David Learmount/AMSTERDAM
Airlines face a pilot shortage due to the military supply drying up and because pilot careers are no longer considered attractive by suitable applicants, the industry was warned at the Flight International Crew Management conference in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, on 25 and 26 March.
The high training costs for self-sponsored pilots with no guarantee of a job at the end is a major reason for the candidate shortage, delegates heard. In addition, airlines have always recruited sporadically, reducing the career's visibility for long periods of time, according to Britannia Airways chief training pilot Nick Winspear. Bigger aircraft rather than fleet numbers has exaggerated this effect, he says.
Kathy Hindes, Britannia's personnel manager air crew, said: "It [the quality pilot recruit supply] is beginning to dry up now." Britannia has just completed a recruitment programme and was surprised at the poor quality of applicants, says Hindes. "We are beginning [ab-initio] sponsorship schemes now," she adds.
One of Britannia's selection tests requires pilots to fly its Boeing 767 simulator without using autopilot, autothrottle, flight director and using only raw navigation data with no navigation display. Many 757/767 pilots with 4,000h experience failed abysmally, says Winspear.
Source: Flight International