How Long Will it Take? Wrong Question!

Originally posted June 4, 2019 on The Pilot Network by Jason Depew, TPN Staff Writer

Do you remember that person from high school who, after being in a relationship for only a few weeks, chose where to go to college based on the plans of his or her significant other? Maybe you knew the person in a military pilot training or airline indoc program who ranked his or her aircraft assignment preferences based on the plans of a significant other from a brand-new relationship. I once knew a couple who bought a house together after they’d been dating for a grand total of a few months.

How did any of that turn out for your friends? It rarely, if ever, worked for mine.

One of the questions I see asked most often on TPN is, “How long will it take me to get to Domicile X as a new-hire at Airline Y?” While this is a valid point to consider, I feel that you’d be doing yourself a huge disservice if you made this a major criteria in choosing an airline. Yes, you should definitely try to pick an airline with a base where you want to live. (See these two posts: https://community.thepilotnetwork.org/posts/give-a-hoot-dont-commute-part-1, and https://community.thepilotnetwork.org/posts/airline-comparison-part-1) However, it’s imperative that you look at the long-term.

I would love to write a series of posts comparing and contrasting specific timelines to get to any base on any fleet at any airline in the industry. The sad truth is that things are just too complex for that post to be useful. It’d be obsolete the moment it was published.

There was a point just a couple years ago where Delta pilots could hold MD88 Captain in NYC at 4 months with the company. Shortly thereafter, that category was closed. At the moment, the most junior Captain seats in the company are going at just over 3 years. That change happened in less time than most people take to prepare their applications, do an interview, and start training.

TPN Co-Founder Matt Swee lives in Tampa and was told that there was no way he’d get to Southwest’s Orlando base for several years. He was based there at about 3 months with the company. Things change so quickly that you almost can’t trust any source of information that claims to predict future events.

It’s also tough to compare apples to apples here because every airline works differently. Some assign seniority (and therefore initial aircraft and base) at Indoc based on age, while others use random things like the last four of your social security number…from high to low. American Airlines has an Advanced Entitlement (seat, base, or aircraft change bid) every month. I think several other companies are like that. At Delta, we’re lucky to get 3-4 AEs a year right now.