our excess people, and I have six days to spend in TN with these guys. I fly single pilot, they fly crew.

At three dinners I learned the captain admitted to flying overgross, and had no problems with it. I have flight planning softeware, with his aircraft profile, and no matter what the power setting, altitude, ect, he had to do the trip either overgross, or come in on fumes. Landing at an airport right behind him, on the return trip the line guy admitted to topping off the this guys tanks, and he had all the seats filled. This is an aircraft that has a BOW of 10,500 and he was estimated to about 1500lbs over gross. I later found out he did both ways, and continues to do it all the time. For those that know, he flies a Beechjet 400, routinely fills the tanks, fills the seats.

Now...his boss loves him, he can't do no wrong. But another pilot in his department has issues with his behaviour, and guess what his boss calls me, his copilot calls me, and they see the problem with the whistle blower not the unsafe pilot. Why? Because the whistle blower pisses people off, just the way he is.

It's getting so bad over there, that these pilots are squabling, calling me to referee, and in the end, I think the safe pilot will be fired, the unsafe pilot will stay, because no on believes the ex-airline guy is that unsafe.

What else has the ex-airline guy done. Flew to Sitka, AK overgross, landed on fumes, 9 pax, and did it on two starter generators that were 170 hours past overhaul.

Took off with the parking brake locked, burned up 8000 feet of runway, and barely pulled it off the end.

I need some advice. Should my buddy call the FAA, his boss won't listen to reason. He really believes this guy will kill some people.

- SSG

This is a tough situation. At a minimum I would convince your company not to use them anymore, for the safety of your own employees.

The FAA unfortunately does little enforcement of corporate operators, and definately nothing if the information is anonymous.

Truly a difficult situation, one that I have personal experience with as well. Please contact me directly, I'd rather not discuss this in an open forum.

The Jetlag Kid

[email protected]

I too have a similar problem to ssg, only my problem has been with the company longer than all the rest of us.
He just will not fly to company procedures, dosn`t understand the modern cockpit, often makes huge mistakes, always runs late,etc, etc, but the boss loves him and thinks i am conducting a witch hunt against him.
Jet Lag Kid i will email you on the subject.
Does anybody else have a similar problem?.

Response to Jetlag
 

Within a week, very possibly a good chief pilot, flying a GIV will get canned over this. He started his flight dept. but the co. he works for acquired another co. and consequently thier flight dept. The guy in the acquired flight dept, is ex airline, and atypical of most airline pilots I know, he's very unsafe. Admits to taking off way over gross, flying with maintanance items months over due, and that's just what I know about. The pilot friend is at his wits end as his boss does not understand why pilots should not do these things.

After hours and hours of talking about this, the chief pilot documenting weight and balance issues putting it all down, it seems it comes down to this.

Should my friend rat this guy out to the FAA? Yes or no.

No one feels good about this, but would you lose a six figure income, a big jet job, your 57, on your last job etc. How Machiavellian would you get here. My informal survery says that non-pilots have no problem being a stooly, but pilots feel different.

Having pilots rat each other out is baaad. In this case the new pilot has the boss's ear, and the boss just see this as sour grapes, not a safety issue.

From what I am told, the FAA knows about this guy, infact they mentioned his last copilot quit because this guy would take off too heavy, land on fumes and basicaly scared the FO that he would either die or lose his license. They won't move unless a formal complaint is signed, and they will step in. No one wants to be the rat.

How do you guys want to weigh in on this.

-SSG

One way, and it may or may not work, is to document all the unsafe incidents and notify the aircraft insurance underwriter company. You’ll also need to make sure the CEO of the company understands that if something happens and the insurance company discovers that the aircraft was not being operated according to the flight manual and was in violation of FARs the insurance can and bloody will reject the claim. Even if in later court action the insurance is forced to pay the company will have extreme difficulty obtaining aircraft insurance again and then with a lot higher cost.

The bottom line of all CEOs is money.

Good luck.

Bad Pilots
 

I agree with the preceeding. A good point brought up, talk money. This will cost you money, that will cost you money, funny things like liability issues, planes hitting the sides of mountains may make some impact, but from my personal experience, bring up the cost, gee whiz and watch thier eyes light up. That's how I get thier attention.

So much for right and wrong, doing the right thing, and all that...

SSG, read my e-mail for additional thoughts.

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