Post-virus: Unsafe, rusty pilots?
 

Do you believe that we'll see a rush of incidents and accidents post-Coronavirus as pilots who have been on the couch for several months, perhaps more than half year, return to flying? Do you think regulators will mandate any special additional training??

We will require the legally required training. I doubt we'd see any spike in incidents. I imagine people will be flying with viggor as they've been grounded for so long and are happy to have their jobs.

You mean the sort of special additional/extended training most regulators already require post extended absence and as a result of which many airlines already have details tucked away in their operations manuals (Ops Manual D >Recency> Retraining Requirements in our case).

It usually gets used when pilots return to the line after time off due to things such as pregnancy, extended long term sickness, etc, etc etc.

There will be much less incidents and accidents, as there will be much less demand for flights.

What flying? Have you any idea the economic consequences of the current situation.

Many thousands of pilots around the world work seasonally anyway. I've had a gap of between 6 months and a year about 3 times in my career. It's never been an issue. Of course the company will give you 4-8 hours in a sim anyway.

It will just mean professional pilots will have to be, errrm, professional about it? The UK CAA have just given a 4-month validity extension to LPC/OPC and it appears medicals will have the same.

I expect recency requirements will be flexed but if not, you can get a surprising number of pilots “recent” in the space of a normal detail. As above, your OM D will say exactly how.

You don’t have any idea either. Nobody really knows. However, I’d say it’s a safe bet that there will still be an aviation industry. It’ll just look very different to the one that existed a month ago.

On the original question: it’s a total non-issue.

Simulator time will be unobtainable for any but a small fraction of the crews they'll need to get started again, but line training will probably be even worse depending on how many sectors everyone needs to get current again. Training Captains are going to be run off their feet as they struggle to get crews current and the process will take quite some time.
The recovery won't be a fast one.

No and No.

So, I've been unemployed since September... My LPC and medical expires mid April 2021.... Does this mean I can expect an extension to my expiry? Or is this just for those lucky to be employed right now?

15,000 hrs. TRI.. 50 years old etc....

Interested...

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Some professionals amongst us will use the time off to recharge the batteries, spend much needed quality time with the family and heaven forbid catch up on tomes of manuals, FCIs etc. I can assure you that our training departments and management pilots will be using the time to catch up as well and push a load of paper our way. Reading the Ops Part B and refreshing yourself on standard calls and SOPs before you go to work is all that most of us will require. Others will find a bit of armchair flying useful.

I had 12 months off after a head injury. Getting back in to the sim felt no different than after annual leave. It's like riding a bike.

Many limits in aviation are arbitrary. An experienced and erstwhile competent pilot is not suddenly incompetent because the calendar clicks over a day, or even 6 months.
The level of retraining required could be scaled to the experience and prior consolidation of each pilot. For a 20000 hour pilot indeed it should be like riding a bike. For a 200 hour pilot more retraining would be a reasonable imposition.

What he said!

My company has been able to extend Licence validity with several different CAAs.

Contact your Licensing authorities and see what they are prepared to do.

UK CAA Exemption

Released yesterday....

I would venture to suggest that any notion of a "Ready, set, GO!" back to normal ops after say six months is an unlikely proposition.

I do hope to be proven wrong.

Australian CASA have mandated exemptions also, presumably aimed at keeping essential services functioning for the duration.

You should be able to obtain it as you would be unable to do your LPC even if you wanted to pay for it yourself.

Of course they will? Really?