The U.S. has a staggering pilot shortage

You sir sound like the right person to slap that dinosaur in the face and let it smell the future! jk

I don't know anything about regulations, but the technology is there. It's reliable and redundant.
These kind of developments will come once the infrastructure is there and don't require one party to pay for it all. No company built the internet so Google or Amazon could make their move.

a reply to: Jubei42

Remember though that >95% of Americans still receive their internet through either A: the digital cellular networks, a 20 year old technology; B: the coaxial cable TV line going into their house, a 40-50 year old technology; or C: their land line, a 100 year old technology.

Just because a given piece of infrastructure is old, doesn't mean that it isn't still the best way available to deliver a given service. Often times the more so-called "modern" solutions only end up causing more problems than they actually solve.

Ask the Pilot

a reply to: grey580

It has always been a boom/bust with regards to getting an airline job.. There were 35,000 seats and pilots working with another 225,000 looking to get a seat back in the 80s..

I have often wondered what would happen when they priced the whole "get a pilot license" out of reach for 90% of the population ? We once had a policy of letting our regional airline pilot move up and work for the flag carrier.. Then as Zaphod58 pointed out that program was basically canned.. It was a good program and the pilots we got from the regionals were qualified and ready to work..

Most of the new hires I flew with before I retired were not stick and rudder guys but could push a button with the best of them.. Let the automation fail or make them hand fly an ILS and some were seriously behind the power curve..

originally posted by: grey580
The U.S. has a staggering pilot shortage


I never thought we'd have a pilot shortage problem.

But it seems that with retirements and all the new aircraft being purchased. The numbers say we need more pilots.

22K people retiring is a large number.

By the time all those pilots retire, all the planes will be "self-piloted" airplanes running on autopilot, just like driverless cars.

The future is robotic transport. Takes too long to train human pilots and human drivers, and it's too expensive, and then there's all the unions and the pilot salaries and benefits..etc...all that is going away...this is the computer age...AI will take us everywhere.

a reply to: AMPTAH

They're still a long way from even single pilot cargo operations, let alone passenger flights without pilots.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: AMPTAH

They're still a long way from even single pilot cargo operations, let alone passenger flights without pilots.

They will be forced into it, because Amazon.com is already delivering packages by drones, auto-piloted by computer software, and bypassing FedEX and UPS transport. The range of the drones is not much today, but the program has started already, to ship cargo without human pilots.

a reply to: AMPTAH

Amazon is already bypassing Fedex and UPS. They have their own aircraft and trucks moving packages. They're not delivering anything yet by drone, they're still testing. But Amazon is a fairly small percentage, comparatively, for either of those carriers.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
But Amazon is a fairly small percentage, comparatively, for either of those carriers.

Well, when Amazon started up, they only sold books online. I remember buying books from Amazon.

Today, I buy all sorts of things from Amazon, and most of the book stores in my city have gone out of business.

And it's only been a few years, that it took for that dramatic change.

a reply to: AMPTAH

I know. But it's a lot different going from manned commercial/cargo flights to unmanned than it is from having a bookstore to ordering online.

They haven't even thought about regulations for unmanned large aircraft yet. They can't even operate unmanned military aircraft in the National Airspace without something flying with it as an escort.

a reply to: Zaphod58

Also, good luck to Amazon with the whole drone delivery business. That whole concept could be obliterated overnight by the FAA if they wanted to do it, ditto for the automated "flying cars" that Silicon Valley is all abuzz over. A lot of these proposals boil down to hubris on the part of the tech sector and the "anti-regulation, disrupt everything, we can change the world" mindset that runs rampant within it. It's one thing to play that game with the cab industry or the trucking/logistics industries, which are low-hanging fruit with lax-to-nonexistent oversight beyond the most basic of DOT or jurisdictional-mandated safety measures ("carry insurance", "get inspected yearly", "log activity, maybe"), and that frankly, needed a bit of "disrupting".

It's when they try to go after more complex, better-regulated industries that actually have their sh!t together that they run into trouble. If the hyperloop and the self-driving cars make it, it will be through a long and painful teething process that leaves many, many failures and bankruptcies in its wake, similar to dial-up ISP's or search engines in the 90's. As to the aviation-related ventures? God help the folks who legitimately think they can "disrupt" how the FAA does business. That'll be like watching a puppy fight a crocodile.

a reply to: 727Sky

Yeah, it certainly seems to have its ups and downs. I'm only looking to get into it on the advice of some friends who are headed towards the "should I stay or should I go?" phase with the USAF, who have all basically said that the window I have right now is about 5-7 years, and that it's doable ("it" being the majors) if I'm flexible and I attack it with the ferocity that I planned to go after medical school with.

Even right now, an aggressive certs+time attack on my ATP will cost me roughly what I would have spent on an 18 month accelerated BSN program, with FO salaries at Republic, Skywest, and a bunch of the other nicer regionals already beating starting nursing salaries off the bat. With PiC salaries at the same places running at or above what I'd make as an NP or PA for roughly half the schooling investment. Even if that's as far as I go, it's a worthwhile investment to me, as I have way more confidence in the long-term salary stability of the airlines (especially given the travel patterns that my fellow millennials seem to have) than I do with the medical field, which seems poised for a catastrophic drop in provider salaries no matter how healthcare reform shakes out. On the bright side, I'd have a hard time believing that the toxicity and burnout in the regionals could come even close to where patient care is right now. That entire industry is in a bad, bad way.

That whole concept could be obliterated overnight by the FAA if they wanted to do it, ditto for the automated "flying cars" that Silicon Valley is all abuzz over.

Go down to your local shopping centre to look at how normal people park and drive...
Pilots go where the money and security is..