Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Alaska Pilot Shortage in AK...

Pay for new pilots has always been low because flying was glamorous and bunches of people wanted to do it. Flying has come to be considered more of a job than a glamorous occupation so it attracts fewer persons wanting to be pilots.

Flying has become a lot more expensive. Not like the days when one could rent a C-150 wet for $8 to $12 per hour. Instructors also wish to be paid more and when they find out the won't be they drop out leaving instructors who charge more.

Flying has become more regulated taking some of the pleasure out of it. This is less true in AK than the lower 48.

If you don't have enough wars, you don't get enough ex-military pilots who have been trained to fly jets, helicopters, etc.

I would say airlines will have to pay more for their pilots and people will have to pay more for their transportation.

Same here - new guys made procedural mistakes, older guys made complacency mistakes which tended to be more fatal.

Doesn't take long to get rather lazy and at ease behind the wheel of a truck.

If you want to read a good book that lays this all out pretty good, read "Squawk 7700" by Peter Buffington. It is a real eye opener as to how bad the small airlines and freight companies abuse young pilots who are willing to fly almost for free to build time for a "real job."

I work for one of the largest, if not THE largest flight training school in the US. These kids all have a dream of being a captain on a wide-body someday. Instructor turnover is huge; kids teaching kids.

Most of our students are contract students and headed for foreign jobs though.

They teach them to fly assuming that they are going for an airline job. No seat of your pants stuff, no thinking outside the box, just get them ready for a commuter airline.

Dennis, my first flight instructor, who was my college roomate, just retired last year as Delta's senior 747 captain and check pilot. He said a vast majority of airline pilots now have no basic stick & rudder skills. They were trained to airline standards to be heavy jet drivers and most couldn't even look down at a lake or pond and tell you which way the wind was blowing on the surface.
Fortunately, since he is over 65 and can't fly the heavies, he has gone back to instructing instruments students in a Cherokee.

I believe him. I see their students fly every day. I see their lesson plans. They are purely there to get you ready to fly a big jet. I don't think it is unique here, either. When I go up with instructors, it's all about numbers. Everything is done by numbers. I'll none of these kids could fly a plane without a glass cockpit either. I guess it is working good enough or they wouldn't do it.

In the auto industry there is all this talk about driverless cars, but how long has the military been using drones ? things are changing

Aren't military drones flown remotely? as opposed to flying by computer?

Yes, the USAF has "Remotely Piloted Aircraft" - RPA's, not drones.

In fact, the definition of "drone" is an aircraft operating autonomously. In USAF documentation, the MQ-1, RQ-170, etc are referred to RPA's. Drone is just a word that the stupid media has latched onto in ignorance.

Also, RPA's have an atrocious mishap rate in the USAF- many times higher than manned aircraft.

Thank you for the clarification! Add "drone" to Saturday night special, and weapon.

Drones of mass destruction.