Pilot Shortage

I have decided to make my final blog about something that I have lived for the last 15 years, and have watched many of my friends go choose paths that either paid off after lots of dues paying or led them into a lucrative career in anything but aviation.

The pilot shortage is real, and getting more and more real every day. The way that things are now it is unrecognizable to someone like me that has been around for the really awful times of 9/11/01, $140 a barrel oil,and all of the bankruptcies and mergers of the 2000s. That is a great thing for someone with some time and all of the licences I need. To give a little background on me, I was a kid whose dad was was in the aviation world, so I got to be around airports in the early 90s and got his pilots licence four months after 9/11 and I remember my commercial ground instructor coming in and asking us "so how does it feel to watch your careers go down the tubes?" And for the most part he was right.

I know that there are lots of articles about the cause of the current and future pilot shortage that we have, things like low starting pay, bad schedules, and the big one, the "1500 rule", and while, yes these things are all factors that have and will continue to make the problem worse, I have had a front row seat to the coming pilot shortage and I can tell you that things are going to get very out of control in the next few years.

Lets start with the numbers. The Rand Corporation did a study that said that the major airlines right now need around 3,000 pilots a year, and by 2020 that number will go to 4,000-5,000, while the same report said that the regionals and 135 operators will need 5,000 pilots a year, and that number will steadily rise until 2021 when the report says that they will need 8,000 new pilots a year, just to keep up with retirements. (Tallman, 2015) That means that if all of the available flight instructors go into commercial flying, and all of their students become flight instructors and leave for the airlines when they get 1500 hours, and so on... they will still only be able to fill 2/3 of the pilot slots needed in the next 5 years. (Levine-Weinberg, 2015) These numbers are insane and spell big trouble for not only the airlines but for businesses in the smaller cities that are going to lose airline service in the next 15 years. These numbers are only for the domestic carriers, with more than 40% of new airliners going to Asia in the next 20 years going to Asia,(Harrison, 2015) they are facing a pilot shortage that may pale in comparison to ours.

Now for the big fight, what caused it. There are numerous articles that are saying that the biggest cause for the pilot shortage is the so called "1500 Rule" that was instituted in 2014, that said that First officer must have an ATP licence, to fly a part 121 operation, where previously they only needed a  commercial pilots licence. This upped the required hours from 250 to 1500. (Fitzpatrick, 2015) Now in reality, no airlines were hiring at 250 hours but it was not uncommon to see people get hired with 500-600 hours.

The other big cause that is always pointed to is the low starting pay of regional pilots, and while I have to admit, $20,000 is not enough to live on, I do not think that that is as big a factor as they are making it out to be. I firmly believe that flying is one of the few careers that people would do for free if they were capable of. I have seen people with the flying sickness, the feeling that if they don't get to fly at least once a week, they start looking like caged bulls. I think that, especially at the beginning of your flight training, this love of flying is what gets you through the long, scary, and difficult pre-solo phase, past your cross countries and into your private licence. What happened to me was I had my private and was working toward my instrument licence and decided that I might as well get my commercial and CFI ratings, and make some of the money back that I had spent to get that far. Aviation is a passion that you try and figure a way to get paid to do. However if you do decide to pursue your passion, you have to make enough money to survive.  

The number one largest factor in my mind leading to the pilot shortage is the cost of training. I can not tell you how many times I have given flight instruction to students that are in their late 40s- early 50s and they tell me the same story, " They started flying out of high school and loved it but... life got in the way, kids, marriage, ect." And the time that they are talking about was when flight training is a fraction of what it is now. Now a days it costs almost $150,000 to get a college degree and up to your ATP licence (Olinga, 2016). That is absolute insanity, I don't understand how anyone can afford that, and even if they can afford it, how do you justify spending that much money, knowing that you are not going to make a living wage until you have been in the airlines for a few years? Its just hard to justify that kind of expense while knowing that it may never pay off, especially if we have another 9-11 or oil prices spike again.

That brings me to my last point, a major reason that I didn't go, and don't plan going into the airlines, is I have seen what happens to pilots when the industry turns down. The biggest concessions always come from the pilots, be it their pay, their benefits, or their jobs, Pilots are almost always the first to be cut and cut the deepest when things turn bad, and getting those concessions back is impossible.  I could fill pages of stories of friends that this has happened to with the airlines over the years, but lets just hope that we can get in and get enough seniority to be safe when this bubble of air travel and cheap gas pops. With all of these cuts and mergers and bad press at times, I have been able to see the role of airline pilot brought down from an enviable position, a master of all, to being treated as a glorified bus driver. I believe that this lack of prestige and recognition of the skills necessary to pilot an aluminum tube full of people all over the world, is the main reason that we are seeing the shortage of people wanting to be pilots.

References

Fitzpatrick, A. (2016, March 23). regional airlines hit by pilot shortage. Retrieved April 21, 2016, from http://time.com/4257940/pilot-shortage/

Harrison, V. (2015, July 21). The world needs more pilots: 28,000 new jobs a year - Jul. 21, 2015. Retrieved April 21, 2016, from http://money.cnn.com/2015/07/21/news/companies/boeing-pilots-demand/

Levine-Weinberg, A. (2015, August 10). why the U.S. airline pilot shortage is so hard to solve -- The Motley Fool. Retrieved April 21, 2016, from http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2015/08/10/why-the-us-airline-pilot-shortage-is-so-hard-to-so.aspx

Olinga, L. (2016, March 7). pilot shortage hits US regional airlines. Retrieved April 21, 2016, from https://www.yahoo.com/news/pilot-shortage-hits-us-regional-airlines-042334238.html?ref=gs

Tallman, J. (2015, May 5). pilot shortage: yes or no? - AOPA. Retrieved from http://www.aopa.org/News-and-Video/All-News/2015/May/05/osu-pilot-supply-conference

   

NTSB Most wanted

The NTSB has some good ideas with their most wanted lists. Their idea is that by putting out what they see as the cause of too many accidents and their ideas on how to fix them. If I were to rank their 2016 Most wanted Improvements I would do them like this.
1. Prevent Loss of control in flight
2. Fatigue related accidents
3. Medical Fitness
4. Reducing distractions
5. Cockpit image recorders.

The reason that I think that Loss of control (LOC) Prevention should be at the top, is because it is really scary to think that someone could fly very little and in very specific situations, can load up a plane full of people and fly into conditions that could be far and above their skill level and lose control and kill everyone on the plane and even people on the ground. There have been over 1200 deaths in the last six years contributed to Loss of Control (NTSB, n.d.) LOC accidents are not only a GA problem. Look at the Colgan Air crash or the Air France flight, both of those aircraft entered textbook stalls, and the pilots reacted in the worst possible ways and crashed the airplane.

The second one on the list is kind of the dirty little secret of aviation. I spent a year flying cargo, and not even that hard of flying, we were out at 6am sat in a hotel room all day and flew back around 6 pm. I was off duty by 9:30 PM every night, but there wasn't one day that I wasn't at least tired, if not fully fatigued. And I know that most of the other pilots felt that way.  I know that 121 carriers are a little better at giving their pilots more rest than 135 operators, but just the lifestyle of living out of a suitcase, in hotels, and the demands of the job make pilots much more fatigued than people that put in 9-5 jobs. The rules that are in place are meant to be a bare minimum, but most if not nearly all commercial operations just copy and paste the regs into their schedule, the thought being that if its legal it must be safe, but that is just not the case.

They have medical fitness on here, but I think that really there should be ways to improve the medical reporting without risking losing your licence. As we saw on the German Wings crash last year, the fear of losing your medical and with it your entire flying career, is enough to make people hide very important medical information. It is the fear of the swift and decisive action that follows disclosing a medical problem, that keeps pilots mum on things that could be a small problem and prevents them from getting help while it is still a small problem.

Distractions in the cockpit can be a problem, but I don't see it as huge problem. Flying on autopilot, day in and day out over the same route can be boring, so what is the difference if a pilot is reading his phone or a book? But when its time for sterile cockpit, I would doubt that you would see any PEDs out.

Lastly, I think the idea of having image recorders in the cockpit would do very little to improve safety. The idea makes more sense in a train where things can jump out at you, but with the voice recorders and the flight data recorders, the investigators get a pretty good idea what happened.

Again I don't think that Cockpit image recorders are necessary for airplanes. There just isn't enough situations that having the image recorded would help in the investigation of accidents. As well as if video of a crash would get out, it could greatly hurt the aviation industry, by letting people see the final moments of a crash.

One thing I would like to see on the list, is an improvement of stick and rudder skills for 121 pilots who spend way too much time on autopilot that they lose the skills to actually fly the airplane if the situation calls for it.

As far as what I think the FAA will actually address, I think that they are working on the medical fitness and I have seen many forums on the Loss of Control issue. LOC is becoming what runway incursions were when I was starting out in the pilot world. Where there is intense focus on the causes and ways to keep them from happening, from training to recognition and prevention.

NTSB. (n.d.). prevent loss of control in flight in general aviation. Retrieved April 10, 2016, from http://www.ntsb.gov/safety/mwl/Pages/mwl6-2016.aspx

NTSB. (n.d.). disconnect from deadly distractions. Retrieved April 10, 2016, from http://www.ntsb.gov/safety/mwl/Pages/mwl5-2016.aspx

Aviation Organizations

Aviation organizations are a great tool to get to know people in the industry and to have a lot of fun in the world of aviation.

 I have been a member of the Experimental Aircraft Association ever since I was 6 years old. I have also been a member of the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association for over 15 years, ever since I became a commercial pilot. I plan on continuing with these organizations because I believe that they are a great way to bring people into the world of aviation.

The EAA's main objective is to promote general aviation, as well as bring new people into the world of aviation. (EAA, n.d.) If you were to go to an airport and started talking to someone about being interested in being involved in aviation, there is a good chance that you would be talking to an EAA member. They have nearly 1000 chapters and over 180,000 members, all focused on promoting the "Spirit of Flight" (EAA, n.d.)
They do this by hosting Young Eagles events, that allow children to get some free time in a general aviation airplane, they also have local fly ins that bring people to airports and of course they host Airventure in Oshkosh, Wisconsin every year where thousands of pilots and aviation enthusiasts gather to see the latest and greatest as well as classic and antique aircraft. The EAA is also very involved in advocacy, especially for older and recreational pilots.

 The AOPA is another organization that's main goal is the promotion of General Aviation. They focus mainly on advocacy and education for pilots as well as lobbying congress and even state and local governments to keep General Aviation accessible to all. (AOPA, n.d.) AOPA has over 400,000 members and uses that clout to help fight back against laws and regulations that are aimed at hurting GA or giving businesses like the airlines preferential treatment. The AOPA has been on the frontlines fighting against user-fees, and ATC privatization as well as all of the knee-jerk security regulations that came out after 9-11

The EAA and the AOPA are the two biggest advocates for General Aviation. Both take great steps in protecting and encouraging new and recreational pilots, they just do it in slightly different ways. The EAA is focused mainly on bringing new pilots into the world, they were a big proponent behind the Sport Pilot rule, which was supposed to bring the cost of flying way down. (It worked...kinda) but they also do the grassroots work of having local chapters and promoting aviation on the ground. Where the AOPA takes more of a legal protection aspect more seriously, they are the ones that are talking to congressmen and women, and pushing for a fair shake in government regulations and laws, as well as helping to protect airports from developers.

The reason that it is important to not only join but to be active in these organizations is the same reason that it is important that Labor unions are important. Without them, the people with the most money, will have the most influence and it is only through the collective weight of these organizations that the everyday pilots voice can be heard.

Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association. (n.d.). mission and history of AOPA - AOPA. Retrieved April 3, 2016, from http://www.aopa.org/About-AOPA/Governance/Mission-and-History-of-AOPA

Experimental Aircraft Association. (n.d.). who we are | EAA. Retrieved April 3, 2016, from https://www.eaa.org/en/eaa/about-eaa/who-we-are

Chinese competitor to Boeing and Airbus

Aviation boneyards are littered with great airplanes that didn't fit with the times and demands of commercial airlines, these manufacturers may have had the best airplane that money could buy, but because of shifts in  business strategies, high maintenance costs (DC-10) downturns in the industry, or just a loss of public trust (Concorde) these companies are no longer around. What is probably going to be the next aircraft manufacturer to join the dustbin of history rolled out late last year in China. The C919 is built to compete with the Boeing 737 and the Airbus A320, the problem that the chinese manufacturer has is that Boeing has been producing their 737 for over 50 years, and not only have the knowledge but the spares and parts in place that the C919 will never make a big impact on the market.

Now I will never completely count the Chinese out of anything. I have been amazed at how much money they can throw at a project, just look up the Three Gorges Dam, so it is entirely possible that they will get FAA approval for their C919, but that could be 5-10 years off and there is a lot of pitfalls ahead of them.

The biggest problem with a Chinese manufacturer is the public perception that everything that is made in china is cheap and of inferior quality. The perception of their multi-million dollar aircraft will be the same, even if most of their components were made by US suppliers. (Francis 2015) But if they do get FAA approval, I do not see them moving the needle on the US market, because of public perception of the quality of chinese made goods.

The Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China, or COMAC for short, is wholly owned by the Chinese government,(COMAC, n.d.) the same government that is certifying the aircraft and is probably putting some serious pressure on the airlines in China to buy the aircraft. You can see the conflict of interest here, and with the State owned media if there is an accident or just a problem with the aircraft I wouldn't expect to hear much about them. COMAC does have future plans for bigger aircraft, the C929 which will hold 290 passengers and the C939 which could hold up to 390 passengers. (globalsecurity, n.d.)

IF the airplane does enter the market, and that is a big IF, I do not see them entering the big markets of the US or even Europe. Designing an airliner from scratch is a HUGE undertaking and the way that they have done this, without having the input of the FAA or EASA, (Francis, 2015) will have a major impact on their certifications. I do see some of the ultra low budget carriers in third world areas buying some, just because of the low price, but the first time one goes down somewhere that the Chinese government can't control the media, that will be the end of the aircraft outside of China.

There haven't been many responses from Boeing or Airbus on the new C919, but that is because they do not see the plane as a serious threat to their businesses. As the Chinese are working to get the best out of the technology that exists now, Boeing and Airbus are designing new technology that will make anything the Chinese make obsolete. Aircraft like the 737 MAX and the A320neo are already erasing any competitive advantage that the 919 may have had. (Francis, 2015)

COMAC. (n.d.). Company Profile_Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China, Ltd. Retrieved from http://english.comac.cc/aboutus/introduction/

Francis, L. (2015, December 21). China’s Comac to challenge Boeing and Airbus - IEEE spectrum. Retrieved from http://spectrum.ieee.org/aerospace/aviation/chinas-comac-to-challenge-boeing-and-airbus

Globalsecurity.org. (n.d.). COMAC C929 / COMAC C939 large airliner. Retrieved from http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/china/c929.htm

Professionalism in the Regional Airlines

The looming "Pilot Shortage" has been talked about for almost as long as I have been flying, but its just in the last few years that it has actually materialized. There really isn't any debate on whether there is a pilot shortage or not, There absolutely is, they say that with the current capacity of training pilots we will only be able to supply two thirds of the pilots needed over the next 20 years.(Anderson, 2016 The real debate is about what caused it and what can be done to fix it.
The airline side of the argument is that since the so called 1500 rule was put into effect in 2014, every co pilot that flew on a 121 carrier needed to have their ATP licence, and it is this rule alone that is choking off the pilot supply. Pilot's Unions see it differently, they point to the fact that first year pay at the regional airlines is so low as to be undesirable to pilots and want to be pilots.
I see it as a whole flock of chickens coming home to roost. I have been flying for over 15 years and I got to see the industry in the late 90s to the crash after 9/11 and then again in 2005 when oil got silly, and then again in 2008, and with all of the downturns in the industry, every time they took more from their pilots, be it pay, vacation time, or benefits. And every time things got better for the airlines, the CEOs got big bonuses but the pilots never even got back what was taken away from them in the bad times. Add to it the fact that the cost of training has more than doubled since I got my first licences and I would find it hard to recruit a good candidate by telling him "Come to our flight school and give us $150,000, and you can be an airline pilot...in about 5 years after you graduate....and make $20,000 your first year..." (Northshore.edu. 2013)

There are some serious changes that need to happen to save the regional airline from going down like Republic Airlines,(Kieler, 2016),  The biggest one is to address the cost of flight instruction, there have been some that have been able to start some cadet programs like the european carriers that have been dealing with pilot shortages for decades, (Northshore.edu, 2013) but they also have to start treating their pilots as the professionals they are. You can see that that is coming with the new fights that the pilots unions have been winning in negotiations. 

There are many groups that are pushing the airlines version of what is causing the shortage, but the biggest is the Regional Airline Association, they are a group that represents the regional airlines and do very well at pointing the finger at everyone but their members treatment of pilots. And like most big trade organizations they say that if we just get rid of all regulation they would be able to do everything, well and safely. (RAA,2016)

All of this low pay and low time, as well as airlines treating pilots like garbage led to a lack of professionalism in the pilot ranks, that eventually led to accidents like we saw in Buffalo, with Colgan air.  

To me professionalism is people showing up for their jobs and know what is expected of them, knowing how do get the job done and doing it in the best, most expeditious and safe way possible and are compensated accordingly. As the airlines found in the late 2000s, you get what you pay for.
There was lots of lack of professionalism at colgan air, from the pilots talking about non essential things during the approach phase of flight to the pressure from the management on pilots to not call in fatigued.
I absolutely believe that low pay contributed to the lack of professionalism, like I said, you get what you pay for.
The best way to maintain professionalism is to know your craft. Take pride in everything that you do, make the best landing, hit your altitude and airspeed perfectly. If you accept no errors and do your best to fix your shortcomings, you will be rewarded in some way.

References

Anderson, B. (2016, January 28). pilot shortage threatens to slow us airline growth. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/oliverwyman/2016/01/28/pilot-shortage-threatens-to-slow-u-s-airline-growth/#45bfbec8bb6e

Kieler, A. (2016, February 26). Major Airlines’ Regional Partner, Republic Airways, Files For Bankruptcy Over Pilot Shortage – Consumerist. Retrieved from https://consumerist.com/2016/02/26/major-airlines-regional-partner-republic-airways-files-for-bankruptcy-over-pilot-shortage/

Northshore.edu. (2013). an investigation of the united states airline pilot supply. Retrieved from https://www.northshore.edu/cms/file/academics/programs/avd/web_resources/airline-labor-supply.pdf

RAA. (2016, February 26). Regional Airline Association Statement on Republic Airways Bankruptcy - Regional Airline Association. Retrieved from http://www.raa.org/news/277230/

Commercial Space

For the first few decades of space flight, the only way that you could get into space was if you were put there by a government that had the capability, basically the USA or USSR and then Russia. There were some very rich people that were able to spend millions of dollars on a single flight to the International space station. While these passengers were technically space tourists, they were still dependent on governments to get them into space and safely back to earth. That all changed in 2004 when a ship designed by Burt Rutan and piloted by Mike Melville was able to launch into space and capture the Ansari X prize. I was able to see the ship when it was on its way to the Smithsonian at Oshkosh. I sat in on every talk given about it and even through some luck was able to shake Sir Richard Branson's hand.

Like I said, there were a few billionaires that were able to get rides on Russian rockets for many millions of dollars, but it wasn't until Rutan was able to get his ship into space did the idea of a commercial space tourist industry begin. Since then there have been many people with ideas, but it is Elon Musk's Space X and Branson's Virgin Galactic that have been the only ones to produce a ship that can get into space and back. There have been some hurdles, Branson's company has had some accidents and deaths, and Musk's failures have been on the news many times. But if you compare the meticulous ways that they are going about space flight as they did with early flight, early spaceflight will be thousands of times safer than early flight was.  

The one thing about rapid expansion of technology, the rules and regulations can not keep up. Commercial space flight has its own part of the Federal Regulations, but if you look at the site you will see that there isn't much there. Basically the only thing that the government has to say about is that you have to have a permit to launch or retrieve things from space. (Federal Register, 2016) However there was an Office of Commercial Space Travel started in 1984, not real sure what they were around for but they have been shuffled around through the Department of Transportation until they ended up in the FAA and I assume that's where they will stay as the industry takes off and we see more regulations.(Office of Commercial Space Transportation, n.d)

I really believe that we are looking at the start of the commercial space industry. If you look at it there are many parallels between the start of commercial aviation and the start of commercial space travel. While things are going incredibly slow, the only ones that are making money are taking government payloads (not unlike the early Air mail routes) I believe that there will be a major interest in the near future. 

Being a pilot on a commercial space flight will not be an easy gig to get in the beginning. Right now Virgin Galactic is taking pilots from the other Virgin Airlines and training them, but there have been some ideas of what kinds of requirements they would be looking for. Things like 3000 hours and experience in many different aircraft are a must.  (Belfiore, 2009)

Belfiore, M. (2009, February). license to thrill | space | air & space magazine. Retrieved from http://www.airspacemag.com/space/license-to-thrill-46607056/?no-ist

Federal Register. (2016, February 10). eCFR — Code of Federal Regulations. Retrieved March 13, 2016, from http://www.ecfr.gov/cgi-bin/text-idx?gp=&SID=1f58495405665a030c05e44bca5a8591&mc=true&tpl=/ecfrbrowse/Title14/14chapterIII.tpl

Office of Commercial Space Transportation. (n.d.). Office of Commercial Space Transportation. Retrieved March 13, 2016, from http://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/ast/regulations/

Global Airlines.

There are many airlines that are subsidized by their government in one way or another, but the airlines of the Gulf states are more so than the others by a wide margin. Airlines like Qatar Airlines, Emirates and Etihad Airlines are very heavily subsidized by their home countries. This is a direct violation of the Open Skies agreement between the United States and these countries.(Laing, 2015)

The idea behind the Open Sky agreement, that has now been signed by over 100 countries, was that the airlines of each country that signed the agreement would enjoy free and open access to each other's airspace without having to be at the mercy of governments demands on routes, or fares. Another key component of this agreement was that the airlines that were benefiting from the Open Skies agreement would not be heavily subsidised by their respective governments, the idea being that the airlines would have to make it in the market on their own. (State Department, 2011)

All of the legacy airlines started as completely government subsidised, as they were flying the mail, but with the loss of the mail contracts and the deregulation of the 1970s, many of the domestic carriers became almost completely dependant on the free market to survive. There are some exeptions that are written into our laws, and while not as heavily subsidised as the Gulf States, the domestic carriers do depend on programs like the Essential Air service that the government pays the airlines to provide service to smaller more remote airlines. Another program is the Fly America Act that tells government employees that they have to fly on US owned airlines for official business. There is also a lot of rules and laws that help protect the airlines if they get in trouble, things like bankruptcy protection and the government pays millions every year to repair and improve airports for the airlines. 

Another unfair advantage that the foreign carriers have is that they are able to use the United States' own government to their advantage over US carriers, in that they can purchase the aircraft at a lower interest rate because of the Government run Export-Import Bank. This Export-Import bank guarantees loans to foreign companies that are buying American made products that would not be able to get private funding to purchase. While this is a great thing for US based Boeing, it is not a great thing for US based airlines that are having to but the same aircraft at higher interest rates. (Weisman, Lipton, 2015)

I believe that the airlines that are very heavily subsidized by their countries create a very unfair playing field in putting out a service that doesn't have to make enough to pay the basic bills and can just focus on the extras, that is why the Emirates and Qatar airlines are so much more luxurious. This will end in them getting more market share that they would have been able to do if they weren't so heavily subsidised.

Laing, K. (2015, March 12). airlines: foreign subsidies are destroying flight competition. Retrieved from http://thehill.com/policy/transportation/235543-airlines-foreign-subsidies-destroying-flight-competition

State Department. (2011, March 29). open skies partnerships: expanding the benefits of freer commercial aviation. Retrieved from http://www.state.gov/r/pa/pl/159347.htm

Weisman, J., & Lipton, E. (2015, April 6). Boeing and Delta spend millions in fight Over export-import bank existence - The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/07/business/boeing-delta-air-lines-export-import-bank.html?_r=0