CX Hiring First Officers? When?
 

CX is currently hiring Second Officers, but is there any word on when CX will be hiring FOs again?

Does anyone have any advice for a high time regional FO thinking about a move to CX?

Thanks.

If you're in ATL, as your handle indicates, you'd be able to get a job with a US carrier. Stay away from CX! Management has not been kind recently to former regional jet pilots (some have been fired for poor performance, most likely their own fault) and our contract continues to be eroded year after year. 20 years from now you'll look back and thank those of us here on pprune who said to stay away. CX is going downhill fast...

Just my two cents (since that's all I have left to contribute after our measly what-they-call-a-pay-raise and inflation!)

as you can see you touched a nerve :hmm:

there is currently only one way to join Cathay, and that is via a Cadet SFO scheme. In your case a transition course of a few weeks in Australia and, more importantly, no expat benefits worth mentioning for the rest of your career.

SFO scheme? I think he's looking for an ATL scheme!

The SFO scheme sounds right up my alley! :p

If you want an ATL base as FO - plan on it taking at least 8 years - 5 of which will be as a Second Officer in Hong Kong. You will not get a DEFO slot in CX as others have mentioned.

I'm surprised you are still considering CX. The company seems to not want based pilots. Although a majority of the pilots are based it has become a thorn in the companies side. But wait, the company doesn't want Hong Kong based pilots either.What a conundrum. If you want a career you need to be smart with your decisions. I wasn't and now I'm looking for for new employment.

Just don't bother. If you have experience they're not prepared to pay for a reasonable cost of living to attract it. Even IF they were to offer DEFO on bases you would be looking at 17+years to a chance at a HKG command on diminished first 3 years command pay and crap housing assistance in VERY expensive city.
If you don't have experience, the package on offer will be so miserable you'll walk away pissed off with a 'wonderful' P2X rating and 5-7 years purgatory. It's NOT what it used to be and they still think they can trade on history.
Don't waste your time. :ugh:

DEFO
 

hopefully NEVER again!!!!

I thought they were conducting DEFO interviews in the UK now for 100-200 ex-RAF pilots that were made redundant......

And offering them the TT (super short course) cadet position to be S/Os.

What an opportunity to be out of work and then offered a job by CX at short notice. :}

At least they'll be able to spend their RAF millions on Hong Kong rent.........

The 170 odd RAF guys were all in training. Those that join Cathay will do it as SOs like everyone else.

But wait, they are RAF pilots. Shouldn't they go DEC instead? :}

I'm sure that they are being measured up for their long-sleeved shirts as I type!

SO are now being upgraded onto the 747, so i doubt there will be much space left in the training schedule to introduce DEFO anytime soon.

You're quite correct. You're coming around to my way of thinking ;)

There's always an upside to hiring ex military pilots that know nothing of commercial operations......at least the bunks will nice and neat!

I don't think it would take too long for an ex-RAF Tristar Captain to get to grips with commercial operations.

Every pilot, military or otherwise, knows how to get from City A to City B. It's not exactly rocket surgery.

(Edit: Rocket surgery is really, really hard stuff: Rocket science + brain surgery = rocket surgery.)

What is rocket surgery?

And at CX, they truly believe that every flight is a lunar mission.

See....that's why guys find it so tough getting through training at CX....we need to be hiring more highly qualified rocket surgeons!! ;)

HAHA...... We've got a few who still haven't.!!!

Ah, that green eyed monster again.

Flown with equally bad examples from all backgrounds and countries over the years.

Here we go again......turning on each other. It's no wonder management think we're a joke.

And at CX, they truly believe that every flight is a lunar mission......................

Ah ah ah indeed. HKG-TPE, CAVOK, no winds feels like you are briefing for a bombing mission......

And, after that "bombing mission" briefing the next thing asked is, "Flight plan fuel?" What a farce!

So it sounds like there are some CX pilots from all different backgrounds who can be a bit tedious to fly with?

Wow shock horror, welcome to being in an airline. HTFU you pussies!!!!

So presumably, the way around that particular farce would be for the captain to decide on the fuel and then to say, "Oh, by the way, my sector".

I think it's eminently sensible to discuss the flight in reasonable detail and include all the crew in the decision making process - after all, none of us are as infallible as we might like to think we are.

STP

PS. What's any of this got to do with hiring First Officers?

Of course it's sensible to include all the crew in the decision-making process. However, when some pilots treat these "bus routes" as lunar missions it's ... (fill in your own thoughts here)

No, this has nothing to do with CX hiring First Officers...

(my italics)

I agree to some extent but the inference in positionalpor's post is that everyone at CX treats every flight as though it were a "lunar mission". Personally, I have never found that to be the case but when there has been cause for detailed discussion it has taken place in a professional, inclusive manner. To make a generalisation such as the original is disingenuous. Given a choice of the current way of doing things or a "Yeah, whatever" approach to operating, I know which one I'd prefer - and it has nothing to do with CX.

STP

Any sense of humor STP?


Do you identify yourselves with any of the blokes in the video?

Sense of humour..
 

positionalpor, I'd like to think I've got a sense of humour but any intended irony or humour in your first post escaped me I'm afraid. The video, on the other hand, is quite amusing but I fail to see its relevance with the "lunar mission" analogy.

STP

The standard (and not SOP) pre-flight briefing these days seems to be

"Well, the weather's fine and there are no NOTAMs to affect us... Flight Plan Fuel?"

How about mentioning....

1. The callsign?
2. The destination alternate?
3. The minimum fuel to divert there?
4. Does the contingency and Rec extra cover all the step below flt lvls?
5. Any Crit Points on the route?

And then the weather and NOTAMs.

The list could go on, but I post these, since I feel they should be briefed as a minimum requirement. It takes 15 seconds longer, but looks and sounds far more professional.

Max -

1. Brief the callsign -are you serious?

2/3. The destination alternate is only chosen if it meets certain criteria, the appropriate fuel is already given to you. If you are happy with the wx, what is there to discuss?

4. Would you really load extra gas to cover step below for the entire route?

5. Crit points are chosen based on wx criteria and the appropriate fuel (again) is given to you. Again, what is there to discuss?

You are standing with fellow professionals who have assessed the whole package and decided that it meets the company (and their own) requirements. So when they say "wx and notams ok" it means they are happy with the "mission" as presented to them. If it wasn't they would say something. Don't mistake economy of words for indifference.

We only get 10 min of briefing time - lets not waste it with verbosity for its own sake. I thought we were trying to get away from that.

Hey Max,

Why not read off 84 other little bits of random information from the papers in front of everyone?

:ugh:

So when are DEFO's coming?
 

Regardless of the thread drift, when are we going to hire DEFOs who know what they're doing instead of these SOs who clearly don't know how to read the dispatch package?

I assume the naysayers are referring to SOs - or is that akin to assuming that the ERA weather is current?

STP

Max Reheat,

It is a shame that someone having flown aircraft with afterburners would lower himself to comments such as yours. You may love the sound of your own voice and word selection, but I can assure you that the rest of us could do without. If you come to the brief with that crap, you can be sure that most of us will have written you off before even getting to the plane.

How's that for CRM? I bet you have some thoughts on that as well...

CXorcist

I think Max Reheat's right. Briefing the callsign is important. The arrival and departure briefing I get from most of the boys and girls is longer than the original CX briefing it replaced! This is due to various junior managers marking their territory by introducing extra items (it started as 'CTWO' then became 'CTWO plus' then 'CTWO plus threats plus mitigation plus landing distance on a runway you've been landing on for decades'). It really is getting beyond a joke.

Often threats are made up on a nice day (since when has 'inbound traffic' been a 'threat'?). We are airline pilots aren't we?

By the end of these briefings I can't remember my own name let alone the callsign.

I can't wait to brief my callsign today!

This should be good!