Congress should address the critical pilot shortage
The U.S. airline sector is booming with a record number of people flying. The combination of an improved global economy and low fuel cost, reflected in ticket prices, is compelling more travelers to take to the air. The trend is expected to continue.
But for all this good news, there is a downside. Airline customer demand is outpacing airline capacity. The airline industry is facing a critical shortage of pilots. Current projections suggest that if the industry continues to produce pilots at the current rate, the U.S. will only have about two-thirds of the pilots needed to keep the airline industry healthy 20 years from now.
Congress is about to tackle the problem in the legislation reauthorizing the Federal Aviation Administration. Sen. John Thune
John Randolph Thune Graham: Trump wants to expand background checks for firearms Suburban anxiety drives GOP on guns Schumer blasts ‘red flag’ gun legislation as ‘ineffective cop out’ MORE (R-S.D.), chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee, has proposed to make it easier for first officers (co-pilots) to meet their required 1,500 hours of training without sacrificing safety standards. Actions akin to that are certainly needed.
The current number of pilots is so low that the Federal Aviation Administration has raised the maximum retirement age to 65 as a stop-gap measure, but that has not and will not solve the problem. The issue is not that pilots are retiring too young; the issue is that young people are not becoming pilots. Regardless of the FAA’s stop-gap measure, by 2022 approximately 18,000 American pilots will turn 65 and be forced to retire. The FAA’s Band-Aid solution won’t work for long.
Many of today’s commercial pilots who are nearing retirement received their flight training in the military. But that is the case for fewer and fewer younger aspirational pilots. For them, the only pathway to the cockpit is through private flight training, a lengthy and costly process.
U.S. lawmakers and regulators have raised the number of hours needed to become certified to fly a commercial plane. To get these hours following traditional training methods, anyone who wants to be a pilot would have had to have been a military pilot or invest upwards of $150,000 to get the required number of flight hours through private lessons.
After investing in such expensive training, what do the job prospects look like for a newly certified pilot? The main avenue to enter the industry is through regional carriers. Those carriers pay entry-level pilots only about $20,000 a year. So, it’s very hard to convince someone to take on that kind of commitment to pay for the training with such a low entry-level salary. While carriers may offer incentives to new pilots, they’re often not enough. These same smaller, regional carriers are experiencing the biggest financial pinch and are being affected the most by the pilot shortage.
What this means for the industry and passengers depends on which airline you fly. Major carriers probably won’t be hit by this shortage immediately. Instead, smaller regional and discount airlines are going to feel the pain first. For example, the CEO of Republic Airways said that the pilot shortage was the main reason behind his airline’s 2016 shutdown.
Similarly, when SeaPort Airlines was forced to file Chapter 11 bankruptcy, pilot shortage was cited as the reason. If the issue is not addressed quickly, major airlines will certainly begin to view the problem more urgently, and passengers will be impacted. Many pilots join larger airlines after having worked for smaller airlines. If you build a dam upstream, you’re going to have problems downstream.
To fix this problem, regulators will either have to change the policy about hours needed to fly in training or flight training will have to radically change. Thune offers one solution. Another option is the MPL (Multi Crew Pilot License) training regimen. Obtaining that license takes on average 18 months. The reason? The use of advanced flight simulators.
Using cutting-edge technology as a training platform can help lower the overall cost while providing flight-training cadets with the opportunity to learn in a dynamic environment in ways they never could by just training in an aircraft. Flight simulators can replicate in-flight emergencies and teach aspirant pilots how to handle them. The only other way pilots can get this kind of experience is in a real-world emergency, something no pilot-in-training wants to endure.
Major carriers such as British Airways and Lufthansa have longstanding relationships with pilot training academies, recognizing their value. U.S. airlines will have to follow suit in order satisfy their pressing need for more pilots. The FAA reauthorization bill offers an opportunity to debate how best to fix the pilot shortage.
Bhanu Choudhrie is executive director of C&C Alpha Group, which owns Alpha Aviation Group. The views expressed by this author are their own and are not the views of The Hill.
Originally published at https://thehill.com on July 27, 2017.
