Airlines Ease Requirements to Fill Pilot Ranks

By SCOTT MCCARTNEY

A worldwide shortage of pilots is putting less-experienced fliers at the controls of passenger jets and even forcing some airlines to cancel flights for a lack of crews.

In the U.S., the pilot squeeze is being felt mostly at regional airlines — carriers that feed passengers to bigger airlines using planes with fewer than 100 seats. Most regional airlines have lowered their experience-level requirements for new hires, and some have struggled to find pilots with enough hours in their logbooks to serve as captains. Pilots still have to pass tests at each airline and meet proficiency standards, but some aviation experts are concerned that that less-experienced pilots may not perform as well in emergencies or may be more prone to mistakes.

“There is no substitute for experience, particularly in a cockpit,” says Jim Hall, former head of the National Transportation Safety Board.

The pilot shortage is the result of a combination of factors. Fast-growing foreign airlines and cargo carriers have sucked up pilots. Growth in the U.S. at discount airlines and private-jet companies has also led to surging demand for personnel. Newer carriers and fractional-jet companies have been hiring hundreds of pilots furloughed by major carriers, plus pilots who built some experience at lower-paying regional airlines.

In the past year or two, major carriers have been recalling furloughed pilots as well, creating rapid turnover at regional airlines. At the same time, the U.S. military — a major supplier of commercial airline staff — has been turning out fewer pilots.

AMR Corp.’s American Eagle Airlines hired more than 500 pilots this year — one-sixth of its total rank of 3,000 pilots. About 170 pilots were called back up to American Airlines, and about 30 others per month found jobs elsewhere. That has left Eagle scrambling to hire pilots from training academies and flight schools.

The pilot shortage was a contributing factor in some flight cancellations this year, American Eagle says. To open its door to more candidates, Eagle lowered its minimum for experience this year to 600 hours to tal flying time from 800 hours, and will “look” at some candidates in the 500-hour range, Eagle spokeswoman Andrea Huguely said.

Several years ago, regional airlines required applicants to have 1,500 hours of total flying time — 500 of those hours in multiengine airplanes. But now, some are down around 500 hours, with as little as 50 of those hours in multiengine airplanes, according to Kit Darby, president of Aviation Information Resources, Inc., an Atlanta-based career resource company for pilots.

Newly minted pilots start as co-pilots. The Federal Aviation Administration requirements to fly as a captain include at least 1,500 hours — which typically take two years.

Major airlines can still require several thousand cockpit hours of experience before taking the controls of Boeing and Airbus jets, and haven’t had a shortage of applicants. But Darby thinks regional airlines will be forced to drop as low as FAA licensing minimums — 250 hours to get a commercial license necessary to serve as a co-pilot — and bigger airlines will ultimately feel the pinch.

Concerned about the pilot shortage, Congress passed legislation recently raising the mandatory retirement age for U.S. commercial airline pilots to 65 from 60, and President Bush signed the law on Dec. 13. But even with the law, Darby estimates a net gain of about 1,500 pilots in the first year the retirement age is raised, while some 13,000 pilots were hired this year.

Ultimately the U.S. may have to adopt new, quicker training models for pilots, Darby says, and airlines may have to start paying for early schooling for pilots and raise their starting salaries, currently as low as $24,000 a year.

Airlines say training of new pilots has improved thanks to better technology, from full-motion cockpit simulators to computer- based ground school, and today’s regional airline pilots are just as safe if not safer than previous generations. Modern jets are filled with safety enhancements, too, making emergencies easier to handle safely. Airlines also point to military training programs that have pilots landing high-performance jets on aircraft carriers within one year and 200 to 300 hours.

“The notion that you need X amount of hours in a Cessna 172 in order to move up . . . with today’s technology and tools is wrong,” said Roger Cohen, president of the Regional Airline Association, which represents smaller carriers. “Someone with fewer hours but better hours, quality hours in modern training, may be more capable.”

Pilot shortage

Airlines around the world are scrambling to fill cockpits. Here are some of the things companies are trying:

Lowering experience levels for new hires.

Partnering with aviation schools.

Offering bonuses to new hires.

Paying for some training.

Developing fast-track licensing programs.

Originally published by SCOTT MCCARTNEY The Wall Street Journal.

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