Aviation Downturns

derg said:
Some are literally making over 10X in a year than I made as a new captain at Skyway. But they're... broke. Hmm.
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Whelp, when you have to buy all the latest Apple tech every year, drive the latest BMW model while living in your upscale house/condo on f/o pay, I can see why they’re always broke. Have no idea how I ever lived on $13k-$25k back in the day while living in NY flying for the “commuters”. A broke down crashpad car would've been an upgrade from what I was driving at the time. 2500 hrs with 500-750 multi would barely raise an eyebrow at the commuters flying BE99’s when I was getting started and dinosaurs roamed the Earth. Nowadays, folks are getting hired at the legacies with that kind of time. Now let me run outside and scream at the kids on my lawn….😏
 
🦈💜 said:
It's real easy to preach down, but everyone faces their own challenges, and while every journey is different, it's easy to project your experiences on others without really understanding them.
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Do you think I didn’t have hardships in this career? Do you think I don’t understand what working for a scumbag operator is like? Do you think I don’t understand fatigue? Do you think I don’t understand financial issues? Do you think I don’t understand external personal factors and how this career affects personal relationships?

Your aviation journey is not unique. I can almost guarantee that whatever you’re dealing with or my mentees are dealing with I’ve experienced in this industry.

Preach down…ok…again…listen to the message. People want to help you…but instead you’d rather just rage against the machine. If you want out, fine, there’s nothing wrong with that. This career isn’t for everyone. No one is forcing you to be here.
 
JordanD said:
Did these mentees go through COVID while in the business or did they mostly start their airline careers in the 2021-2023 wave? I've only been in the industry directly for a decade and 2020 was my first "here it is, my first downturn/potential furlough/industry implosion." I'm lucky enough to have been around people in the job to know that while it was the first, and probably not the last downturn I'd see in my career, commuting through IAH and seeing the airport littered with parked airplanes was the first in an "oh •" realization, compounded when I was ferrying airplanes to BFE to be stored for an indeterminate amount of time. I still can't believe how lucky we got that that whole thing was a relatively minor bump in the road, industry wise. I've always believed in having a furlough fund in the bank before that, but that really compounded the importance. Just curious if a lot of the people complaining had that moment or got hired immediately after.
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You make a good point Jordan. Some were in the infancy stages of training but others not even in the industry yet.

Covid was a scary time for airline pilots and I don’t want to downplay it, but it was also very short lived followed by extreme growth. I’m just not sure if it hits as hard as some of the other black swan events even though it should.

I preach a furlough fund to anyone that listens. That’s great advice. The amount of stress that a fund like that sheds in this career is absolutely worth the financial investment.
 
🦈💜 said:
Stop treating numbers as if they're constants. Inflation.
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I’m afraid you missed the point entirely.

What was $15,000 in 1996 is about $30K today. But that wasn’t the point. The message is right there in the text and I’m afraid that all I can offer is re-reading it without sniping-out the math.
 
///AMG said:
I wonder if a lot of these folks got into this industry, or are at least trying to get in, for the wrong reasons. I'm sure someone will take offense to pretty-new to 121 me saying that there are wrong reasons, or "what the hell were your reasons man?". But I'd say that you should have an interest in aviation first. And you shouldn't be doing this job to get rich. That's it. Nothing wrong with trying to get wealthy doing it, but that isn't the vast majority of pro aviation. It just happens to be the life that aviation influencers popularized in the last decade, probably inaccurately in a lot of cases, that young kids are emulating. Maybe an unpopular take
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I do this because I like flying airplanes.

I stay (and do it on days where I'd rather not) because they pay me an almost literal boatload of money to do it, and because I like flying airplanes, even on days when I'd rather not, I'm still flying an airplane.
 
JordanD said:
Did these mentees go through COVID while in the business or did they mostly start their airline careers in the 2021-2023 wave? I've only been in the industry directly for a decade and 2020 was my first "here it is, my first downturn/potential furlough/industry implosion." I'm lucky enough to have been around people in the job to know that while it was the first, and probably not the last downturn I'd see in my career, commuting through IAH and seeing the airport littered with parked airplanes was the first in an "oh •" realization, compounded when I was ferrying airplanes to BFE to be stored for an indeterminate amount of time. I still can't believe how lucky we got that that whole thing was a relatively minor bump in the road, industry wise. I've always believed in having a furlough fund in the bank before that, but that really compounded the importance. Just curious if a lot of the people complaining had that moment or got hired immediately after.
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"What do you mean you've never sat reserve? never mind"
 
A300Capt said:
Whelp, when you have to buy all the latest Apple tech every year, drive the latest BMW model while living in your upscale house/condo on f/o pay, I can see why they’re always broke. Have no idea how I ever lived on $13k-$25k back in the day while living in NY flying for the “commuters”. A broke down crashpad car would've been an upgrade from what I was driving at the time. 2500 hrs with 500-750 multi would barely raise an eyebrow at the commuters flying BE99’s when I was getting started and dinosaurs roamed the Earth. Nowadays, folks are getting hired at the legacies with that kind of time. Now let me run outside and scream at the kids on my lawn….😏
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I remember when I was at Skyway, someone would get married and we were roundly “OMG! How can they afford…oh the fiance is a doctor?”

I think there was a lot more leapfrogging jobs back then and the mere fact that I went from CFI-Regional-Major was still somewhat of an anomaly as most of my peers were banner-CFI-prop freight-commuter-struggling major-major. You can’t swing a broom in the my employers pilot lounge and not whap someone in the head that did a tour of duty at Midway (1, 2), TWA, Midwest, ExpressOne, Planet, Champion, etc.

Another difference today may be ‘hope’. Even thought we’re off the irrational exuberance of 2022/2023, it’s still a fantastic time to become an airline pilot. But maybe Training > Regional > Career Carrier is maybe shifting to Training > CFI > Regional > Small LCC > Career Carrier. I don’t know, I wish I didn’t have an NDA to dance around else I could really speak freely on the record.
 
derg said:
“Can I bring a broadsword and fire people at-will, with no restrictions? Nah, I don’t think I’m the right guy for the job”
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People would complain the ORD chief at NKS would yell at them. I’d rather be yelled at than issued a letter of investigation, especially because odds are he would promptly forget whatever he was yelling at you over about two seconds after he hung up.

I’ll take the yelling over the paperwork, thanks.
 
Autothrust Blue said:
People would complain the ORD chief at NKS would yell at them. I’d rather be yelled at than issued a letter of investigation, especially because odds are he would promptly forget whatever he was yelling at you over about two seconds after he hung up.

I’ll take the yelling over the paperwork, thanks.
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That’s actually one of the few things I miss about Kalitta. Now at Brand X I deal with an investigation and I say out loud numerous times during the meeting, this probably could have been dealt with by pro stands. It falls on deaf ears, but it’s the truth.
 
A little adversity makes for a better cockpit companion. - Unpopular opinion

If you want to tell me I'm wrong I'll be in Camelback at a former Courtyard Marriott next to Whole Foods tomorrow.

#LivinTheDream
 

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jhugz said:
That’s actually one of the few things I miss about Kalitta. Now at Brand X I deal with an investigation and I say out loud numerous times during the meeting, this probably could have been dealt with by pro stands. It falls on deaf ears, but it’s the truth.
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Are you a chief or something?
 
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