A few years ago, before the COVID pandemic, I wrote a post on TPN for Second Career Pilots. While almost everything in that post remains relevant today, our industry experienced some titanic shifting over the last four years. It’s high time for an update.
My prompt for getting around to writing this happened when a friend, whom we’ll call Melvin, wrote with some questions. He holds a USAF navigator rating, but wants to work as an airline pilot after he retires in a few years. He’s finishing up his FAA pilot ratings and expects to hit ATP minimums within six months of retiring. After reading my recent post about Delta’s pay rates he asked: “Is Delta realistic for me with 1,501 flight hours at age 50?” He assumed that if I answered “No” he’d be stuck at a regional airline for the next 15 years.
Bottom line: I believe a 50-year old pilot can enjoy a fun and lucrative second career at Delta or another major airline. Even if they don’t get to a major, the “worst case” alternatives are most likely not regional airlines. Today we’ll look at some big-picture industry forces, and consider how those might affect a second career pilot like Melvin.
COVID: Speed Bump + Knee Jerk
Our discussion about job prospects in 2023 and beyond has to start around March 2020. At its height, the COVID pandemic was very scary. It wrecked our economy for a while. However, it was largely an artificial and temporary curb on travel demand.
Global air travel demand in June 2023 surpassed 2019 levels. For reference: 2019 was about as busy as the US airline industry had ever been pre-COVID. Although we’ve returned to those levels overall, the demand for international travel with US carriers still has room to grow before it matches 2019 levels.
This means the airline industry is operating at Maximum Continuous Thrust, and could still be doing more. Delta Air Lines has been hiring more than 2000 pilots per year (more on that soon) and yet it’s so understaffed that it’s given out 8,000-14,000 duty periods of premium pay per month since the pandemic recovery began. Each of those duty periods represents at least 10.5 hours of extra pay for Delta pilots. Other airlines are in similar situations.
Put simply: the airlines are and continue to be unable to staff their operations to meet current demand, let alone staffing for growth.
It doesn’t help that circumstances looked particularly dire at the start of the pandemic. With no cure of vaccine in sight, and mass confusion about effective ways to prevent the spread of COVID, the airlines all found themselves desperate to stem massive losses. One popular measure was offering early retirement to the most senior (and expensive) pilots in the industry. A few thousand pilots took such deals just at American, Delta, and United.
That strategy was fine, until President Trump’s Operation Warp Speed helped create an effective vaccine and started a strong recovery sooner than anyone expected. (Odd, isn’t it, how many MAGA gobblers seem to have forgotten that Trump himself was a driving force behind the creation and distribution of the very experimental, and very effective COVID vaccine?) With COVID increasingly under control, and America’s patience thoroughly exhausted, travel demand spiked just as the airline industry found itself thousands of pilots short. It has yet to catch up.
Growth
Before the pandemic, most airlines were growing rapidly. Since the recovery started, those expansion plans have resumed and expanded. Consider the following:
- United CEO recently bragged that they have 800 aircraft on order, scheduled to arrive by 2032. United is on the record saying they want 28,000 pilots to fly those aircraft.
- Delta is only about halfway through taking delivery of its 131 A220 orders so far, it’s getting 155 A321neos, 100 B737-10 MAXes, they’re still awaiting delivers of ~30 A350 and A330 widebodies with rumors of an A350-1000 order on the horizon.
- Although Hawaiian replacing their passenger A330s with 12 B787s, they just took delivery of the first A330F they’ll be using to fly packages for Amazon. The recently-announced Hawaiian/Alaska merger will save Hawaiian from a tough spot and shake things up here, but overall I’m optimistic about their chances together.
- Allegiant is expanding with an order of at least 50 B737 MAXes.
- Frontier has long had enough aircraft on order to triple the size of their operation.
- JetBlue is expanding service to European destinations with A321neos.
Although some of these aircraft orders will replace aging jets, the majority are pure expansion. (And this list goes nowhere near describing the entire US airline industry). Delta plans to keep flying many of their B757s and B767-300ERs into the 2030s! Many of the retirements that were due already happened during the pandemic.
So, riddle me this: if travel demand already exceeds 2019 levels, and the airlines can’t staff themselves to adequately meet that demand with their current fleets, how can they possibly staff themselves to fly all of these additional aircraft?
If I was a second career pilot, I’d see significant opportunity here.
1,501 Hours
I hope we’ve just answered one part of Melvin’s question. The demand for pilots at major airlines is so insatiable, that even a late bloomer should be able to get to one.
Now, will the most desirable airlines hire a second career pilot at 1,501 hours total time?
The good pilot answer here is: “It depends.”
The obvious answer is: “Probably not.”
Most major airlines expect a pilot to get some professional turbine flying experience under Parts 121, 135, or 91K before applying. That said, as a NYC B737 Captain, I fly with the most junior pilots at my airline. I’ve flown with 23 year old aviators who have fewer than 2,500 hours total time. A couple airlines (American and Allegiant for sure) have been interviewing pilots and awarding them CJOs at hiring conferences for at least a year. United has hundreds of unfilled Captain seats available right now, and needs fresh blood to bolster seniority to help convince someone to step up. I would be shocked if every pilot in those dog and pony shows had more than 2,000 hours. There is a very real chance that a pilot like Melvin could get hired by a major airline as soon as he reaches unrestricted ATP minimums.
Most pilots, second career or otherwise, will need to do something like the old Regional Airline Touch & Go. The thing is, pilots don’t even need to do that Touch & Go at a regional airline anymore. Remember how the Tier 2 airlines like Frontier, Spirit, and others are also trying to grow like crazy. They’re rapidly losing pilots to the majors and have no choice but to hire the most inexperienced aviators in the industry. Even Southwest has suffered from what one article calls “resume washing.”
So, if any low-time pilots, including older ones like Melvin, need to fly for a starter company before moving on to the majors, it doesn’t need to be a regional airline. At the very least, it should be a Tier 2 carrier flying Boeing or Airbus products. (Apparently, this could even include Southwest even though I tend to include them on my list of 6 major airlines.) This is awesome! It means better pay and work rules while building your hours. It means you’ll accrue hours more quickly than if you’re doing 15-minute hops between places like Detroid and Flint.
Part of the reason Melvin asked if he’d have to fly for a regional before a major is that he’s worried about getting stuck there. I don’t blame him. The regionals have some truly terrible work rules. Eventually, they’ll stop paying as much money too. I feel bad for any pilot who gets stuck at one through no fault of their own.
Thankfully, most of the Tier 2 carriers are places where most of us would be lucky to get stuck. They pay well, and have much better work rules than the regionals. They fly to some interesting places. With all the movement going on, seniority progression should be fairly continuous. If I were in Melvin’s shoes, I wouldn’t even apply to a regional until I’d explored all these options.
And yet, I think there’s still some time to stop by one of these carriers and still get hired by a major. Starting at a Tier 2 airline at 1,500 hours, it shouldn’t take an industrious pilot more than 18-24 months to hit 2,500 total hours. We’ll discuss this more in a moment, but if a second career pilot can’t get hired by a major at 2,000-2,500 hours in this environment, they’re doing something wrong.
Cycles and Waves
Although I’m optimistic for aviators like Melvin, that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t hurry! This hiring boom isn’t endless. The wave will eventually peak.
After that peak, the industry should still enjoy a hiring steady state higher than it was in the early- to mid-2000s. I have zero faith in the military’s ability to improve pilot retention, which should help all-civilian pilots, and second career aviators like Melvin. However, competition will get tighter. The majors will be the first places to get healthy, and career progression there will slow significantly.
If your ultimate goal is a seat at a major airline, there is no excuse for putting anything less than maximum effort into getting there ASAP. If there’s any way to follow a version of the Ideal Military Pilot Career Path and finish out your time in the Guard or Reserves while focusing full-time on flying, you should!
I’m confident any non-rated military member can find part-time staff work as a TR or IMA. Do that for a few years while you finish your hours and ratings, then do your initial Touch & Go at a regional or Tier 2 carrier, then move on to your major ASAP. Once you’re on that seniority list, take 3-5 years of AGR orders and finish up that way.
DE&I
Although I believe we’ve answered most of Melvin’s questions, there’s one subtlety he didn’t even necessarily want to spell out. He didn’t ask: “Will they even hire an older pilot, knowing they can’t get as many years out of me?”
The short answer is: “Yes, they will.”
For some anecdotal support:
- The Delta ALPA MEC publishes some basic demographic data on each hiring class. I know that Delta has recently hired pilots as old as 61.
- In the last year, I flew a trip with a new-hire FO in his mid-fifties.
- I know plenty of airline pilots who retired after reaching O-6, or higher. This took them more than 20 years on active duty, meaning they were in their late 40s or early 50s when they started at the airlines. Yes, they had past flying experience, but that doesn’t make as much difference as you think. (More on that shortly).
Let’s use this question as an opportunity to discuss a bigger (positive) trend in our industry.
Every serious airline these days places great emphasis on the ideals of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DE&I).
This is good.
While DE&I certainly covers categorizations like race and gender, it goes far beyond that. Intelligent business people value diversity of backgrounds and ideas. Most have done away with hiring quotas from affirmative action days, which is good because those gave the impression (or reality) of hiring less-qualified people for the sake of meeting a quota. Instead, most DE&I efforts these days focus on reaching out to increase a company’s pool of qualified applicants.
Since most pilots in the US are middle-aged white dudes, this means that particular group faces more competition for jobs in these pools. That’s not a bad thing. If you want the most qualified people to get the job, then you shouldn’t mind greater numbers of qualified people being in the pool. If this makes you less competitive it’s your own damn fault. Go make yourself better and apply again.
An important part of that process means lawyers watch airline hiring departments like hawks. They’re extremely careful to avoid even the appearance of bias or prejudice. They insist that hiring departments give every applicant the same shot at a job, regardless of any DE&I categories. This is awesome!
If you meet an airline’s requirements for ratings, flight hours, medical certificate, etc. you will get the same fair shot at the job as anyone else there that day. Period. At that point, thanks to the unrelenting scrutiny of the “blood-sucking lawyers,” DE&I categories have no influence on a candidate’s chances.
The category that concerns Melvin is age. I can say with absolute certainty that no worthwhile airline will forgo hiring an otherwise qualified applicant right now because of that pilot’s age. If some airline out there wants to prove me wrong, then they’re a shitty company. They deserve to be sued out of existence by denied applicants, and I wouldn’t want to work there anyway. Thankfully, I believe all major US airlines and most others are firmly committed to doing the right thing here. Older pilots like Melvin have nothing to worry about.
Make Yourself Competitive
I can’t emphasize enough that, although I think second career pilots like Melvin can get to the major airlines, they need to work hard to make this happen ASAP.
I’ve always said that each pilot has to make their own stars align. That’s true here. Second career pilots must take action to make themselves competitive.
This means pouring money and free time into getting hours and ratings now. If you’re already in a career, you probably have some resources for making this happen. If not, I wrote a 6-part series on helping to obtain funding. Also, veterans charity RTAG has mastered the art of squeezing every penny out of the government gravy train. If a military member needs help funding flight training, RTAG can help them.
This also means no cutting corners on your ratings. Young pilots sometimes forego things like a Commercial Single Engine rating, or flight instructor ratings altogether. That’s gonna be a nah for you, dawg. You need to earn Commercial ASMEL, along with CFI, CFII, and MEI ratings on your way to an unrestricted ATP. Yes, this will mean some training courses that are more expensive than just smashing bugs in a rented C-152. That’s okay because it makes your application more competitive.
Since you’re trying to make yourself stand out anyway, I recommend you also ensure you get endorsements for tailwheel, complex, high performance, high altitude, etc. I suggest you pursue glider and seaplane ratings. Not only are they eye-catching on an application, they’re a whole lot more fun than that corrosion-infested C-152.
You should try to find some paid flying to help get you from 250 hours to 1500. Look for jump operations, glider towing, survey flying, and small charter operators. You need to start showing career progression as a pilot. Any time you can step up as a chief instructor, chief pilot, or otherwise demonstrate aviation leadership is good.
Some pilots seem to think of their non-pilot background as a weakness. That shouldn’t be the case. I would expect that in your first career you experienced career progression and gained leadership and other skills that any airline will value. Don’t be afraid to continue pursuing advancement if you have more time left in your first career before you shift to full-time aviation.
Put yourself in your future hiring board’s shoes. What would interest you more? The 23 year old who had rushed so hard to get ratings and hours that they didn’t even bother with college and has never held a job other than stick monkey…or a mature adult with a BS, MS, or even PhD and years of practice at being responsible and leading others?
You already look pretty good to an airline. The next thing you have to do is just get the flying side of your resume to the point where it’s at least as good as that 23 year old. This means accruing as many jet hours as possible as quickly as possible.
This is incredibly difficult to do flying between ATL and CSG six times a day without ever climbing above 18,000 ft. It’s a lot easier to do flying an Airbus or Boeing product on transcons, Florida turns, and Caribbean overnights. That alone is the primary reason why you should try to get hired at a Tier 2 carrier before you even consider a regional.
It’s also important to prioritize flying over other job activities. This is not the season of your life to be a squadron commander or project leader. This is not the time to diversify your aviation-related resume at a starter airline.
One second-career pilot friend of mine spent several years in the Army infantry before heading to a regional. When he arrived, they were thrilled to have a mature pilot with experience leading impressionable young men and women. They begged him to join their mentor program and quickly promoted him to a trainer/leader in that department, even though he was a low-time FO. He got paid well and enjoyed good QOL while spending a week a month, or more, training future mentors at Airline X’s HQ.
While this guy did a service to the industry overall, he paid for it dearly. All those weeks riding a desk were weeks he wasn’t accumulating flight hours. This delayed him upgrading to Captain, and left him stuck at the regional when the COVID downturn locked our entire industry in place for 18-24 months. Then, a military deployment popped up and instead of asking to go the next time, he took one for the team right as he might have been competitive for hiring at the majors.
Thankfully, he got hired at one of the less-desirable majors and spent a year there before the best major hired him. He has a training date in about a month. However, he likely lost 1-2 years of seniority at his forever airline…and that also means 1-2 years at top-line pay rates on that company’s biggest widebody.
If you gain fulfillment from non-flying jobs, you will absolutely find desirable opportunities in our industry. However, until you’ve at least earned an unrestricted ATP and 2,000 total flight hours, those things are only a waste of your time. Also, remember that if you’re not at your forever airline any big-picture work you do in the company is only going to strengthen a future competitor. Don’t do that to your future self. Save making a difference for when that influence will improve your forever airline. Wait until you get there, then start asking around. I promise, your managers will be thrilled to get some skilled and enthusiastic help.
Wrap-Up
The aviation industry is on a tear, and we haven’t even fully recovered from the COVID dip yet. The airlines don’t have enough pilots to cover current demand, and most have big expansion plans. If you want an enjoyable, lucrative job at a good company, it lies within your grasp no matter your age or background.
Deserved optimism aside, we must admit that our industry is cyclical. Eventually, things will slow from today’s breakneck pace. As such, anyone aspiring to fly for a major airline should get to work on making themselves competitive. Get your ratings and your hours. Don’t waste time building up a corporation or airline where you don’t plan to be forever. Don’t give up airline years to active duty military service if you could potentially finish your time in the Guard or Reserves after you have a seniority number at your forever airline.
Don’t forget that it’s up to you to make your own stars align. Work hard to make yourself competitive and your chances of achieving your goal will be high.
Older pilots like my friend Melvin can rest easy that they won’t face age-related discrimination. The airlines all need you badly enough that they’ll take whatever time they can get with you. Give them every reason to start that relationship sooner, rather than later.
Good luck in your pursuits. Reach out if you have questions. I look forward to making sure you couldn’t possibly pay for a beer as a new hire FO!