Pilot Sues For Forced Retirement
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Heading up to retirement myself and I just can’t wait to get away from the airline environment of pilot de-skilling and over reliance on automation in the name of illusionary safety.
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Could someone give some information about how 'unsafe' the travelling public in Australia, New Zealand and Canada feel due to the fact that they might have 'old' pilots flying them?
Nemo Me Impune Lacessit
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I agree pilots who want to increase the maximum age for a pilot to be allowed to fly generally are doing it for money. When two airlines have gone bust underneath you, periods of unemployment to overcome, eventually getting a start again, RHS, only to be back on the streets within a few years, two pension funds badly depleted, most of your savings gone just to pay the mortgage and reaching ones late forties with all retirement hopes and dreams shattered then yes, I do agree that money is a major motivator to raise the arbitrarily imposed retirement age.
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The reasoning behind this, medical checks miss a lot of unhealthy people, so do operational checks.
https://www.icao.int/NACC/Documents/...ICAO-Evans.pdf
https://www.icao.int/NACC/Documents/...ICAO-Evans.pdf
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I agree pilots who want to increase the maximum age for a pilot to be allowed to fly generally are doing it for money. When two airlines have gone bust underneath you, periods of unemployment to overcome, eventually getting a start again, RHS, only to be back on the streets within a few years, two pension funds badly depleted, most of your savings gone just to pay the mortgage and reaching ones late forties with all retirement hopes and dreams shattered then yes, I do agree that money is a major motivator to raise the arbitrarily imposed retirement age.
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This has already been ruled on by the UK Supreme Court https://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...l-7678309.html
Case Law already ruled on with a precedent set, I suspect this guy will not win and just cost himself a lot of money.
Case Law already ruled on with a precedent set, I suspect this guy will not win and just cost himself a lot of money.
Avoid imitations
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A PPRuNe'r tried this in court a few years ago. He wasn't successful.
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This has already been ruled on by the UK Supreme Court https://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...l-7678309.html
Case Law already ruled on with a precedent set, I suspect this guy will not win and just cost himself a lot of money.
Case Law already ruled on with a precedent set, I suspect this guy will not win and just cost himself a lot of money.
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Advice for younger pilots
As an older pilot who has seen the age limit go up to 65 during my career and observing the attitude of the younger pilots on this forum .... It is inevitable the age limit will go up again, if not totally removed, during your career... plan for it. You should also not assume more sh#t will not happen to you. Companies collapse, economies fail, families have problems. Deal with it and move on or become bitter and screw up your life.
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As an older pilot who has seen the age limit go up to 65 during my career and observing the attitude of the younger pilots on this forum .... It is inevitable the age limit will go up again, if not totally removed, during your career... plan for it. You should also not assume more sh#t will not happen to you. Companies collapse, economies fail, families have problems. Deal with it and move on or become bitter and screw up your life.
Join Date: Mar 2006
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Join Date: Mar 2006
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Avoid imitations
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Youngsters should consider themselves financially well off in other ways. My first house was purchased when the mortgage interest rate jumped from 9.5% to 15% in just a few weeks. For many like me there was no spare money to invest for the future and we lived below the breadline for years afterwards. What was invested has since lost ground very severely and I'm still playing catchup.
Go home guys and play some golf. We do not need to increase the retirement age, give me a break! what is wrong with people? do you really not have a life?
Would we say the same about, say, musicians? “Please Mr McCartney and Mr Clapton, stop insisting on playing your instrument that you spent 40 years perfecting. Leave the music to the young ones and go and grow tomatoes”? (Music is not normally life threatening of course, apart from some other bands I could mention .........)
Owing to the seniority system that exists in most airlines, the young ones are held away from the LHS until the old ones retire. So the young ones want the old ones out as soon as possible so that they - the young ones - can earn more money. (Who is being mercenary or selfish there?). But the older person was there first - why shouldn’t s/he continue? “They are not fit enough” comes the reply. Many of them are indeed unfit - they eat a bad diet, are obese or morbidly obese and never do any exercise. But what about the ones that do keep themselves fit - why shouldn’t they carry on if they want to? Medical and SIM tests might have to adapt to check health and mental faculties more thoroughly, but that is not beyond the wit of man.
Governments tell the general public that they cannot retire at 65 any more - they will have to work for longer. Yet, in the airline profession, where we are scruitinised very carefully once or twice a year both for our performance AND our medical condition, there remains this culture of ‘retire early’.
You can’t have it both ways.
Last edited by Uplinker; 15th Jul 2018 at 13:10.
Unfortunately due to the nature of this industry and associated ego issues, the jealousy is actually unsurprising and some of the comments here are unworthy of apparent professionals. Personally, I think that the antipodeans etc are absolutely correct in that medical fitness and competence should be the sole arbiters of continued pilot careers. In an era when anything that ends in - ist causes outrage in the permanently offended but ageist appears not to be in the lexicon.
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Owing to the seniority system that exists in most airlines, the young ones are held away from the LHS until the old ones retire. So the young ones want the old ones out as soon as possible so that they - the young ones - can earn more money. (Who is being mercenary or selfish there?). But the older person was there first - why shouldn’t s/he continue?
Why did not the old one fight to raise or eliminate the retirement age when they were sitting on the right seat?
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Join Date: Mar 2007
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Originally Posted by arketip
Originally Posted by Uplinker
Owing to the seniority system that exists in most airlines, the young ones are held away from the LHS until the old ones retire. So the young ones want the old ones out as soon as possible so that they - the young ones - can earn more money. (Who is being mercenary or selfish there?). But the older person was there first - why shouldn’t s/he continue?
Why did not the old one fight to raise or eliminate the retirement age when they were sitting on the right seat?
Maybe you know better than both the elders and the lawmakers? You shouldn't be afraid of questioning the judgement of the former sat in a LHS, but the latter? That's not something I would think would normally be seen as a good quality in a professional pilot at any rate!
As others have indicated, the Australians got past this nonsense years ago. Why are so many of the rest intent on remaining so Neanderthal about it?
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It surely also begs the real question about why exactly - when we as a society are far more aware of what can be done against deliberate unlawful discrimination - that the current young ones aren't arguing to uphold the law, or to support the old one in upholding it.
Specifying a retirement age for pilots, of 65 years. Is of course “discrimination”, and unarguably “deliberate”. However what it most definitely (currently) is NOT, is “unlawful”!
Indeed, quite the opposite is true. There are various protected characteristics. Only one of which is age. However, unlike all other protected characteristics, discrimination on the basis of age, most definitely CAN be legal. This is because certain Objective Justifications can be used to back up such things as compulsory retirement ages for certain professions. By all means research this if you are interested.
However, back to the above quote. It is actually the “current young ones” who ARE arguing to uphold the law. It is actually “the old one” seeking to change it. Having of course benefitted from the previous compulsory retirement of all his/her elders!
Which makes this quote rather interesting?
Maybe you know better than both the elders and the lawmakers. You shouldn't be afraid of questioning the judgement of the former sat in a LHS, but the latter? That's not something I would think would normally be seen as a good quality in a professional pilot at any rate!
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I have asked before: could somebody explain what a 'seniority system' is? There are many, many pilots who are not on any such system.
If I do some simple sums, it appears to me that if the odd captain doesn't retire at 65 and delays the odd first-officer/co-pilot from a promotion, that new captain, when he gets his promotion, will have the new advantage of being able to continue working longer himself and thus enjoying a very similar number of years as captain as he would have enjoyed under the old enforced retirement age. So where is the problem? In other words, being able to retire later is not only a benefit to old pilots but to ALL pilots!! (As they will all become old themselves one day.)
Also, there are endless predictions of growth in the airline industry, so surely that will create promotion opportunities for all those 'hard done by' junior pilots who are complaining about this causing them to lose promotion opportunities. It appears that with all those youngsters having the opportunities of growing airlines and increased life/job expectancy themselves that they do complain a bit much.
But please someone, explain what a seniority system is?
If I do some simple sums, it appears to me that if the odd captain doesn't retire at 65 and delays the odd first-officer/co-pilot from a promotion, that new captain, when he gets his promotion, will have the new advantage of being able to continue working longer himself and thus enjoying a very similar number of years as captain as he would have enjoyed under the old enforced retirement age. So where is the problem? In other words, being able to retire later is not only a benefit to old pilots but to ALL pilots!! (As they will all become old themselves one day.)
Also, there are endless predictions of growth in the airline industry, so surely that will create promotion opportunities for all those 'hard done by' junior pilots who are complaining about this causing them to lose promotion opportunities. It appears that with all those youngsters having the opportunities of growing airlines and increased life/job expectancy themselves that they do complain a bit much.
But please someone, explain what a seniority system is?