SIC: Good points about somebody connecting an Airbus aircraft to being pilotless.
D246: One major reason as to why a large US regional airline (which only operates CRJs) has hired pilots with only about 500 hours is that they pay nothing during training, not even per diem, unless this changed. Some of this might be in order to comply with a....eh...'cross-gender' quota :uhoh: . After training, their pay as First Officer qualifies them to use govt. food coupons so they can feed a wife or baby at home. Apparently, pilots with a much better chunk of experience refuse to work for such demeaning and insulting conditions during Initial Training. This is exactly what one of their Line Check Airmen told me while we waited in line for a burrito at a major airport in the "Great Lakes" region. Bean counters at their best- no, not Taco Bell-I mean corporate 'integrity', or the lack thereof :E .

Boeing has probably had its share of crews not understanding or allowing the automation (partial auto. can be worse) to be the boss.
Airbus alone had four or five accidents which I can name by place or airline, and misunderstandings or non-standard procedures (over-confidence) etc led to tragedies. This includes the A-330 in Toulouse, with a factory demonstration pilot in command.

To second the vote of Commander Danny Pprune, not only do the 'leaders' of many airlines understand the cost of everything and the value of nothing, they are well-insured against a major "hull loss", and they are never found liable after the FAA and the NTSB are finished with months of playing "Monday morning {football} quarterback". Look at what the previous "Freight King" got away with at Willow Run years ago (YIP). Somebody was allegedly paid off numerous times, or certain "field reps" received some free type ratings to buy them off.

A US company suffered quite a string of accidents over several years {narrow but mostly widebodies}, plus or minus some well-known MD anomalies (possibly misplaced logbook pages?...I don't know about there, but it happened after the TWA B-727 flown by 'Hoot' Gibson rolled over Michigan in the 70s....the pages with previously documented UNcommanded leading edge problems turned up decades later...based upon "Aviation Week & ST"...very strange coincidence?) and kept their hull loss insurance. This latest incident can not be blamed on the pilots, apparently. This might prove to be unfortunate for one or two major corporate departments. What is the duration for the warranty on landing gear?:O

Rather than forgetting, I perhaps failed to emphasise the use of the MPL, if properly constructed, for the airline environment in turboprops as well as jets.

Military training is not particularly relevant in this respect, as there is no element of unsupervised hour building at all, however it is of note that some fighter pilots do have trouble in an airline environment, while others are of great additional value.

That is why I stressed the point of diversity of backgrounds, however for an ab initio, the intentions of the MPL are intended as an improvement on current training - this benefits everyone, including those who have to build up to the jet job through other backgrounds.

Alfa Floor
 

I agree Alfa, its a pitty that , once again saa is trying to re invent something, together with the jokers at caa. The only hope weve got is the fact that faa, now in sa, inspecting caa due to irrigualities trying to set things right for icao inspection shortly , might put a hold on this 3rd world type licience. Because, if caa dont pass the inspection with icao then saa gets its but kicked out of usa and poss uk !!!!!!! O and, I would imagin that this MPL Licience will only be available to black candidates if it comes !! so dont worry, the international adverts for jobs will say, -- icao atpl licences only-- or something to that effect, and what when Mr Public just does;nt get on board!! or the hul insurance is x3 for MPL operators.:D

We've had programs like this in the U.S. for a couple of decades now. United Airlines had a famous settlement with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission where numerical goals (but not quotas <g>) were set for various sub-categories of other than white males.

Separate interviewing and hiring criteria were established. A friend of mine tells of an all black interview group at the old Stapleton Airport in Denver. One of the very vocal rejects was none other than Auburn Calloway, the future FedEx hijacker.

Attempts were made to modify seniority to promote "affirmative action" but most of these failed. However, when United offered jobs to Pan Am pilots in 1992 class dates were delayed for many since they were not in the right EEOC categories due to Pan Am's hiring practices years earlier.

More than one white South African expat has attempted to list as an African American in the obligatory ethnicity declaration on a U.S. airline application. A buddy of mine at United (last name same as a Rolls Royce competitor) was threatened with dismissal even though he was born in Africa and was a naturalized American citizen.

This idea of segregated pilot hiring standards is coming to many international carriers, for example, a recent Air India posting:

"Air-India Limited invites applications for the post of Trainee Pilot from Indian Nationals belonging exclusively to the Scheduled Tribe / Other Backward Class Community"

http://www.airindia.com/page.asp?pageid=512

The details go on to mention certified exclusion of the "Creamy Layer" in the recruitment qualifications, the codewords for political correctness are somewhat different everywhere you go...

[QUOTE=Lucifer;2935173] however it is of note that some fighter pilots do have trouble in an airline environment, while others are of great additional value.

Perhaps, Lucifer,me old mate, it's because they can think..............

AirBubba: What descriptive language-to "paraphrase" it.... I never found the nerve to state that on Pprune.
I was reluctant to explain what several United pilots had told me.

They had no hang-ups with various 'types' of new-hires, whether their ethnic desription or whether a man or a woman. But with so little experience, and despite so much Extra IOE time required after the sims, it would not have bothered people if most new-hires had somehow made the transition from FE to pilot, i.e. to 737 FO.. (well...at least to the easier job of 727 FO etc). By the way, if these young applicants with almost no experience had decided to work their way up the experience ladder in the normal way, is it not possible that many more of them would have been hired in the normal manner and succesfully transitioned to a United pilot seat, instead of remaining as Flight Engineer?

Had so few young people in these other minority categories wanted, years earlier, to actually become pilots, but years later during this United process, were many then somehow persuaded to try a career which previously had no real attraction for them, in order to meet the murky legalistic agendas of various groups?

The company filled lots of quotas, and I feel sorry for the pilots who had far too little background to adapt to fast, two-person c0ckp1ts and many kinds of changing weather, airport scenarios etc. BUT-their employer United met ITS apparent court-orderd obligations.
Never mind very sudden system malfunctions with little time to decide WHO flies, then WHO identifies which of similarly-titled abnormal procedures to read and somehow do, as they descend into the mountains. The CIVET Arrival at LAX (maybe controller ignorance and/ or lack of jumkpseat observation into that cesspool) bugged the heck out of me after many years of flying, just three runway changes on an FMC with speedbrakes the whole way down {757...}).

Those pilots were sometimes woefully unprepared while at the same time United met some outside private agenda. In a similar realm, this reminds me of the amazingly frank comments of a feminist attorney on the 5:30 NBC new years ago, when she admitted to a reporter that whether young overweight female cadet 'S. F.' made it years ago thru the Citadel military school was not the point.
She stated that the goal was "to break down a male tradition", or "barrier", or almost identical words to that effect. It must have humiliated the young, out of shape Miss S.F. But so what? The ever-so-smug, legalistic, always abrasive (their true goal and joy in life :E ...) politicized feminist goal was achieved.

So what was accomplished? A young lady was used, exploited, squeezed like a plump lemon, by these outside, "interested" parties, who proved to be indifferent to her actual success, when their true motivations were exposed to the harsh light of day. This film clip is quite true.:hmm:

Does this sort of callous exploitation of naive young people in the name of a purportedly "noble agenda" apply to aviation?

I imagine South African will go through much of the cycle we've seen at United and most of the other U.S. carriers in the last twenty years.

There will be a whole "touchy-feely" mandatory training syllabus on "diversity", "cultural awareness" and "sensitivity". The perpetrators in the training videos will always seem to be from the same oppressive group:

http://www.pfandp.com/videoclips/Con...l_Airlines.wmv

Some of the folks hired with low time will eventually do really well after a while. However, a very few will never get the picture, will fail checkride after checkride, even have their ticket pulled by the feds, but never get terminated due to threat of adverse publicity and litigation. At least, that's how it has worked at some airlines here in the U.S.

European airlines are just now coming around on the idea of giving preference in pilot hiring for diversity, I'm sure they will see a lot more of the same issues disccussed in this thread in the years to come.

D246, sorry about the long delay in getting back to the thread but have been on the road again. The type of flying I described is simply not "bush flying" It is a combination of all the skills needed to make a safe and well rounded pilot, the combination of "black hole" landings combined with high density airports is no more "bush flying" than Regents Park is a wild game reserve{dont be fooled by the Canada Geese crapping all over the park. thats just our revenge for sending the Starling to Canada} A few years back I was involved with the introduction of the Airbus to Canada,we had an experienced crew find themselves with a totally black flight deck one night with a 400ft ceiling, by reaching deep into their experience bank they were able to get it down in one piece, we then put this failure into the sim and tried it on some overseas students who had very low real world time and were products of one of these "puppy farms" which crank out a Lic called a "frozen ATPL" {thought we had the edge on frozen things!}The results were that only one crew hit the ground wings level but even they were about a mile short of the paving.Dont get me wrong, the sim is a great training aid, but our recent experience with products of training which does not expose pilots to an envioroment which gives them a sound background can only result in more bent tin when things dont go acording to "the book"In closing I recently had to sit jump seat in order to get home, the F/O on this flight was a bright friendly fellow and tried hard but when it came to a simple visual landing{the aids were of for routine maint} the Capt had to twice re-stabilize the aircraft to get it back in the slot, my wife and I were going to sell our company but I think we will keep one aircraft for our own transport in retirment as this experience has quite put me of being a pax !

Isn't it wonderful that SAA thinks they can train an airline pilot in two weeks (70 hours).

What's next? I wonder how long they think they would take to train a brain surgeon?

It's amazing how few people have actually read the facts quoted at the beginning of this thread before going off on a rant!

The MCL is an ICAO initiative at the behest of airlines who wish to see airline pilot basic training made more relevant to the job. It has nothing to do with South Africa, South African Airways, or aviation in Africa as a whole. The MCL proposal is being examined by every major Aviation Authority worldwide, and the final structure of the course is still a matter of debate. As I understand it, the MCL will neither replace nor invalidate the conventional route to the ICAO ATPL.

For those who wish to learn more (which might be wise before you comment), Google Multi Crew Pilot Licence. Some information is available on Pprune in this thread. Please don't leap in there with the kind of ill-informed drivel I see here (with one or two notable exceptions); such posts will not appear for long!

Scroggs

First Thread Page 1
Are we missing something here?

Yes, you are missing something. The quote in the first post was from an inadequately-researched and essentially scaremongering South African newspaper article, as was made perfectly clear in this post.

The MCL is not a South African Airways initiative. It is an ICAO one. It is a work in progress, and is not yet available. South Africa, and any other nation, may adopt the MCL if it sees fit in future. If it does so, SAA will be free to recruit and train for the MCL, as will any other airline from any country where the national authorities accept the MCL.

Scroggs

Neurosurgical training in South Africa takes 4 years (this is in addition to a minimum of 2 years basic surgical training beforehand, plus 5 years med school and 2 years Community Service).

:ok:

Scoggs... Slightly Bemused or not...
I don't think anyone here doubts the validity of your claim that the MCPL is not a purely South African initiative... the feeling is only that it is likely to be seized upon by SAA as a way of introducing more non-white f/o's into the stream who might otherwise lack the necessary talent to achieve a conventional ATPL by the more traditional routes.

Complete and absolute b**lox - read the previous posts as suggested by Scroggs and then return with an intelligent comment

Flopsie.
"Complete and absolute b**lox - read the previous posts as suggested by Scroggs and then return with an intelligent comment"

Despite your obnoxious phrasing I did take the trouble to read the whole page ( I'm assuming that 'Scroggs' wasn't commenting on something said 4 pages back ) and I stand by my statement. With one small arguable exception, a ref. to a 3rd world type licence ( which doesn't mean the contributor was under the impression that it WAS a licence designed for the 3rd world... the contributors appear only to be questioning the advisablity of the MCL as it maybe taken advantage of by SAA who have their own dubious agenda,

This is not a racial question, it's not even a debate about the lack of opportunities for white South Africans to fly for their national airline.. it's much more important than that... IT'S ABOUT SAFETY. That's what we're all concerned about in the forums as it's our livelihood and our lives and the lives of those we fly every day that may be put in jeopardy.

There is bound to be concern world-wide amongst existing aircrew at such a radical departure from the accepted forms of pilot training... and SAA's current misplaced enthusiasm for accepting Affirmative Action policies over safety, together with their inability to attract sufficient non white recruits of the required calibre will inevitably lead to close scrutinisation of their policies. That is what this is about, SAFETY.

MPL
 

If you read the whole thread, you may well be better informed. I find your comment offensive and it does contain overtones of a racist nature. As a professional pilot I have met many “non-white” pilots who are extremely competent and undoubtedly have sufficient “talent” to obtain an ATPL and operate an aircraft in accordance with national and international requirements.
The final product of the proposed MPL syllabus has yet to be validated but from extensive research carried out by several FTOs around the world, there is sufficient evidence to believe that the result will be positive within the limitations and restrictions of the license. As with any new and radical training concept there are risks involved and that is why the regulating authorities are monitoring progress very carefully to ensure the quality of training and therefore that SAFETY is not compromised. It is not only SAA that is considering the MPL, there are many other operators that have already committed to supporting this license. There is extensive coverage in the links that Scroggs has already mentioned but as a reminder:
Proposals developed by ICAO’s Flight Crew Licensing & Training Panel (FCLTP)
• The Multi-crew Pilots Licence (MPL) is a product of
ICAO’s recent review of Annexes 1 & 6
• Demand from airline sector:
• Licence training route adapted to multi-crew pilot
• Advantage of modern simulation
• Training programmes geared to the airline
Panel consisted of:
• Australia
• Brazil
• Chile
• Canada
• China
• Egypt
• France
• Germany
• Japan
• Mexico
• Netherlands
• Russian Federation
• Singapore
• South Africa
• United Kingdom
• United States
• IAOPA
• IATA
• IBAC
• IFALPA
Observers:
• Korea, New Zealand, FAI, JAA, IFHA
Quality Assurance
• Training Programme competency equivalent to
CPL + IR + Type Rating
• First MPL course in each Training Organisation provisional
• ICAO Risk & Safety Benefit Analysis
• ICAO Proof of Concept programme
So don’t hold your breath – it will be some time before we see an MPL holder in the right-hand seat of any aircraft.

I see that we{Canada} are included in the list of those who must sign on to this new Lic, it may be worth pondering tha t when it comes to regulating safety we recently had a PM who registered his single hull tanker rustbuckets under a "Flag of covienience" and we are the refueling destination of choice for every clapped out, crew fatigued aircraft that can stagger across the pond.Further to this the "Nodding Donkeys "in Transport Canada consist largly of those who have been booted out of the industry for various sins, one only has to read our TSB reports on their gear up landings to see that TC is not staffed by the cream of the crop, so Canadas input to this process will consist of going along with the crowd in the interest of job security and indexed pensions!

It's comforting that the medical profession is sticking to the time-honoured methods of training!

Yes, I understand that Mungo. However, some posts here give the impression that the posters think the MCL and its ramifications are a purely South African issue - and, given the wording of that original newspaper article, they could be forgiven for thinking so. I was attempting to point out that in fact it's an international issue, and will affect airlines worldwide.

It also seems to be the understanding by some posters that the MCL will be some kind of shortcut, and will be less rigorous than the current systems of obtaining an ATPL. I see no evidence for that, and it is this point that is perhaps the most important one to take on board. The purpose of the MCL is purely to better fit the training to the task, not to shortcut the current, old-fashioned and deeply flawed (from an airline perspective) training system.