Is it the right time to finish training?
 

Hey everyone, for the last 2 years I paused my flight training after getting my PPL license.

During that time I passed the atpl exams and did some hour building in between. Would it be the right time now to get the mep/cpl/ir ? Any advice is appreciated

@asmith474: No one knows when the time is right. At the moment I would wait as long as validity of ATPL(A) theory exams allow then do the FI(A) if you have a good connection to the school where you were training so you get hours as FI. Then you just wait with MCC/JOC or APS MCC for the beginning of the good times.

There's no right time ever, some times are just better than others overall.

so is now one of those better times?

Well obviously one of those better times will be in the moment when the traffic is back to the prepandemic one and all pilots are rehired again. Then there should be some spots from the ones who resigned and the ones who passed the 65 years mark meanwhile.

Today as we see there is still a lot of experienced pilots who are waiting to get back their job.

I would get an SE IR if you can, & build hours to CPL

asmith474 When did you finish the ATPL exams? Don't forget you have a three year deadline.

around one year ago

You still have a bit of time then. Though whatever you do, don't leave it until two years and six months post passing to start like someone I know. TBF to him, he was planning to do it summer 2020 and we all know what happened then, but still, rushing it through autumn 2021 with the clock counting down was far from ideal.

I think the real answer is that nobody knows. The industry in Europe looks like it might have a pretty good summer 2022, however, that is far from certain. To be honest, I would consider holding off and seeing how the summer season actually goes, but that might be the wrong decision with Ryanair and Wizz both hiring 200 hour FOs at the moment.

If you don't do it this yea, quite a few people on this forum have given advice like Alex Whittingham above about doing a single engine IR to keep your ATPL exams valid. I know little about it, but a few knowledgeable posters have suggested it so it may be something to look into.

It is better than it was a year ago...
Will a year from now be any better? No one can really tell.

And while it will require a leap of faith, do not leave it to the last.
Right now you still have time, but you don't want to be in a position where you end up scrambling to get things done before the ATPL theory expires.

So even if you have time, start looking for schools, decide what route you want to take, and be ready to jump on it with time to spare.
And also, to be fair, now it's not the worse time ever. So while these are not exceptional boom times, low-hour pilots are getting jobs.

It's better than most of 2020, but not as good as 2018/2019...

I'd just crack on with it if I were you. But don't bet everything on it.

I'm looking into this option myself and in case anyone is curious about then upgrading the SE IR to an ME IR, this was the CAA's response to just that question:

"To upgrade from a SE IR to a ME IR you will need to complete 5 hours of instruction and a skills test on a MEP aircraft. You will then be issued with a IR-SP-ME class/SE rating."

However, the difficulty in passing that skills test after just 5 hours of multi engine time, even with a lot of single engine instrument hours, is a question I don't know the answer to.

It will come down to how well you can fly :)
Be careful about the "minimum hours" trap, especially after a prolonged break. Better to budget for a little longer just in case.

Also, 5 hours is barely enough to become proficient, but as someone mentioned above sim assessments do not tend to focus on OEI procedures.
They do focus on flying an approach, often using raw data.

One advantage of flying IR in an ME aircraft is that by flying approaches in a heavier aircraft you will become better at energy management, which is a key skill for later.
This can also be successfully addressed during the APS MCC of course. But you won't have previous experience doing it, and doing it during IR ME allows for a lot more trial and error than a 737 sim.

Minimum hours trap? Believe in yourself. It's only putting some rudder in and knowing the drills. That's what chair flying is for. The advantages of actually having flown and passed an IR test profile outweigh the disadvantages of not being familiar with the aircraft.

Next time I have someone fail an ST I will make sure to write that it wasn't that they went below VMCA while OEI and forgot the landing gear, it was because they didn't believe enough in themselves...
Being aware of one's own limitations and planning for non-ideal scenarios are vital skills of any modern pilot.

That's hardly the point I was making!