elitetraveler

Try Emirates, Qatar Airways, Etihad, Jet Airways, plus companies that manage private jets as "hiring" for qualified pilots.

Klm is Dead - Long Live KLM

On the other hand, most of these companies would prefer to hire younger, internationally oriented, near ab initio pilots who are team players, haven't been tainted by ALPA-style union work rules & who are trained to higher international e.g. JAA standards rather than hiring the whining losers from US airlines, many of whom could not adjust to living outside of N.A.

pbarnette

The bolded part gets to the heart of the problem. I do not believe that we will see that many pilots relocating to India or the Middle East.

And if they were going to, why haven't there been massive defections already?

Firewind

Not what I saw on Emirates. In fact, the flight deck reminded me pretty much of home -- e.g., older, of indistinguishable parentage. But I didn't stop to check their credentials -- e.g., license, training, union card...

GUWonder

Your beliefs are your beliefs.

The fact is that American, Canadian and European pilots (amongst others) have relocated to India to fly for Indian private carriers within the past several years. The GCC countries are not so different either in that respect.

tomh009

Quite true. But it's still only a tiny percentage of the active pilots in North America and Europe. At least so far.

sxf24

The flight crews at those airlines are already largely staffed by Europeans and Americans and I don't expect the trend to stop.

elitetraveler

I believe close to 25 percent of EK's pilots are American citizens, so that the answer is this has been happening since 911 furloughs and continues. The expat packages I believe are pretty good, and I remember reading an article that EK provides car service for its pilots to/from DXB to their homes. I think the article focused on an ex-US pilot, and in fact his entire family had relocated with him

Plenty of American execs live the expat life throughout the Middle East, India and Asia, and depending on the company the lifestyle can be very nice.

In these parts of the world, pilots are still considered "Sky Gods" and are well respected.

pbarnette

You don't need to lecture me on the ex-pat lifestyle. I live it. I love it. My wife loves it.

But as an ex-pat, I also know that many don't adjust well. It is especially tough on those with families and for those with wives who find themselves now without a job, and living in a strange country. I know at least as many that hate as love it. Among those with children, the proportion that hate it (or whose spouse hates it) jumps exponentially. And I live in what the wife and I jokingly call a "starter" country, because it is safe, progressive (in some ways), clean, and everyone speaks English. Moreover, many ex-pats are on fixed assignments. There is an end date. There is a home to go back to. Going to work for EK does not do the same thing.

I know that many will take these jobs. I just don't think that, were NW to go under, anywhere close to a majority of the pilots would actually move abroad. And this doesn't even get us to people like the mechanics or flight attendants, many of whom take the same nuclear attitude. The FA's, in particular, will not be getting jobs with EK and the like.

elitetraveler

Didn't mean to lecture In terms of Dubai and Qatar there are quite a few good jobs for expat spouses within hospitality, real estate and local offices of multi-nationals. In fact, pretty much all the expats I know in the region have spouses who also work and would compare the lifestyle to Arizona, Palm Springs, etc.

Even in China, many of the residential developments are based on the gated desert residential communities in the U.S.

For pilots not interested in moving overseas, there are pretty decent opportunities in General Aviation. The last three times i have been on a Netjets plane, three of the six pilots were ex-US commercial airline pilots. Netjets has plenty of planes on order, and delivery of new private jets continue to set records so there are domestic US opportunities as well.

pbarnette

And I didn't really take it as such. Just a poor choice of words on my part, in an attempt to emphasize where I was coming from.

elitetraveler

No worries, happy weekend

TheMoose

Save China and a few other countries, nearly all airlines are close to 100% international carriers with little to no "domestic" routes. Contrast that with North American carriers who are striving to reach a 40% threshold of International routes to their 60% majority of domestic routes.

You're trying to compare apples to oranges. Most other airlines NEED these "internationally oriented" crews because that's almost exclusively what they do. As for the training aspect, why do so many flight deck crews fly to the U.S. to do their training? Why do so many of the "renowned" international carriers seek out American pilots?

Apples and oranges. One neither better or worse than the other, but different animals that you can't easily dismiss when compared to the other.

goaliemn

I'm getting sick of the short sidedness of some of these politicians.. He just doesn't want NW to move out of his state.. but, if he blocks the merger, there's a chance they'll go belly up and then he'll have lots of unemployed, unhappy people in his state, as opposed to a lower number losing their jobs and/or being relocated to atl.

frankc98376

I wonder if he is up for re-election? If so, I'm sure he wants to be seen as the "hero" that saved NW and Minnesota and got himself re-elected in the process. By the time NW went under he'd be convieniently in DC figuring out who to blame for the failure before the next elections.