Sunwest

[nimbostratus]

Well, guess this "slave" should add his two cents as well.

I worked the ramp after flight school. Spent two and a half years off and on working for an aircraft refuelling company.

When I left flight schol, I'd learned how to fly a multi-engine aircraft well enough to get a commercial license with an IFR. I knew nothing about aviation as a profession. No one I knew had ever been involved in the industry. My time on the ramp taught me a lot about the industry, it also introduced me to many people who have had a strong influence in my career.
I got my first (part-time) job flying while I was working the ramp. Just chatting with a customer and it slipped out that I was a pilot. He hired me on the spot to work pulling banners on my days off. Didn't add up to a lot of time but it was my first step through the door.
Later when I would find a seasonal job I would leave fuelling (once with only a days notice) be gone for several months and when it ended I'd always have a spot fuelling planes to pay the rent.
Believe me, I was much happier being at an airport, around aircraft and learning from the pilots coming through the door about a lot more than flying planes, than flipping burgers. It paid much better too..

A few years later on, one of the guys I met fuelling was looking for a first officer on a jet. He remembered me from the ramp and hired me based on that. I went from flying a piston twin to a jet.

Yup, I'm a slave...

[crankedup]

You should all sit back, take a deep breath, and listen to what BrownBear and his supporters are trying to tell you.

If I'm not entirely out to lunch on this one, what they are trying to point out, is that the industry has evolved into a cesspool of bullshit that newcomers have to endure to get their first flying job and it just isn't right.

The system is so fucked up now, that a new guy is looking at spending a few years on the ramp while waiting for that elusive flying position, and it appears to me to be a case of these companies exploiting young inexperienced pilots as much as humanly possible for no better reason than they can.[/b. So they do

Its called cheap labor. And as long as pilots are willing to do it, it will continue. Its not right and it should never have sunk to such a level. Having said all that, what else can a guy do other than get on with it and hope it all ends someday with an airplane strapped to your ass.

I was, and still am away from Canada, but I spent a few months, a few years ago, in Canada, laying low, while the dust settled on one issue or another. Anyway I went up to where I started so long ago and actually did some TO flying for my old company, to keep busy, in one of the AC I flew for them back when I was about 22-23. I was a TO captain back then at that age and I was nothing special. It was normal. Floats-wheels-skis. IFR-VFR.

But I was appalled at what you are all discussing here in this post. How new guys have to eat so much shit to get to where they want to be. Its not necessary to learn any particular skills associated with flying and don't let any dipshit ever try to tell you different.

Hopefully industry demands will someday spell an end to this ridiculous treatment of employees.

Thats all folks

[Captain_Canuck]

Well said Crankedup........Well said

[ScudRunner]

The issue is that to get your CPL all you need is a heart beat with a bank loan and a year to complete the training. The choke points to filter out the weak have evolved into this as a result of this vast over supply of pilots in the market as a result of this lack entrance requirements. This continues through the job market with low wages and slow advancement, other professions and industries have established prerequisites and entrance exams before studying can even begin. Further to those entrance requirements the time commitment is a heck of a lot longer and more involved with multiple tests or choke points along the way.

Until this excess of pilots in the market is dealt with this will remain the system.