Who says there is no shortage of Helicopter Pilots?
 

One US based recruiting web site has four pages of job listings....99 separate entries that lists about 125 jobs for pilots in the United States and for International locations.

Someone convince me there is not a shortage of pilots.

Why do most Operators cling to the "Old Way" of recruiting while being confronted with such evidence the market now favors the Pilot and not the Operator.

Is it time for Operators to think outside the same old box in finding and retaining pilots?

I say so.
 

shortage of experienced pilots, quite possibly.
shortage of pilots, NO.

There are 6 guys that were on my course that dont have jobs in the industry at all but they are still commercial pilots. That was a few years ago now too. I think you will find most "pilots" are in a smilar situation.

Pilot shortage? Never happen.
 

I wouldn't make any judgments about a "pilot shortage" situation based on anything related to job posting websites or recruiting services.
This would be like asking an insurance agent whether you had enough coverage.
Call it the "Kit Darby" effect.
The fact is, there are a few more open positions today than in previous years. However, I wouldn't characterize that as a pilot shortage, rather I'd call it a "job surplus."
Several forces will soon act on the industry to correct this situation...among them fuel prices and/or availability, government regulation, and the inevitable results of competition in oversaturated markets. When this occurs it will be back to business as usual, i.e., ten qualified applicants for each position, instead of the mere two or three that we have now.
Pilot shortage? Not now, and under no imaginable circumstances. Sorry to rain on anyone's parade or ruin someone's fantasy or dream, but these are the facts and realities of the situation.

There are more than enough pilots in Canada, but too many of them have 100 hours.....

The shortage is in mid-range experience.

Phil

there are under a thousand helicopters in australia, most new helicopter purchases are for private owners.

there are under a thousand commercial pilots with current medicals, (casa website). this has been the case for a few years now

there are over 9000 people that hold australian commercial helicopter pilots licences. this number gets bigger every year.

in the words of professor julius sumner miller, "why is it so". :confused: :confused:

In utility work there always has been and always will be a shortage of EXPERIENCED pilots

i think there is a shortage of experience pilots because heli flying is so diverse , there is.... instruction, offshore, charter, long-line, AG, powerline, firefighting, IFR, stunt/movies, tours, EMS, police etc...

and there are also many different types of helicopters

put all this together and that's why there are hundreds of people with a CPL and 200 hours (because all you need to get that is time and money), whereas there are not many people with 2000 hrs, 700 night, 500 turbine, 300 IFR, NVG experience, and 300 hours on an S76 (for example)

it's the old problem of "you get no job without experience, but no experience without a job"

Sasless,
There is a shortage of pilots , but IMO there is even a bigger shortage of good companys to work for. I am a young guy, paying my dues, I have found most of these compnays are the same. Most of them havent figured out this isnt the 80's anymore. They all promise you the world and rarely follow thourgh. No one wants to pay for training!

I shopped for a better paying gig, found one then the owner started waffeling on the deal and the start date. He expected me to keep waiting for a job to start after giving me a start date months before that had now came and went. I wasnt going to wait until June they find out his drill job was still in court and all the other jobs for the summer were gone, I had already passed on lots of good oppertunity. I even offered to work in the hanger at the time of the orginal start date, but he was too cheap.
I opted to go back to the operator I worked for last summer for the following reasons= he paid on time, maint is good ( never pressure to fly if I thought somethign was worng), the CP backs me up anytime I need it ( to the point of screaming at the owner). The pay is substandard low ( the check out in the H and 12 makes up for it).. but is higher pay worth dealing with unknowns?

Lama Bear, you guys have been busy over there! They tried to move me twice but politics got involved. 41 days 6 hours of flight time! I am baking away in the sun over here!

Common theme seems to be, when they need you they really ( and will pay)do, when they dont, well too bad.

The one other thing I have learned is Desperation creates oppertunity!!

SAS looking at those jobs do you think if they paid what they are really worth they would still be unfilled?

RB

and that, my fellow pilots, is the $64,000 option.

There are very few good companies to work for because they have low attrition because they are good. It is the circle of life!!
These companies rarely suffer from "the pilot shortage". Particulalry when they are willing to train the right person.

Maybe there is a lesson in that somewhere?:8 :8 :8

..........and the company I work for is hiring as fast as it can, but can't keep up with tha attrition, thus lots of mandatory overtime for those of us still there, and still trying to squeeze us on pay and benefits.

Helicopter Pilot Shortage Coming?
 

The Morning News


Following the Vietnam War thousands of helicopter pilots trained by U.S. military forces landed jobs in the civilian ranks flying for an emerging air ambulance industry, offshore transport and utility maintenance crews. Today those pilots range from 55 to 60 years old and, according to Stuart Buckingham, director of operations for Air-Evac in West Plains, Mo., they are rapidly leaving the industry.

The Alexandria, Va.-based Helicopter Association reports more helicopter companies starting and expansion of air-ambulance and offshore transport at the same time dozens of seasoned pilots are retiring, further widening the gap.

"During that time we trained roughly 1,700 to 2,000 pilots per year. A major difference today is those pilots are being asked and given incentives to stay in the military for up to 10 years. Whereas, in the 1970's pilots who came home from the war went straight to the workforce," Howard Anderson said.


"The closest helicopter flight school to this area is in St. Louis. I wanted to bring this resource to the immediate area because it has not been previously offered here. I realize that the costs can be expensive but no more so than a complete college education," McAhren said.

The costs of acquiring a commercial license in today's market ranges between $35,000 and $50,000 -- or roughly $235 per hour.

So a number of pilot training schools have said there is a pilot shortage...:suspect:

Why would that be?:p

oh dear, here we go again. there was a thread on this a few weeks ago. articles like this just make people search for "helicopter training" on google, then rush off to a flight school, thinking that 1,000 hours of teaching people to fly around the pattern in a Schweizer gets you an EMS/north sea job with $70,000 salary.

yes, there is a shortage, but of EXPERIENCED pilots.

go to HAI and tell me there is a shortage. the place is rammed with over 250 students.

Tex-Air is now merged with ERA and operates under the ERA logo.

One fortunate young lady got hired by Tex-Air with 600 hours was it? That appears to have been a one off hiring.

This lack of experienced pilots is also happening in the UK how many of the regular faces that appear in their twin squirrels are about to face retirement without any young guys to take over.

It's funny, but you'd think people would be smart enough to discern the definition of "pilot shortage." It is *not* "a shortage of pilots with the bare-minimum credentials" but rather, "a shortage of qualified pilots.:ugh:

Minimum-hour requirements will only come down so far. I was amazed when EMS operators started hiring pilots with less than 3,000 hours; it was a floor I thought would never be violated. I was wrong. Nevertheless, the 1,000-hour floor will probably stand firm (he says, knowing that he's been wrong before).

The real issue that is never addressed when talking about a "pilot shortage" is: How do pilots gain the required experience to become employable? Obviously, being a CFI is "The Way"...right now, about the only way. Will that ever change? Hmm...I do not know. I do know that not everyone wants to instruct, and not everyone is suited for it.

More and more offshore companies are operating the S-92. The AW-139 will probably make some inroads too. If the offshore operators in the U.S. were smart, they would put all new-hires in these machines as SIC's, right? Ah, but there are "issues." Oil companies have certain minimum standards and qualifications for the pilots who fly for them. The current system virtually guarantees that an S-92 SIC will be nearly as qualified and experienced as the PIC. Strange, that. And pretty unnecessary if you ask me. But our helicopter pilot egos just bristle at the thought of putting a wet-behind-the-ears newbie in an S-92 when there are so many old-timers just itching to fly the latest-and-greatest, even if they have to take an SIC slot to do it.

And then really, how many "SIC slots" are we talking about? Certainly fewer per year than there are small-ship PIC positions opening nationwide. Not only that, but does serving as an SIC in an S-92 or even a 412 really prepare a guy to take the reins of an EC-130 or 407 as a sole PIC? Some would say no.

The helicopter industry is faced with our eternal dilemma: Where does the experience come from? In the past, pilots coming into this industry were already seasoned "journeymen" due to their military experience that exposed them to a wide array of challenging situations in a compressed amount of time. I don't think anyone here would argue that a 1,000-hour ex-mil pilot is the same as a 1,000-hour Robbie CFI in terms of overall training and experience. But the big question is: Can they do the same job with an equivalent level of safety?

I have said this before and will reiterate it here: If the accident rate starts creeping up and insurance rates go up commensurately, we will start to see helicopters parked by the end of this decade due to a lack of qualified, available crews. (In other words, I'm sort of predicting that we'll see a downturn in our industry soon.) The GOM operators may be forced to accept new-hire SIC's just to satisfy their own staffing needs, much less to supply qualified pilots to the rest of the industry.

It will be interesting to see what happens in the next five years!

What'll happen in the next five years is the industry will wean itself off the easy (and wrong) reliance on minimum hours of experience as the qualification in itself. I've flown with new Thai copilots hired and trained off the street that were better at 600 hrs than many of us 10,000 hr old farts. There was no benefit to them to fly a thousand hours of circuits in an R22, just as the US military didn't require their pilots to do a thousand hours of H269 time to be qualified to then copilot a Huey. Someone mentioned the holy grail of 3000 hrs for EMS - again, I've flown with absolutely competent day/night/IFR captains in a multi-engine EMS operation that had no more than 900 hours of helicopter time. Nothing will get parked, more pilots that paid for their own initial training will get jobs with operators willing to invest in a proper training program for their pilots.

Helicopters are getting easier to fly too. Bush work used to be with old Bell 47's, manual throttle, problematic turbo's, skilled techniques like overreving a couple hundred to slingshot off a mountain pad. Of course in those days helicopter flying was only an endorsement to a fixed wing license and only took as long as it took to solo. At 300 hours you were an experienced pilot.

Even now, look at how much easier it is flying a 407 compared to even a 206. Or a 76 C+ compared to an A model. Navigation - the fine art of flying an LF range, an HSI compared to a drum DG, tuning old HF's and coffee-grinder ADF receivers... the list of improvements goes on.

Better equipment and a more appropriate and structured training - the same approach the military has that can send out 600 hr Seahawk commander to do a night winching of a ditched 61 crew that wouldn't let anyone with less than 5000 hrs sit in their cockpit.

malabo

There is the current rub....no investment by operators. They want the applicant to bring it all when they show up.

The effect of the post-Katrina/post-$70 barrel increase in GoM flight hours has been compounded by the loss of reservists called up for active duty.

I/C

i'll take a S.W.A.G at this one
 

(firstly imabell, or at least his better half are the one of the few who honestly told me to go away & consider a different career move - commendable advise, but post-license, elsewhere)

unfortunately the helicopter 'industry' is dominated at the front end by sausage-factory training schools who will willingly take your money , self perpetuating the cycle of oversupply of pilots, but barely a handful of jobs for the picking for a select few pilots ( & not necessarily the pick of the buch, just) those that are fortunate enough that favourable circumstances prevail. (& good luck to them)

what is missing are viable avenues of progression from 105>>500>>1000, that don't require the new pilots to stoop to slave labour. It has been so difficult for too long to get a start that a mere fraction of pilots have managed a starting role.

Had the industry invested in some (more) of these new comers, it wouldn't be in the predicament that it finds itself in now.

There is clearly not a shortage of pilots, there is a shortage of progression paths for new pilots. Pure & simple.

too many pilots today (with x000) forget where they came from, & sitting in the comfort of their flying jobs cast dispersions on the dedication & potential of the ones who try to follow. The path might not be so hard had not some predecessors done such a fine job of burning many bridges that served them so well.