Yemenia Expat Contract: Full Info
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Yemenia Expat Contract: Full Info
A carrier which is very rarely mentioned on here, I’m going to give you an insight into what it is like to work for them under one of those famous expat contracts that have floated about here and there in the past. I understand 99% of you will see the advert and simply move on, perhaps with an amused exhale while you scroll down to the flag carrier DEC jobs, but for the 1% of you looking for answers, here you go!
I’ll start from the beginning:
Background:
So, you made some silly choices in your aviation career, and have found yourself fallen into the contractor bubble, jumping between contracts with various contractors. You don’t see your family as often as you’d like, and it’s far from stable, but the money is great and there is a large variety of flying.
Your previous contract blew up after just a few weeks and you find yourself now unemployed, bills to pay and a family to look after, when by miracle, a contractor rolls across your path offering a starting-6 month contracting role with Yemenia, LHS of the 320, a high roller 6 figure salary, accommodation, a joining bonus, and all the addons one might expect from this sort of contract. You know that when things seem too good to be true, they usually are, but hindsight is always 20/20, and you reassure yourself at the time that it is a reputable contractor, so don’t think twice about it.
Application:
You throw in a fairly straightforward application, not really expecting to hear back. As with all of these types of contracts, they often die out before they start, and the ones that do get up and running with high salaries are often competitive, so you don’t expect to hear anything back. A few weeks pass, and you’re invited to a few unsociably timed zoom interviews which take place with cameras off and audio that sounds like a 2007 era Call of Duty microphone. The interview process was inexplicably easy, with questions more evolving toward “when can you start” than anything more bus or career specific. Red flags, but it’s all good, you’ve crossed these bridges before when you joined other random carriers in the past and they turned out OK. Eventually they contact you and send you flight details for a trip to Cairo to complete an assessment, no say in the dates, they’ve already made the bookings. Your journey to Cairo involves 2 stops via Frankfurt and Istanbul on an Economy Basic ticket, not exactly an Emirates Suite, but you are grateful that they pick up the tab. They whisk you into the Sofitel Cairo with a blank cheque to drown your sorrows, and where you can socialize with the other 7 expats here for the job, 2 Americans, a Brit, and a handful of continental Europeans, a few faces you’ve seen before too which is always reassuring.
The sim follows the usual rigmarole, and everybody passes with flying colours, in part due to the Egyption “assessor” not paying attention for 90% of it. A tick in the box, a shake of the hand and you’re sent packing back to Europe with nothing but a verbal promise of being contacted. A few weeks pass by, and eventually you are contacted once again, this time offering you a training start date in just a matter of days, once again taking place in Cairo. Alongside this wonderful news, they will essentially ask you to share a generations worth of info with them, from your stamped logbook pages, to bank statements. Odd, but what do you know. Still no word on signing a contract though, so you hope that will be completed in training, and head on your merry way.
Training:
You kiss the wife and kids goodbye and tell them you’ll see them when you’re back from Yemen in 6 months time. Painful, but it’ll be worth it when you come back with pockets full of cash eh?
Not best pleased, at least the better half knows you’ll not get up to any funny business in that part of the world.
So you arrive in Cairo, alongside the other 7 expats who managed to navigate the gruelling selection process and sim assessment, and tuck into a few weeks of training.
Now, you are reminded of the fatal Yemenia Flight 626 crash back in ‘09, where the investigation blamed poor crew training, inappropriate actions, and training programmes “riddled with gaps and flaws” for the loss of 152 souls, and reassure yourself that they will have modified their training appropriately.
Ha!
What I can only describe as a serious box ticking exercise, interspersed with Death by Powerpoint in what I can only assume was English that had been smashed through Google Translate 6 or 7 times before being released. A few courses that should have been completed at the Yemenia Training Centre in Sana’a are completed virtually due to security reasons, and eventually you finish the course having learned next to nothing, in fact you are convinced you have left with less knowledge than you arrived with, you get some shiny gold wings stamped to your chest, and sent packing to the ancient city of Aden, your new home for the next 6 months. Contract remains non-existent.
Relocating:
Now the fun begins.
As we haven’t signed contracts yet, we cannot be loaded onto a GENDEC or be provided with company tickets, so they ask you to purchase your own ticket to Aden and it will be reimbursed in your first salary. Oh well, seems like bs but you’ve got this far, how much could it hurt.
So $130USD later, you find yourself sitting on the 2R Cabin Crew jumpseat of an overbooked 17 year old A320, the inop APU means you are really getting a sweat on in your fancy new uniform which you were forced to wear during the unexplained 5 hour ground delay, and the all male cabin crew who refuse to acknowledge you prefer to smoke Camels in the back galley than do anything productive, thus adding to the already wonderful ambiance.
Overbooked you say? Wow, they must be doing quite well! No, there are 45 seats with INOP taped on them. No explanation though.
You peer into the open flight deck to say hello and try to get an understanding on the delay, but the local crew don’t acknowledge you and continue to dab out their cigarette ends into a Coke can jammed in front of the engine master switches. Oh well, must be a bad crew today.
Eventually though, you land in the historic city of Aden a few hours later than expected.
Now, Yemen is a country that nearly ALL countries advise against travel too, hell, even the Taliban recommend Afghan nationals don’t travel to Yemen right now. Oh well, the armoured G Wagon that will pick you up from the airport will keep you safe.
Ha!
They don’t provide transport, only for duties, so you hail a local 1980’s Toyota Landcruiser and the driver fleeces you for $50USD to drive you 15 minutes to your luxury accommodation. The technology of SAP Concur hasn’t reached these parts yet, so you convince yourself that you’ll talk to somebody in the office about claiming it back.
You arrive at the accommodation and realise the sh*t sandwich you’ve got yourself into.
Oh and by the way, you’ve still not signed a contract, so as far as anybody is concerned you’re just a random bloke going for a jolly to a war zone. Nothing like a bit of war tourism to boost the local economy.
Accommodation:
“Luxury accommodation, with fully functioning Air Conditioning, a pool, plentiful local attractions and amenities, and 24/7 Private Military Contractors providing security for your safety”.
Now you see they are really playing fast and loose on the word luxury. 10 expats now reside in this 10 room compound out in the middle of nowhere to the NW of the city. High walls and a single gate for entry, it looks like something out of Ross Kemps ventures into Helmand Province.
But oh well, you crack on anyway, and you’re shown to your room by the first Yemenia rep you’ve met throughout this whole process. Your room consists of a very small single bed, with an old CRT Television propped on a wooden shelf and a mirror on the wall. A single square window with a net protects you from the elements. The washrooms are located in a separate building, as is the kitchen. There’s a single plug socket in the room which is used to power the TV, so you must decide between Yemeni MTV or charging your phone. The kitchen is at least well equipped, and is restocked 3 times per week with all kinds of western goods, like the fridge full of “Orange Mirinda” and “Shani”. There were even a few cans of Budweiser hidden in there, although whether these were officially provided, or sourced by a few of the more experienced expats, you’re not sure.
Copious amounts of bottled water were provided too, gratefully.
The washrooms were basic, a few cubicled bogs with a shared shower, alongside a couple of sinks to shave or have a wh*res wash in, very similar to something you’d find at some old relic summer camp. There is a pool, but it’s empty. You come to the conclusion that they didn’t lie, they never said it would be full of water, so they can have the benefit of the doubt on that one.
There were security guards too, but the term Private Military Contractors has you thinking of the high speed, low drag door kickers whose past lives had them on 22 SAS or one of the SEAL teams. That, they were not. They were the 2002 Manchester United shirt, jeans and flip flops with an AK47 slung over the shoulder kind of contractors. Oh well, they are there, sleeping and high on khat at the gate, but there nonetheless.
Now for those local attractions and amenities, you soon realise that the nearest civilisation is a petrol station, around 20 minutes walk away, or a 5 minutes drive.
Since you don’t have a car, your only way of getting anywhere is on foot, and given the dirty civil war waging sporadically in the region, you decide it’s best to forfeit your Chocolate Bar given the risk that you might end up in an orange jumpsuit on Al Jazeera just trying to get it.
Contracts:
After your guided tour of the Love Island villa, the Yemenia rep brings you into a room where he chucks a contract and a biro at you. Once again, the backwards English throws you off, but you see the numbers add up to what was promised and you sign.
Your 13,500 joining bonus is on the way mister captain. They don’t tell you that it’s 13500 Yemeni Rial, the equivalent of about $50USD though.
But at least the important figures, salary and duty pay, are clearly in $USD on the contract.
Oh well! Payday is on the 2nd of each month, so only a week left.
How Yemenia Works:
So there is a 320 crew base in Aden, and one in Seiyun, in addition to a 330 skeleton crew based in Sana’a.
Aden is the largest base, and the only one with an expat community, this includes cabin crew who are drafted from places such as the Philippines, Venezuela, Ukraine, Cambodia, and other random parts of the world.
The head office of Yemenia is in the city of Sana’a, which is essentially off limits at the moment due to an escalation in the conflict. This includes the Operations Control Centre and all other relevant teams. In Seiyun there is no Yemenia hard presence, and in Aden there isn't either, but there is a ground team and a station manager.
The postal system is entirely unreliable in Yemen, so anything that needs to come from Sana’a is generally delivered in person, this includes stuff that could be sent by email because the internet here is also incredibly unreliable. Unfortunately, this does come with risks, one of the couriers had his car blown to bits by a Saudi drone a few weeks back.
Financially, the company is a bit of mess, nobody really knows where it sits, it hasn’t updated any technology for many centuries, ground staff often need to be negotiated with at outstations to get them to service the aircraft, but the airline say they want to buy some new Airbus’, so who knows.
Rostering:
Like many airlines, Yemenia use one of the major rostering apps, and rosters release 15 days before the end of the month. Even despite the rocket attacks, car bombs, mortars, and intermittent electricity and wifi, they do still manage to get the roster out on time, which is more than I can say for the few European carriers I worked for.
For expats, the roster is 5/2/5/3, however with regular lengthy delays, you’ll often find yourself flying into your days off with no extra cash or days off in lieu offered. Flying is a mix of 2 and 4 sector days, rarely you’ll get a 3 sector with a stop in Seiyun, but more often than not it’ll be 2 sectors. Becoming AOG is a daily occurrence, but AOG nightstops are not a thing here, you’ll fly back to Aden regardless of duty hours completed, and you’ll be expected to give up your min rest on occasions where you return late. Your 2000 check out and 0800 report will often become a 2300 check out and an 0800 report because Crew Control/Ops don’t have the facilities to make changes. Sometimes, they won’t even know you’ve arrived, and you’ll be woken up at 0130 to a phone call from Ops asking if you’ve landed in Aden, a duty you completed at 1700.
Roster changes are regular, however, you don’t often actually see any changes because either Crew Control don’t have any internet or electricity to update your roster, or you’ve not got the internet to receive it. Given the situation in Sana’a, the OCC is generally unreliable, and so major flight info such as delays will often be sent by text from the Aden station manager.
There is no bidding system of course, and expats are strictly forbidden from flying with each other unless it’s for the purpose of line training. No no, we get to fly with the locals and the EagleJet p2f goons. Don’t get me wrong, some of the locals are really good at their jobs, especially some of the younger FOs who trained abroad, but they are more the exception than the rule.
If you need to call sick, you try Crew Control, but you’ll likely not get through, so you phone the Aden station manager and just arrange yourself with another pilot to take your place.
Aden:
The safer of the 3 major cities in Yemen, Aden is still home to sporadic fighting. While currently “peaceful”, this isn’t the definition you would find in the West, it’s certainly peaceful compared to 2 years ago, but I wouldn’t say peaceful. The click-clacking of AKs and explosions can still be heard rolling across the city on some days. The city is riddled with checkpoints from various factions. To get to work, your driver takes you on a longer route so you pass only through police and military checkpoints where you’re essentially granted a free pass as you work for Yemenia. Other checkpoints especially heading North, or into the centre of town are less friendly, with different militias setting up their own, and as an employee of Yemenia, and therefore a representative of the Yemeni Government and a Yemeni flag flyer, you’ll quickly be hooded and scooped up for a fun interrogation. Like most towns in these parts of the world, 80% of the locals are lovely people who just want to get on with their lives, some of the older women will treat you as one of their own while you’re so far from home, but despite that there is still a very present and serious danger if you decide to venture out without protection. The airport, the port and Little Aden and At-Tawah which guard the mouth to the port have a heavy military presence which seems, recently, to be working. If you’re in uniform, the police and military will leave you alone, sometimes even escort you where you need to go, if you’re out of uniform, expect some potentially heavy handed questioning.
There are no consular services from any nation available in Yemen, Sana’a was once home to various embassies including the U.S. and U.K., but these are now closed and operate remotely from Djibouti. If you need consular support, you lose your passport or something, well, quite frankly, you’re f*cked.
Life outside of flying:
There isn’t much of one. You can’t really venture out of the compound so you find the best spot in the compound for wifi, crack open a few beers and sit in the 40 degree sun doing nothing for 3 days. Sounds good, and it is at first, but the novelty soon wears off. The expat cabin crew compound is about 25 minutes away and they regularly find their way here, since we have the cold amber nectar they desire.
Some people try and get home for their 3 days off but it is seemingly next to impossible, largely because trying to get on flights out of Aden is like trying to get blood out of a stone, and if you manage, it’ll cost you an arm and a leg. There’s no ID90 around here, just crisp USD that must be dished out to multiple people before you get your ass on a crew jumpseat. Some days you might get lucky, if it’s an expat captain, we all have a gentleman’s agreement that we will let fellow expats jumpseat in the flight deck if they’re on their way to/from home to save any hassle. There’s only way out of Aden for most, and that’s to take a company flight to Cairo and travel onwards from there, alternatively you can fly into Jeddah and go onward from there, but factor in a few extra hours into your connection for a very uncomfortable interrogation in a bright white room about your time in Yemen. Royal Jordanian previously operated an E190 down here but it stopped due to security reasons. Be aware, everytime you leave Yemen, you’ll need an “exit visa”, this is relatively straightforward to obtain though, if you carry your Yemenia ID with you, if all else fails, the Aden station manager will sort you out. While straight forward, it can be a painstakingly long process lasting a few hours sometimes, so consider this before making your way to the airport.
I’ll start from the beginning:
Background:
So, you made some silly choices in your aviation career, and have found yourself fallen into the contractor bubble, jumping between contracts with various contractors. You don’t see your family as often as you’d like, and it’s far from stable, but the money is great and there is a large variety of flying.
Your previous contract blew up after just a few weeks and you find yourself now unemployed, bills to pay and a family to look after, when by miracle, a contractor rolls across your path offering a starting-6 month contracting role with Yemenia, LHS of the 320, a high roller 6 figure salary, accommodation, a joining bonus, and all the addons one might expect from this sort of contract. You know that when things seem too good to be true, they usually are, but hindsight is always 20/20, and you reassure yourself at the time that it is a reputable contractor, so don’t think twice about it.
Application:
You throw in a fairly straightforward application, not really expecting to hear back. As with all of these types of contracts, they often die out before they start, and the ones that do get up and running with high salaries are often competitive, so you don’t expect to hear anything back. A few weeks pass, and you’re invited to a few unsociably timed zoom interviews which take place with cameras off and audio that sounds like a 2007 era Call of Duty microphone. The interview process was inexplicably easy, with questions more evolving toward “when can you start” than anything more bus or career specific. Red flags, but it’s all good, you’ve crossed these bridges before when you joined other random carriers in the past and they turned out OK. Eventually they contact you and send you flight details for a trip to Cairo to complete an assessment, no say in the dates, they’ve already made the bookings. Your journey to Cairo involves 2 stops via Frankfurt and Istanbul on an Economy Basic ticket, not exactly an Emirates Suite, but you are grateful that they pick up the tab. They whisk you into the Sofitel Cairo with a blank cheque to drown your sorrows, and where you can socialize with the other 7 expats here for the job, 2 Americans, a Brit, and a handful of continental Europeans, a few faces you’ve seen before too which is always reassuring.
The sim follows the usual rigmarole, and everybody passes with flying colours, in part due to the Egyption “assessor” not paying attention for 90% of it. A tick in the box, a shake of the hand and you’re sent packing back to Europe with nothing but a verbal promise of being contacted. A few weeks pass by, and eventually you are contacted once again, this time offering you a training start date in just a matter of days, once again taking place in Cairo. Alongside this wonderful news, they will essentially ask you to share a generations worth of info with them, from your stamped logbook pages, to bank statements. Odd, but what do you know. Still no word on signing a contract though, so you hope that will be completed in training, and head on your merry way.
Training:
You kiss the wife and kids goodbye and tell them you’ll see them when you’re back from Yemen in 6 months time. Painful, but it’ll be worth it when you come back with pockets full of cash eh?
Not best pleased, at least the better half knows you’ll not get up to any funny business in that part of the world.
So you arrive in Cairo, alongside the other 7 expats who managed to navigate the gruelling selection process and sim assessment, and tuck into a few weeks of training.
Now, you are reminded of the fatal Yemenia Flight 626 crash back in ‘09, where the investigation blamed poor crew training, inappropriate actions, and training programmes “riddled with gaps and flaws” for the loss of 152 souls, and reassure yourself that they will have modified their training appropriately.
Ha!
What I can only describe as a serious box ticking exercise, interspersed with Death by Powerpoint in what I can only assume was English that had been smashed through Google Translate 6 or 7 times before being released. A few courses that should have been completed at the Yemenia Training Centre in Sana’a are completed virtually due to security reasons, and eventually you finish the course having learned next to nothing, in fact you are convinced you have left with less knowledge than you arrived with, you get some shiny gold wings stamped to your chest, and sent packing to the ancient city of Aden, your new home for the next 6 months. Contract remains non-existent.
Relocating:
Now the fun begins.
As we haven’t signed contracts yet, we cannot be loaded onto a GENDEC or be provided with company tickets, so they ask you to purchase your own ticket to Aden and it will be reimbursed in your first salary. Oh well, seems like bs but you’ve got this far, how much could it hurt.
So $130USD later, you find yourself sitting on the 2R Cabin Crew jumpseat of an overbooked 17 year old A320, the inop APU means you are really getting a sweat on in your fancy new uniform which you were forced to wear during the unexplained 5 hour ground delay, and the all male cabin crew who refuse to acknowledge you prefer to smoke Camels in the back galley than do anything productive, thus adding to the already wonderful ambiance.
Overbooked you say? Wow, they must be doing quite well! No, there are 45 seats with INOP taped on them. No explanation though.
You peer into the open flight deck to say hello and try to get an understanding on the delay, but the local crew don’t acknowledge you and continue to dab out their cigarette ends into a Coke can jammed in front of the engine master switches. Oh well, must be a bad crew today.
Eventually though, you land in the historic city of Aden a few hours later than expected.
Now, Yemen is a country that nearly ALL countries advise against travel too, hell, even the Taliban recommend Afghan nationals don’t travel to Yemen right now. Oh well, the armoured G Wagon that will pick you up from the airport will keep you safe.
Ha!
They don’t provide transport, only for duties, so you hail a local 1980’s Toyota Landcruiser and the driver fleeces you for $50USD to drive you 15 minutes to your luxury accommodation. The technology of SAP Concur hasn’t reached these parts yet, so you convince yourself that you’ll talk to somebody in the office about claiming it back.
You arrive at the accommodation and realise the sh*t sandwich you’ve got yourself into.
Oh and by the way, you’ve still not signed a contract, so as far as anybody is concerned you’re just a random bloke going for a jolly to a war zone. Nothing like a bit of war tourism to boost the local economy.
Accommodation:
“Luxury accommodation, with fully functioning Air Conditioning, a pool, plentiful local attractions and amenities, and 24/7 Private Military Contractors providing security for your safety”.
Now you see they are really playing fast and loose on the word luxury. 10 expats now reside in this 10 room compound out in the middle of nowhere to the NW of the city. High walls and a single gate for entry, it looks like something out of Ross Kemps ventures into Helmand Province.
But oh well, you crack on anyway, and you’re shown to your room by the first Yemenia rep you’ve met throughout this whole process. Your room consists of a very small single bed, with an old CRT Television propped on a wooden shelf and a mirror on the wall. A single square window with a net protects you from the elements. The washrooms are located in a separate building, as is the kitchen. There’s a single plug socket in the room which is used to power the TV, so you must decide between Yemeni MTV or charging your phone. The kitchen is at least well equipped, and is restocked 3 times per week with all kinds of western goods, like the fridge full of “Orange Mirinda” and “Shani”. There were even a few cans of Budweiser hidden in there, although whether these were officially provided, or sourced by a few of the more experienced expats, you’re not sure.
Copious amounts of bottled water were provided too, gratefully.
The washrooms were basic, a few cubicled bogs with a shared shower, alongside a couple of sinks to shave or have a wh*res wash in, very similar to something you’d find at some old relic summer camp. There is a pool, but it’s empty. You come to the conclusion that they didn’t lie, they never said it would be full of water, so they can have the benefit of the doubt on that one.
There were security guards too, but the term Private Military Contractors has you thinking of the high speed, low drag door kickers whose past lives had them on 22 SAS or one of the SEAL teams. That, they were not. They were the 2002 Manchester United shirt, jeans and flip flops with an AK47 slung over the shoulder kind of contractors. Oh well, they are there, sleeping and high on khat at the gate, but there nonetheless.
Now for those local attractions and amenities, you soon realise that the nearest civilisation is a petrol station, around 20 minutes walk away, or a 5 minutes drive.
Since you don’t have a car, your only way of getting anywhere is on foot, and given the dirty civil war waging sporadically in the region, you decide it’s best to forfeit your Chocolate Bar given the risk that you might end up in an orange jumpsuit on Al Jazeera just trying to get it.
Contracts:
After your guided tour of the Love Island villa, the Yemenia rep brings you into a room where he chucks a contract and a biro at you. Once again, the backwards English throws you off, but you see the numbers add up to what was promised and you sign.
Your 13,500 joining bonus is on the way mister captain. They don’t tell you that it’s 13500 Yemeni Rial, the equivalent of about $50USD though.
But at least the important figures, salary and duty pay, are clearly in $USD on the contract.
Oh well! Payday is on the 2nd of each month, so only a week left.
How Yemenia Works:
So there is a 320 crew base in Aden, and one in Seiyun, in addition to a 330 skeleton crew based in Sana’a.
Aden is the largest base, and the only one with an expat community, this includes cabin crew who are drafted from places such as the Philippines, Venezuela, Ukraine, Cambodia, and other random parts of the world.
The head office of Yemenia is in the city of Sana’a, which is essentially off limits at the moment due to an escalation in the conflict. This includes the Operations Control Centre and all other relevant teams. In Seiyun there is no Yemenia hard presence, and in Aden there isn't either, but there is a ground team and a station manager.
The postal system is entirely unreliable in Yemen, so anything that needs to come from Sana’a is generally delivered in person, this includes stuff that could be sent by email because the internet here is also incredibly unreliable. Unfortunately, this does come with risks, one of the couriers had his car blown to bits by a Saudi drone a few weeks back.
Financially, the company is a bit of mess, nobody really knows where it sits, it hasn’t updated any technology for many centuries, ground staff often need to be negotiated with at outstations to get them to service the aircraft, but the airline say they want to buy some new Airbus’, so who knows.
Rostering:
Like many airlines, Yemenia use one of the major rostering apps, and rosters release 15 days before the end of the month. Even despite the rocket attacks, car bombs, mortars, and intermittent electricity and wifi, they do still manage to get the roster out on time, which is more than I can say for the few European carriers I worked for.
For expats, the roster is 5/2/5/3, however with regular lengthy delays, you’ll often find yourself flying into your days off with no extra cash or days off in lieu offered. Flying is a mix of 2 and 4 sector days, rarely you’ll get a 3 sector with a stop in Seiyun, but more often than not it’ll be 2 sectors. Becoming AOG is a daily occurrence, but AOG nightstops are not a thing here, you’ll fly back to Aden regardless of duty hours completed, and you’ll be expected to give up your min rest on occasions where you return late. Your 2000 check out and 0800 report will often become a 2300 check out and an 0800 report because Crew Control/Ops don’t have the facilities to make changes. Sometimes, they won’t even know you’ve arrived, and you’ll be woken up at 0130 to a phone call from Ops asking if you’ve landed in Aden, a duty you completed at 1700.
Roster changes are regular, however, you don’t often actually see any changes because either Crew Control don’t have any internet or electricity to update your roster, or you’ve not got the internet to receive it. Given the situation in Sana’a, the OCC is generally unreliable, and so major flight info such as delays will often be sent by text from the Aden station manager.
There is no bidding system of course, and expats are strictly forbidden from flying with each other unless it’s for the purpose of line training. No no, we get to fly with the locals and the EagleJet p2f goons. Don’t get me wrong, some of the locals are really good at their jobs, especially some of the younger FOs who trained abroad, but they are more the exception than the rule.
If you need to call sick, you try Crew Control, but you’ll likely not get through, so you phone the Aden station manager and just arrange yourself with another pilot to take your place.
Aden:
The safer of the 3 major cities in Yemen, Aden is still home to sporadic fighting. While currently “peaceful”, this isn’t the definition you would find in the West, it’s certainly peaceful compared to 2 years ago, but I wouldn’t say peaceful. The click-clacking of AKs and explosions can still be heard rolling across the city on some days. The city is riddled with checkpoints from various factions. To get to work, your driver takes you on a longer route so you pass only through police and military checkpoints where you’re essentially granted a free pass as you work for Yemenia. Other checkpoints especially heading North, or into the centre of town are less friendly, with different militias setting up their own, and as an employee of Yemenia, and therefore a representative of the Yemeni Government and a Yemeni flag flyer, you’ll quickly be hooded and scooped up for a fun interrogation. Like most towns in these parts of the world, 80% of the locals are lovely people who just want to get on with their lives, some of the older women will treat you as one of their own while you’re so far from home, but despite that there is still a very present and serious danger if you decide to venture out without protection. The airport, the port and Little Aden and At-Tawah which guard the mouth to the port have a heavy military presence which seems, recently, to be working. If you’re in uniform, the police and military will leave you alone, sometimes even escort you where you need to go, if you’re out of uniform, expect some potentially heavy handed questioning.
There are no consular services from any nation available in Yemen, Sana’a was once home to various embassies including the U.S. and U.K., but these are now closed and operate remotely from Djibouti. If you need consular support, you lose your passport or something, well, quite frankly, you’re f*cked.
Life outside of flying:
There isn’t much of one. You can’t really venture out of the compound so you find the best spot in the compound for wifi, crack open a few beers and sit in the 40 degree sun doing nothing for 3 days. Sounds good, and it is at first, but the novelty soon wears off. The expat cabin crew compound is about 25 minutes away and they regularly find their way here, since we have the cold amber nectar they desire.
Some people try and get home for their 3 days off but it is seemingly next to impossible, largely because trying to get on flights out of Aden is like trying to get blood out of a stone, and if you manage, it’ll cost you an arm and a leg. There’s no ID90 around here, just crisp USD that must be dished out to multiple people before you get your ass on a crew jumpseat. Some days you might get lucky, if it’s an expat captain, we all have a gentleman’s agreement that we will let fellow expats jumpseat in the flight deck if they’re on their way to/from home to save any hassle. There’s only way out of Aden for most, and that’s to take a company flight to Cairo and travel onwards from there, alternatively you can fly into Jeddah and go onward from there, but factor in a few extra hours into your connection for a very uncomfortable interrogation in a bright white room about your time in Yemen. Royal Jordanian previously operated an E190 down here but it stopped due to security reasons. Be aware, everytime you leave Yemen, you’ll need an “exit visa”, this is relatively straightforward to obtain though, if you carry your Yemenia ID with you, if all else fails, the Aden station manager will sort you out. While straight forward, it can be a painstakingly long process lasting a few hours sometimes, so consider this before making your way to the airport.
Last edited by Contractorgrad; 14th Jun 2023 at 06:24.
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Flying life:
You’ll be picked up from your accommodation 30 minutes before report time, which is an hour prior to departure. If there’s a delay, you’ll likely not be informed unless the Aden station manager sends you a text. You’ll pass through pax security and meet your crew at the gate, with all briefings completed onboard. Punctuality is 50/50, some days you’re out and back early or on time, other days you encounter mammoth delays for reasons which are unclear to you. OCC will remain uncontactable 90% of the time, so your go to guy is the Aden station manager. Report times are often unsociable, with report times through the night with the latest ones reporting from 1930 through to 0200, and morning reports starting from 0400.
CRM isn’t really a thing here, on a good day you’ll have an expat cabin crew and a solid local FO who knows it’s stuff, but 9 times out of 10 it’ll be a p2f FO, thankfully still with one or two expat cabin crews. Worst case, a p2f FO and an entirely local male cabin crew who will not call you once throughout the entire 4 sector day.
Following of SOPs too is not really a thing, largely in part to Yemenias very loose standards when it comes to operating an aircraft. Again, keep a close eye, you’ll see some mind blowing stuff.
I’ll give you a couple of examples of the other non-standard days that you may encounter more regularly than you’d like.
So you wake up at 0300, your transport will arrive at 0330 to take you for your 0400 report. You have a quick shower and shave and get ready for the 4 sectors of fun you’ve got coming up. You can’t check your roster or the weather though, wifi is down. So 0400 your transport rocks up, a 1970s era Nissan Sunny that will bundle you along the bumpy roads and checkpoints and drop you off outside the airport. Since there is no crew room, you’re dropped off outside the pax building and fight your way through pax security. Once airside, you find your Pakistani P2F FO who informs you that we’ve picked up a 90 minute delay because the aircraft is 8 hours late arriving from Jeddah. You didn’t know though because you had no internet in the compound, and there’s a good chance Crew Control are being mortared so never updated it anyway. Together, you go and find the station manager who hands over all of your required docs for your Aden-Seiyun-Cairo-Seiyun-Aden duty. Check out time of 1630 is now already pushed back but you hope to make up some time enroute. That’s right, no iPads out here chaps, it’s all paper, even down to the clip file full of Jeppesen charts that you carry about with you.
The cabin crew turn up, the wifi at their compound was working so they knew of the delay beforehand, and together with your FO, the Uzbek, Romanian, Venezuelan and Indian cabin crew, you make your way out to the aircraft.
Handing over to you is one of your friends from the compound, an experienced Austrian chap who simply shakes your hand and tells you “good luck”.
You get into the flight deck and take your old style dentist chair seat, as the cabin crew work to square away the cabin. Your MCDU has a beautiful amber FAIL light on it, but this is a well known issue, so you go out and do the walk around and let the FO play about with his. Returning to the flight deck, you see the FO is clearly struggling, aw shucks, the F-PLN is now all f*cked up in the MCDU because genius doesn’t know how to enter an airway. Oh well, mister captain will fix it. Even 10 year olds playing Microsoft Flight Simulator can achieve this level of piloting, but it’s okay, mister captain will give you a pat on the shoulder for trying anyway.
Everybody is ready, fuelling is complete, so you inform the ground staff that you’re ready to board. In a matter of minutes, all 13 pax have boarded and you’re nearly ready to go.
It’s getting warm now, the effects of the inop APU are starting to show through your shirt, but you darent drink much water, because you’ve got 3 inop lavs on this flight so no chance of taking a p*ss break, there are no water/waste facilities in Aden, and the waste tank is full to the brim, so the senior cabin crew member plans to get it done in Cairo. Water is OK, for now.
Eventually though, you’re airborne from Aden, just under 2 hours late, flight time of 52 minutes, arriving about 1 hour and 40 minutes behind schedule, meaning your Seiyun-Cairo flight is now 40 minutes late. You run into the terminal for a lav break, and the 4 passengers flying to Cairo board while you’re gone. A belly full of Rice and Wheat is todays money maker though, and miraculously the aircraft is turned around in just 20 minutes, thus departing an hour late. A flight time of 3 hours and 20 minutes to CAI. The cabin crew sporadically call the flight deck to check on you, and ask if you would like some breakfast. Funnily enough, you do get crew meals here. Breakfast today is Kidbah - Lamb Liver with some onions and tomatoes. Not particularly appetising at this time of the morning, but you’ve got no choice, the P2F kid doesn’t get crew meals so they’ve only loaded the one flight deck meal. You’re starving, so you eat some of it, and realise that it might have been a mistake, you’re now cruising at FL350 but your bowels are suddenly on short final with an aircraft full of inop lavs, so you offer the rest to the FO who gratefully accepts and gobbles it up like a ravenous prisoner whose not eaten in days.
Probably a good time to add that the galleys don’t work, so don’t expect any coffee or anything, this is the same across the entire fleet. Only on a few aircraft does the oven work, so if you are unlucky enough to get an aircraft with an inop oven then it’s cold Kidbah or Shakshuka for you today mister captain.
Oh yeah, Your MCDU will also magically kick into life before later dying again. This will happen to a number of systems and random ECAM messages that will come and go as the day passes.
Cairo is one of the few airports the P2F guys can land at, so you give him the opportunity to do so. You feel the same way about P2F as anybody else, but nearly all FOs who you work with are pay2fly and it’s actually quite entertaining to watch, there’s even a betting pool going around in the compound about who is going to f*ck an aircraft into the Gulf of Aden first.
Of course, the ones who don’t know their left from right are reported by the captains, but there’s no base management in Aden, it’s all handled in Sana’a so the situation is largely left ignored.
Anyway, you’re on final into CAI, the FO is frantically pushing buttons in the MCDU, turning knobs on the MCP for no apparent reason, and not telling you what he’s doing. Frantically disengaging and then re-engaging AP1, he eventually flicks on AP2 and lets the thing land itself in quite possibly some of the friendliest weather conditions you could ask for.
Pleased with himself, he asks you how he did and is disappointed when you tell him that he didn’t actually land the aircraft, some French computer engineer did. You try and give him some guidance and advice but his English isn’t the best and so he just nods along and apologises. Sorry mister captain, maybe next time. It’s cool though, his expensive GoPro mounted on his window caught all the action for DikDok.
You arrive on stand in CAI and you’re slowly making up some time from the early morning delay, now only 40 minutes behind schedule.
You fly 60 pax back to Seiyun, and apart from the couple of F16s circling about you on descent into Seiyun, who didn’t identify themselves at all, it’s pretty uneventful, and you’re now only 20 mins behind schedule. The homebound flight has just 3 pax, so you turnaround quickly and make your way down to Aden in record time, arriving bang on schedule.
No time for any engineers to look at anything though, and you hand off to another friend of yours who’s about to take the aircraft off to Djibouti.
Check out time of 1630, back in the accommodation by 1655 and you try and chill out for a bit before your 0400 alarm tomorrow for a flight to Medina.
Next day rolls around, and you’re with a local FO who did his training in the US. He’s a well known popular local, very competent and good at his job so you can relax a little, and you’re joined by a local, all male crew of 4 who don’t like you at all. You manage to depart on time to Medina, carrying a full load* of pax over to the holy city.
*Full load with 45 inop seats, so not full in the slightest. But stats are stats and I’m here to pad them. Full load, pat on the back.
You start your welcome PA and as a force of habit you start telling the pax that the cabin crew are here for their safety etc etc. I paused myself when I realised not only did the pax have no idea what I was saying, but the crew were probably all hot boxing the rear galley with their sticky camel blues.
Anyway, the flight is uneventful and you pull onto stand in Medina, where the marshaller suddenly buggers off. There are no stairs and no staff in sight. You call Ops, no answer of course. Right yeah, there’s no ACARS or datalink either, you’ll be shocked to know. There is a company frequency, but it’s just static now.
You try again, no answer, so you call the Aden station manager who promises to get on top of it.
Good job you leave one engine on, because the temperature in the cabin is reaching 27 degrees so without it, it would be inhospitable. Despite the running engine, the crew in all their wisdom decide to open some cabin doors for a breeze. They never told you in advance though. Least it’ll clear the smell of cigarette smoke from the cabin, must look like a cheech and chong scene from the outside.
Anyway 3 hours pass, and eventually a ground team turns up, connects a set of stairs to 1L, a GPU and a PCA unit.
Ops call you on the aircraft phone and ask if everything is okay. Firstly, you ask if they are okay, to which they reply that they’ve had easier days. You inform them that you’ve only just started disembarking because the ground staff were refusing to service us, and you will update them with more info when you can.
Eventually, nearly 7 hours after arriving in Medina, a dispatcher tips up in a fresh Fiat, and informs you that they had some trouble with ticketing passengers, but the buses are on their way.
You get back to Aden eventually, a full 9 hours behind schedule after a total flight duty period of 14 hours and 6 minutes. Captains discretion isn’t a thing, because you can’t contact Ops anyway. It’s cool though, you’re done for the next 2 days so you can watch Taylor Swifts Anti Hero music video another 700 times on Yemeni MTV.
Other things that you may come across on a regular basis:
Pay2Fly FOs activating a secondary flight plan that you didn’t know about or generally just pulling other crazy stunts that completely blow you away. I could write a book on those. Keep a watchful eye AT ALL TIMES.
Disruptive pax: Very regular, almost daily, smoking onboard and sexually harassing, sometimes even assaulting the female expat cabin crews. Keep an eye out on them and offer support where you can.
Food poisoning. Crew meals are generally the only substantial food you’ll eat, but expect leaking later on.
FOs trying to smoke in the FD. A Wild West theory to you and I, but common practice here. You’re the a**hole for trying to put a stop to it.
Guns. Guns everywhere. Don’t be alarmed if the dispatcher brings you the final load sheet with an AK slung over his shoulder.
General disrespect at foreign outstations. They don’t like you because you’re working for Yemenia. I don’t get the grudge, but it’s not personal. Ground staff will often cut corners or just outright not complete them unless you explicitly catch them and tell them. Don’t even try and ask for an engineer in Medina or Jeddah. Just because you’re an expat doesn’t mean you don’t work for Yemenia.
Know the aircraft. There will be times when systems fail, and ECAM messages appear and you haven’t seen them before. Don’t ask the p2f FO, because he doesn’t even know what a transition level is. Make sure you’re clued up on how to resolve issues and what is fatal and what’s not. There’s not much in the way of engineering or diversionary options. QRH is usually covered in stains, cigarette ash and has ripped pages so don’t rest on that being an option.
NEVER, ever, blame your sh*tty day on the OCC. It’s an unwritten rule. Everywhere else in the world they are a call away and you can always pin the blame on them when things go wrong. If you think your AOG delay in Cairo is bad and you’re effing and jeffing because Ops aren’t answering the phone, it’s frustrating yes, but they are having a sh*ttier day than you are, there’s a reason they aren’t picking up. Same with crew control, they will miss lots of things, in fact they’ll miss most things, but to be honest, if someone was shooting RPGs through my office window, I too would dismiss your text about a delayed check in.
Layovers:
If you’re really unfortunate, you’ll be rostered on an Aden-Cairo-Seiyun duty, changing crews in Seiyun for a minimum rest layover, before a Seiyun-Aden single sector the next day. There’s no explanation for the layover, you have the same routing on 4 sectors anyway so it’s nothing to do with hours.
You’ll stay at the only tourist hotel in the town which is average at best. A nice pool though, and a half decent mezze for breakfast. No lounging about the pool with bikini clad cabin crew though, where do you think you are? Emirates? No, sharia law is strictly enforced, niqab clad cabin crew have to be taken to breakfast by one of the males on the crew and that’s it, no pool time. Glamorous life eh.
You’ll also have to go on a death trip into Aden town centre beforehand, because they will send you money via Western Union wire transfer to pay for you mr transport and accommodation in Seiyun. You’ll have to pay the cab driver and the hotel reception in cash. Thank you mister captain.
Don’t forget to pay the taxi driver extra to avoid the STC militia checkpoints, those are a barrel of laughs.
Payday:
Paid on time into a European bank account, just about the only part of this experience that you can’t have a moan about. The duty pay calculations might not always be correct, sometimes they even give you too much, but yeah, can’t expect miracles from an HR team that double up as infantrymen.
End of Contract:
Eventually, your time will run out and your role in this beautiful country will come to an end.
A smiling Yemenia rep will show up a few weeks before the end and offer you an extension, however this is entirely optional. You don’t take it, you are excited to go home and see your family, but others will extend for the extra cash.
Your final payment is made on time and to the full amount, and Yemenia ship you to Cairo hassle free to end your time here on a high. From Cairo, you’ll be booked on an economy basic ticket back to your home town on Egyptair, covering the cost of a suitcase from your own pocket.
You’ve learned many things from your time in Yemen, some things outrageous and somethings that you’ve taken for granted your whole career, like FOs who know what the red button means on the side stick. But you’re happy you tried it, an experience many won’t ever see.
Anything I’ve missed or questions you may have, let me know.
Comments welcome
You’ll be picked up from your accommodation 30 minutes before report time, which is an hour prior to departure. If there’s a delay, you’ll likely not be informed unless the Aden station manager sends you a text. You’ll pass through pax security and meet your crew at the gate, with all briefings completed onboard. Punctuality is 50/50, some days you’re out and back early or on time, other days you encounter mammoth delays for reasons which are unclear to you. OCC will remain uncontactable 90% of the time, so your go to guy is the Aden station manager. Report times are often unsociable, with report times through the night with the latest ones reporting from 1930 through to 0200, and morning reports starting from 0400.
CRM isn’t really a thing here, on a good day you’ll have an expat cabin crew and a solid local FO who knows it’s stuff, but 9 times out of 10 it’ll be a p2f FO, thankfully still with one or two expat cabin crews. Worst case, a p2f FO and an entirely local male cabin crew who will not call you once throughout the entire 4 sector day.
Following of SOPs too is not really a thing, largely in part to Yemenias very loose standards when it comes to operating an aircraft. Again, keep a close eye, you’ll see some mind blowing stuff.
I’ll give you a couple of examples of the other non-standard days that you may encounter more regularly than you’d like.
So you wake up at 0300, your transport will arrive at 0330 to take you for your 0400 report. You have a quick shower and shave and get ready for the 4 sectors of fun you’ve got coming up. You can’t check your roster or the weather though, wifi is down. So 0400 your transport rocks up, a 1970s era Nissan Sunny that will bundle you along the bumpy roads and checkpoints and drop you off outside the airport. Since there is no crew room, you’re dropped off outside the pax building and fight your way through pax security. Once airside, you find your Pakistani P2F FO who informs you that we’ve picked up a 90 minute delay because the aircraft is 8 hours late arriving from Jeddah. You didn’t know though because you had no internet in the compound, and there’s a good chance Crew Control are being mortared so never updated it anyway. Together, you go and find the station manager who hands over all of your required docs for your Aden-Seiyun-Cairo-Seiyun-Aden duty. Check out time of 1630 is now already pushed back but you hope to make up some time enroute. That’s right, no iPads out here chaps, it’s all paper, even down to the clip file full of Jeppesen charts that you carry about with you.
The cabin crew turn up, the wifi at their compound was working so they knew of the delay beforehand, and together with your FO, the Uzbek, Romanian, Venezuelan and Indian cabin crew, you make your way out to the aircraft.
Handing over to you is one of your friends from the compound, an experienced Austrian chap who simply shakes your hand and tells you “good luck”.
You get into the flight deck and take your old style dentist chair seat, as the cabin crew work to square away the cabin. Your MCDU has a beautiful amber FAIL light on it, but this is a well known issue, so you go out and do the walk around and let the FO play about with his. Returning to the flight deck, you see the FO is clearly struggling, aw shucks, the F-PLN is now all f*cked up in the MCDU because genius doesn’t know how to enter an airway. Oh well, mister captain will fix it. Even 10 year olds playing Microsoft Flight Simulator can achieve this level of piloting, but it’s okay, mister captain will give you a pat on the shoulder for trying anyway.
Everybody is ready, fuelling is complete, so you inform the ground staff that you’re ready to board. In a matter of minutes, all 13 pax have boarded and you’re nearly ready to go.
It’s getting warm now, the effects of the inop APU are starting to show through your shirt, but you darent drink much water, because you’ve got 3 inop lavs on this flight so no chance of taking a p*ss break, there are no water/waste facilities in Aden, and the waste tank is full to the brim, so the senior cabin crew member plans to get it done in Cairo. Water is OK, for now.
Eventually though, you’re airborne from Aden, just under 2 hours late, flight time of 52 minutes, arriving about 1 hour and 40 minutes behind schedule, meaning your Seiyun-Cairo flight is now 40 minutes late. You run into the terminal for a lav break, and the 4 passengers flying to Cairo board while you’re gone. A belly full of Rice and Wheat is todays money maker though, and miraculously the aircraft is turned around in just 20 minutes, thus departing an hour late. A flight time of 3 hours and 20 minutes to CAI. The cabin crew sporadically call the flight deck to check on you, and ask if you would like some breakfast. Funnily enough, you do get crew meals here. Breakfast today is Kidbah - Lamb Liver with some onions and tomatoes. Not particularly appetising at this time of the morning, but you’ve got no choice, the P2F kid doesn’t get crew meals so they’ve only loaded the one flight deck meal. You’re starving, so you eat some of it, and realise that it might have been a mistake, you’re now cruising at FL350 but your bowels are suddenly on short final with an aircraft full of inop lavs, so you offer the rest to the FO who gratefully accepts and gobbles it up like a ravenous prisoner whose not eaten in days.
Probably a good time to add that the galleys don’t work, so don’t expect any coffee or anything, this is the same across the entire fleet. Only on a few aircraft does the oven work, so if you are unlucky enough to get an aircraft with an inop oven then it’s cold Kidbah or Shakshuka for you today mister captain.
Oh yeah, Your MCDU will also magically kick into life before later dying again. This will happen to a number of systems and random ECAM messages that will come and go as the day passes.
Cairo is one of the few airports the P2F guys can land at, so you give him the opportunity to do so. You feel the same way about P2F as anybody else, but nearly all FOs who you work with are pay2fly and it’s actually quite entertaining to watch, there’s even a betting pool going around in the compound about who is going to f*ck an aircraft into the Gulf of Aden first.
Of course, the ones who don’t know their left from right are reported by the captains, but there’s no base management in Aden, it’s all handled in Sana’a so the situation is largely left ignored.
Anyway, you’re on final into CAI, the FO is frantically pushing buttons in the MCDU, turning knobs on the MCP for no apparent reason, and not telling you what he’s doing. Frantically disengaging and then re-engaging AP1, he eventually flicks on AP2 and lets the thing land itself in quite possibly some of the friendliest weather conditions you could ask for.
Pleased with himself, he asks you how he did and is disappointed when you tell him that he didn’t actually land the aircraft, some French computer engineer did. You try and give him some guidance and advice but his English isn’t the best and so he just nods along and apologises. Sorry mister captain, maybe next time. It’s cool though, his expensive GoPro mounted on his window caught all the action for DikDok.
You arrive on stand in CAI and you’re slowly making up some time from the early morning delay, now only 40 minutes behind schedule.
You fly 60 pax back to Seiyun, and apart from the couple of F16s circling about you on descent into Seiyun, who didn’t identify themselves at all, it’s pretty uneventful, and you’re now only 20 mins behind schedule. The homebound flight has just 3 pax, so you turnaround quickly and make your way down to Aden in record time, arriving bang on schedule.
No time for any engineers to look at anything though, and you hand off to another friend of yours who’s about to take the aircraft off to Djibouti.
Check out time of 1630, back in the accommodation by 1655 and you try and chill out for a bit before your 0400 alarm tomorrow for a flight to Medina.
Next day rolls around, and you’re with a local FO who did his training in the US. He’s a well known popular local, very competent and good at his job so you can relax a little, and you’re joined by a local, all male crew of 4 who don’t like you at all. You manage to depart on time to Medina, carrying a full load* of pax over to the holy city.
*Full load with 45 inop seats, so not full in the slightest. But stats are stats and I’m here to pad them. Full load, pat on the back.
You start your welcome PA and as a force of habit you start telling the pax that the cabin crew are here for their safety etc etc. I paused myself when I realised not only did the pax have no idea what I was saying, but the crew were probably all hot boxing the rear galley with their sticky camel blues.
Anyway, the flight is uneventful and you pull onto stand in Medina, where the marshaller suddenly buggers off. There are no stairs and no staff in sight. You call Ops, no answer of course. Right yeah, there’s no ACARS or datalink either, you’ll be shocked to know. There is a company frequency, but it’s just static now.
You try again, no answer, so you call the Aden station manager who promises to get on top of it.
Good job you leave one engine on, because the temperature in the cabin is reaching 27 degrees so without it, it would be inhospitable. Despite the running engine, the crew in all their wisdom decide to open some cabin doors for a breeze. They never told you in advance though. Least it’ll clear the smell of cigarette smoke from the cabin, must look like a cheech and chong scene from the outside.
Anyway 3 hours pass, and eventually a ground team turns up, connects a set of stairs to 1L, a GPU and a PCA unit.
Ops call you on the aircraft phone and ask if everything is okay. Firstly, you ask if they are okay, to which they reply that they’ve had easier days. You inform them that you’ve only just started disembarking because the ground staff were refusing to service us, and you will update them with more info when you can.
Eventually, nearly 7 hours after arriving in Medina, a dispatcher tips up in a fresh Fiat, and informs you that they had some trouble with ticketing passengers, but the buses are on their way.
You get back to Aden eventually, a full 9 hours behind schedule after a total flight duty period of 14 hours and 6 minutes. Captains discretion isn’t a thing, because you can’t contact Ops anyway. It’s cool though, you’re done for the next 2 days so you can watch Taylor Swifts Anti Hero music video another 700 times on Yemeni MTV.
Other things that you may come across on a regular basis:
Pay2Fly FOs activating a secondary flight plan that you didn’t know about or generally just pulling other crazy stunts that completely blow you away. I could write a book on those. Keep a watchful eye AT ALL TIMES.
Disruptive pax: Very regular, almost daily, smoking onboard and sexually harassing, sometimes even assaulting the female expat cabin crews. Keep an eye out on them and offer support where you can.
Food poisoning. Crew meals are generally the only substantial food you’ll eat, but expect leaking later on.
FOs trying to smoke in the FD. A Wild West theory to you and I, but common practice here. You’re the a**hole for trying to put a stop to it.
Guns. Guns everywhere. Don’t be alarmed if the dispatcher brings you the final load sheet with an AK slung over his shoulder.
General disrespect at foreign outstations. They don’t like you because you’re working for Yemenia. I don’t get the grudge, but it’s not personal. Ground staff will often cut corners or just outright not complete them unless you explicitly catch them and tell them. Don’t even try and ask for an engineer in Medina or Jeddah. Just because you’re an expat doesn’t mean you don’t work for Yemenia.
Know the aircraft. There will be times when systems fail, and ECAM messages appear and you haven’t seen them before. Don’t ask the p2f FO, because he doesn’t even know what a transition level is. Make sure you’re clued up on how to resolve issues and what is fatal and what’s not. There’s not much in the way of engineering or diversionary options. QRH is usually covered in stains, cigarette ash and has ripped pages so don’t rest on that being an option.
NEVER, ever, blame your sh*tty day on the OCC. It’s an unwritten rule. Everywhere else in the world they are a call away and you can always pin the blame on them when things go wrong. If you think your AOG delay in Cairo is bad and you’re effing and jeffing because Ops aren’t answering the phone, it’s frustrating yes, but they are having a sh*ttier day than you are, there’s a reason they aren’t picking up. Same with crew control, they will miss lots of things, in fact they’ll miss most things, but to be honest, if someone was shooting RPGs through my office window, I too would dismiss your text about a delayed check in.
Layovers:
If you’re really unfortunate, you’ll be rostered on an Aden-Cairo-Seiyun duty, changing crews in Seiyun for a minimum rest layover, before a Seiyun-Aden single sector the next day. There’s no explanation for the layover, you have the same routing on 4 sectors anyway so it’s nothing to do with hours.
You’ll stay at the only tourist hotel in the town which is average at best. A nice pool though, and a half decent mezze for breakfast. No lounging about the pool with bikini clad cabin crew though, where do you think you are? Emirates? No, sharia law is strictly enforced, niqab clad cabin crew have to be taken to breakfast by one of the males on the crew and that’s it, no pool time. Glamorous life eh.
You’ll also have to go on a death trip into Aden town centre beforehand, because they will send you money via Western Union wire transfer to pay for you mr transport and accommodation in Seiyun. You’ll have to pay the cab driver and the hotel reception in cash. Thank you mister captain.
Don’t forget to pay the taxi driver extra to avoid the STC militia checkpoints, those are a barrel of laughs.
Payday:
Paid on time into a European bank account, just about the only part of this experience that you can’t have a moan about. The duty pay calculations might not always be correct, sometimes they even give you too much, but yeah, can’t expect miracles from an HR team that double up as infantrymen.
End of Contract:
Eventually, your time will run out and your role in this beautiful country will come to an end.
A smiling Yemenia rep will show up a few weeks before the end and offer you an extension, however this is entirely optional. You don’t take it, you are excited to go home and see your family, but others will extend for the extra cash.
Your final payment is made on time and to the full amount, and Yemenia ship you to Cairo hassle free to end your time here on a high. From Cairo, you’ll be booked on an economy basic ticket back to your home town on Egyptair, covering the cost of a suitcase from your own pocket.
You’ve learned many things from your time in Yemen, some things outrageous and somethings that you’ve taken for granted your whole career, like FOs who know what the red button means on the side stick. But you’re happy you tried it, an experience many won’t ever see.
Anything I’ve missed or questions you may have, let me know.
Comments welcome
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Now this was fascinating. Thank you for writing this.
Love hearing stories about aviation in often forgotten parts of the world. Credit to you and your colleagues for picking up this contract.
Love hearing stories about aviation in often forgotten parts of the world. Credit to you and your colleagues for picking up this contract.
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Now this is real T&C thread. Thank you for the read Contractorgrad , best one this year
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Thank you all for the kind comments, glad I was able to inform and entertain.
Other than onboard the aircraft, I had little interaction with the expat Cabin Crews. They had fewer freedoms than we did, other than the occasional visit to our compound, I think they were pretty much just locked away in their own compound other than to get to/from work. Onboard, they certainly struggled, alot, with both crews and passengers alike. Morale was incredibly low among the expat CCs, although their contracts were very lucrative by CC standards so I think they just wanted to complete their 6 months and get on their merry way with a pocket full of cash. An enormous culture shock for all involved.
Other than onboard the aircraft, I had little interaction with the expat Cabin Crews. They had fewer freedoms than we did, other than the occasional visit to our compound, I think they were pretty much just locked away in their own compound other than to get to/from work. Onboard, they certainly struggled, alot, with both crews and passengers alike. Morale was incredibly low among the expat CCs, although their contracts were very lucrative by CC standards so I think they just wanted to complete their 6 months and get on their merry way with a pocket full of cash. An enormous culture shock for all involved.
Your story, like the book Flying Upside Down about an expat's time in China,is particularly interesting to those of us who never did anything quite as exotic as you did.
My son's time living on the local economy in beautiful downtown Kabul while flying there comes with some stories too.
Some people just live more interesting lives, I guess.
My son's time living on the local economy in beautiful downtown Kabul while flying there comes with some stories too.
Some people just live more interesting lives, I guess.
Last edited by bafanguy; 16th Jun 2023 at 19:46.
I really ddon't know whether to envy you, or to feel sorry! 
Absolutely mind-blowing!
With a wife and two kids, as well as a job in a good airline by now, I guess I'm beyond trying out a new adventure, and enjoy memories of my own.
I really admire people who try an uncomfortable but interesting path in their life.
Absolutely mind-blowing!With a wife and two kids, as well as a job in a good airline by now, I guess I'm beyond trying out a new adventure, and enjoy memories of my own.
I really admire people who try an uncomfortable but interesting path in their life.
Contractor:
Thanks for writing the story and hat off to you for doing the Yemen contract, although I doubt you renewed it?
Your story makes my 18 months in Kuwait seem like a paid luxury vacation.
You have the talent, now write a book.
Thanks for writing the story and hat off to you for doing the Yemen contract, although I doubt you renewed it?
Your story makes my 18 months in Kuwait seem like a paid luxury vacation.
You have the talent, now write a book.
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Thank you, such an interesting story. Life if about the choices you make and the experiences that come after. Some people simply cannot live the groundhog day every day, no matter how good the paycheck is. Good luck!
To think I thought I had done some 'interesting' things on the 73.
Well done Contractorgrad, we need more. Have you thought about the After Dinner Circuit? At the very lease you need to write a book.
Well done Contractorgrad, we need more. Have you thought about the After Dinner Circuit? At the very lease you need to write a book.