Best route into commercial aviation - UK/NZ/AUS?
Guest
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Best route into commercial aviation - UK/NZ/AUS?
One thing i've noticed from reading this forum is that although some are saying that 'there has never been a better time' to pursue a commercial flying career in the UK, there are still plenty of people graduating from ATPL training with 250 hours and struggling to find a job. Considering that this kind of training in the UK costs about £50k from ab-initio, this seems like a MASSIVE risk to me.
Does anyone have an opinion on the health of the industry/prospects for jobs in other English-speaking countries (USA, NZ, Australia?). I have dual UK/NZ nationality and am considering living in NZ anyway so I'm interested as to whether it's any 'easier' over there. I know the training is much cheaper but what about finding a job afterwards?
Returning to fly in a JAA state seems a no-go with a NZ license (expensive conversion), but what about in Australia? What are the NZ->Australia immigration laws like? (Bit off-topic I know....)
Thanks for any info, I'm thinking that there's no point in spending £50k for a UK ATPL when I could end up in the same kind of job in NZ for a third of the cost.
Cheers
Does anyone have an opinion on the health of the industry/prospects for jobs in other English-speaking countries (USA, NZ, Australia?). I have dual UK/NZ nationality and am considering living in NZ anyway so I'm interested as to whether it's any 'easier' over there. I know the training is much cheaper but what about finding a job afterwards?
Returning to fly in a JAA state seems a no-go with a NZ license (expensive conversion), but what about in Australia? What are the NZ->Australia immigration laws like? (Bit off-topic I know....)
Thanks for any info, I'm thinking that there's no point in spending £50k for a UK ATPL when I could end up in the same kind of job in NZ for a third of the cost.
Cheers
Guest
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Hi,
I was just about to start a thread on this topic, although with different Countries in mind.
My position is I have married in mainland China, I have spent a quite a while there and I can just about speak Mandarin + Shanghainese.
I am going down the modular route in the UK and hope to finish in Canada with a type rating on a 737-300 in early 2003.
I hope to gain employment with Air China or Cathay Pacific, but any carrier in Asia will do. (or anyone on this planet)
I am interested to see if there is a need for JAA pilots in some countries more than others.
Does being multi lingual help ? (no cunning jokes please !)
Anyway sorry if I have hijacked your topic to talk about Asia.
Best Regards to all Wanabees,
YanYan.
[This message has been edited by YanYan (edited 27 May 2001).]
I was just about to start a thread on this topic, although with different Countries in mind.
My position is I have married in mainland China, I have spent a quite a while there and I can just about speak Mandarin + Shanghainese.
I am going down the modular route in the UK and hope to finish in Canada with a type rating on a 737-300 in early 2003.
I hope to gain employment with Air China or Cathay Pacific, but any carrier in Asia will do. (or anyone on this planet)
I am interested to see if there is a need for JAA pilots in some countries more than others.
Does being multi lingual help ? (no cunning jokes please !)
Anyway sorry if I have hijacked your topic to talk about Asia.
Best Regards to all Wanabees,
YanYan.
[This message has been edited by YanYan (edited 27 May 2001).]
Guest
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Forget New Zealand. Probably OZ too. The reason that there are so many of us antipodeans over here in the UK is that the job market down there is completely stuffed. Airlines in trouble all over the place, for instance NZ's second airline Qantas NZ went under a month or so ago.
Stay in the UK and 'do your time'. Much better prospects in the long run.
Sorry to be so glum.
Stay in the UK and 'do your time'. Much better prospects in the long run.
Sorry to be so glum.
Guest
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My 2p's worth....
I was over in the US back in Jan doing some hour building, and the FAA School I hired a plane from consisted of mainly Brit instructors. This lot held JAR PPLs but had got hacked off with the JAA system / cost and gone and got the FAA CPL CFI stuff, and were now working as instructors, while hour building.
I recently got a quote from one of the schools to take me from PPL to FAA Commercial SE/ME/IR CFI CFII (Instrument instructor) and it came out at around $18,000 (~£12,000),inc. 150hrs and all exams and skill tests.
From what I gathered talking to this lot was that it is not that hard to get a visa for the US, and especially to get a job as an instructor for a few years as the airlines are snapping the more experienced people up.
I have also been told by a mate of mine learning to fly in Singapore / Malaysia that the FAA licence is 'prefered' and most people who progress beyond PPL head off to the US to get the CPL, so chances in Asia may be better....Not sure if this is because there are a lot of N reg's there or becasue the conversion costs are cheaper.
Then there's the problem of conversion if you decide to convert to JAA.......very expensive, unless the FAA join the JAA in the future....(v unlikely!!)
I was over in the US back in Jan doing some hour building, and the FAA School I hired a plane from consisted of mainly Brit instructors. This lot held JAR PPLs but had got hacked off with the JAA system / cost and gone and got the FAA CPL CFI stuff, and were now working as instructors, while hour building.
I recently got a quote from one of the schools to take me from PPL to FAA Commercial SE/ME/IR CFI CFII (Instrument instructor) and it came out at around $18,000 (~£12,000),inc. 150hrs and all exams and skill tests.
From what I gathered talking to this lot was that it is not that hard to get a visa for the US, and especially to get a job as an instructor for a few years as the airlines are snapping the more experienced people up.
I have also been told by a mate of mine learning to fly in Singapore / Malaysia that the FAA licence is 'prefered' and most people who progress beyond PPL head off to the US to get the CPL, so chances in Asia may be better....Not sure if this is because there are a lot of N reg's there or becasue the conversion costs are cheaper.
Then there's the problem of conversion if you decide to convert to JAA.......very expensive, unless the FAA join the JAA in the future....(v unlikely!!)
Guest
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I've said a thing or two about this on other threads, but it won't hurt to repeat my thoughts and perhaps expand them a bit.
At the end of the market that you guys are working to get into, there is no pilot shortage. This is true, almost without exception, worldwide. There will not be any pilot shortage at the bottom of the market while so many people want to fly professionally. And, incidentally, while so many of you are prepared to spend so much of your own money on it, there's little incentive for commercial operators to fund any kind of pilot training.
The pilot shortage that does exist, right now, and again this is worldwide, is in multi-thousand-hour, multi-jet type-rated pilots that airlines can use without any risk. This shortage is partly due to industry expansion over the past 10 or so years of plenty, and partly due to a 'retirement bulge' from the ranks of those who joined in the last expansion period in the late '70s, early '80s.
In the UK, there's been little recent expansion in the air taxi/courier/small commuter field that you guys need for your first jobs. There's been quite a lot in the low-cost and charter lines (but they want more experienced people, in general) and there's been some in the long-haul field - BA and Virgin. Much the same can be said of the rest of Europe.
The Antipodes have not undergone any significant airline expansion in the last 10 years, but there has been a large increase (again, probably true worldwide) in the number of people who can afford to pay their own way in the hope of getting a commercial airline career. In other word, it's actually become more difficult to get employment in Oz and NZ.
The USA has seen a massive expansion in air transport over the last decade, but that's been matched by the high level of youngish retirements from a shrinking military and, again, the greater number of wannabes prepared to gamble $50k plus on a potential career.
Much of Asia has really suffered economically over the last decade, and such airline expansion as has happened has been made possible by the use of ex-pat US, ANZAC, and European experienced pilots. There have been few, if any serious moves to develop indigenous flight schools in most Asian countries, so this is likely to remain the case for some time, with the possible exception of Singapore. I can't really speak of China, as I know little or nothing about its aviation field, but I suspect it's one of the few areas with decent prospects for the mid future.
That brings me on to what happens next. The current global economic slowdown will reduce, if not eliminate, the long-haul airlines' expansion for a while. Capacity problems in the most populous, and profitable, parts of the world are already capping air traffic. Governments are now beginning to change the argument to 'if' rather than 'when' capacity increases should be achieved in infrastructure. Airlines are beginning to look at higher yield rather than higher frquency or capacity. The upshot of all this is that there isn't, in my opinion, likely to be any really noticeable pilot shortage in any major market over the next four or five years, and possibly for considerably longer than that. Add to this pressure in all areas of work, and in many countries, to increase retirement ages (mainly to postpone costly pension funding problems....), and the increased longevity and useful working lives of most people, and I think you are very unlikely to see any improvement in pilot employment prospects for some time to come. As the last few years have been the best ever for pilot recruiting, it would be a surprise if that wasn't so!
Right now, and for the forseeable future, the UK and USA remain the most buoyant aviation employment areas, but both are likely to remain static, or even slightly contract over the next few years.
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Scroggs
Wannabe Forum Moderator
[email protected]
At the end of the market that you guys are working to get into, there is no pilot shortage. This is true, almost without exception, worldwide. There will not be any pilot shortage at the bottom of the market while so many people want to fly professionally. And, incidentally, while so many of you are prepared to spend so much of your own money on it, there's little incentive for commercial operators to fund any kind of pilot training.
The pilot shortage that does exist, right now, and again this is worldwide, is in multi-thousand-hour, multi-jet type-rated pilots that airlines can use without any risk. This shortage is partly due to industry expansion over the past 10 or so years of plenty, and partly due to a 'retirement bulge' from the ranks of those who joined in the last expansion period in the late '70s, early '80s.
In the UK, there's been little recent expansion in the air taxi/courier/small commuter field that you guys need for your first jobs. There's been quite a lot in the low-cost and charter lines (but they want more experienced people, in general) and there's been some in the long-haul field - BA and Virgin. Much the same can be said of the rest of Europe.
The Antipodes have not undergone any significant airline expansion in the last 10 years, but there has been a large increase (again, probably true worldwide) in the number of people who can afford to pay their own way in the hope of getting a commercial airline career. In other word, it's actually become more difficult to get employment in Oz and NZ.
The USA has seen a massive expansion in air transport over the last decade, but that's been matched by the high level of youngish retirements from a shrinking military and, again, the greater number of wannabes prepared to gamble $50k plus on a potential career.
Much of Asia has really suffered economically over the last decade, and such airline expansion as has happened has been made possible by the use of ex-pat US, ANZAC, and European experienced pilots. There have been few, if any serious moves to develop indigenous flight schools in most Asian countries, so this is likely to remain the case for some time, with the possible exception of Singapore. I can't really speak of China, as I know little or nothing about its aviation field, but I suspect it's one of the few areas with decent prospects for the mid future.
That brings me on to what happens next. The current global economic slowdown will reduce, if not eliminate, the long-haul airlines' expansion for a while. Capacity problems in the most populous, and profitable, parts of the world are already capping air traffic. Governments are now beginning to change the argument to 'if' rather than 'when' capacity increases should be achieved in infrastructure. Airlines are beginning to look at higher yield rather than higher frquency or capacity. The upshot of all this is that there isn't, in my opinion, likely to be any really noticeable pilot shortage in any major market over the next four or five years, and possibly for considerably longer than that. Add to this pressure in all areas of work, and in many countries, to increase retirement ages (mainly to postpone costly pension funding problems....), and the increased longevity and useful working lives of most people, and I think you are very unlikely to see any improvement in pilot employment prospects for some time to come. As the last few years have been the best ever for pilot recruiting, it would be a surprise if that wasn't so!
Right now, and for the forseeable future, the UK and USA remain the most buoyant aviation employment areas, but both are likely to remain static, or even slightly contract over the next few years.
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Scroggs
Wannabe Forum Moderator
[email protected]
Guest
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Scroggs that is the best summary of the pilot recruitment situation I have seen, well done !. The ANZAC scene is getting even more horrid with Qantas trying to buy Air NZ having already grabbed Impulse and Singapore Airlines poised to grab Anssett. None of this bodes well for the local drivers. Makes my UK ATPL look like a good idea in the end 
Good news the Frieght aprons seem to be expanding in the UK and where I am there are regular leaving parties for those GOing to join the discount 737 carriers, so in the UK the bubbly may be needed for a while yet.
Good news the Frieght aprons seem to be expanding in the UK and where I am there are regular leaving parties for those GOing to join the discount 737 carriers, so in the UK the bubbly may be needed for a while yet. Guest
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I'm sorry, peeps, I forgot to mention the freight sector. And me the original trash-hauler (rubber dog-**** out of Hong Kong, etc)!
Freight is really the only sector that is likely to see serious expansion over the next few years, and that's probably true world-wide. As very few experienced airline pilots like to leave their comfortable, hostie-served seats for the slightly less well-paid position of trash-hauler, that means that recruiters of freight lines are actually quite welcoming to the low-hour frozen-ATPL holder. Don't expect to get offered a B747F RHS with 300 hours, but there is more liklihood of you getting a jet job than with the shiney BAs of this world. Later on, when you want to try your luck with the passenger lines, jet time is jet time, whatever was down the back!
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Scroggs
Wannabe Forum Moderator
[email protected]
Freight is really the only sector that is likely to see serious expansion over the next few years, and that's probably true world-wide. As very few experienced airline pilots like to leave their comfortable, hostie-served seats for the slightly less well-paid position of trash-hauler, that means that recruiters of freight lines are actually quite welcoming to the low-hour frozen-ATPL holder. Don't expect to get offered a B747F RHS with 300 hours, but there is more liklihood of you getting a jet job than with the shiney BAs of this world. Later on, when you want to try your luck with the passenger lines, jet time is jet time, whatever was down the back!
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Scroggs
Wannabe Forum Moderator
[email protected]
Guest
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There's a lot of stuff here of relevance to those attending the Wannabes' Seminar next weekend, so in the hope it gets a few more readings, back to the top!
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Scroggs
Wannabes Forum Moderator
[email protected]
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Scroggs
Wannabes Forum Moderator
[email protected]
Guest
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Oz is possible if youre willing to get off your a**e, jump in a car and drive around the country looking for work..Some of these jobs are very rewarding with the amount of flying time..try QLD or NT, the states are much bigger hence the need for aircraft..Must be willing to live in an ordinary town for a year or so, but if theres cold beer then thats all we need..! The airlines, regionals in particular, like these sorts of guys..best of luck..
