Is the global pilot shortage on hold?
 

Up until a few weeks ago airlines all over the world were saying they were having a difficult time finding pilots, particularly the regionals (Trans States stating a couple of weeks ago they were ceasing operations primarily due to the pilot shortage).

Now there is talk that airline traffic may not return to the same level of passenger volume until 2026. Scores of older planes will be retired earlier than intended. Orders for new planes will be put on hold or canceled. Boeing is in a bad way with the 737 Max and hundreds of new "Maxes" awaiting delivery.

How will this affect the demand for pilots?

Is this a trick question?

One of the television shows I love to watch is "Air Disasters" on Smithsonian.

The show goes into air incidents and the resulting investigation. The shows tend to fall into one of three broad categories: A fatal crash because of an issue beyond pilot control, a fata crash because of pilot error, or a recovered incident because the pilots were able to synthesize a solution on the fly. I imagine there is a fourth category, which is the pilots followed procedure and recovered from an incident, but I'm sure that one is ignored for the purposes of the show as it doesn't make for a compelling story. I'd say in those four categories of incident, they roughly boil down to: 1) the pilots never had a chance, 2) the pilots had a chance and blew it, 3) the pilots shouldn't have had a chance but made one anyway, and 4) the pilots had a chance and took it. What concerns me is that machines are not good at synthesizing solutions on the fly.

Jets used to have a flight engineer and a navigator. Automated planes will still have a pilot, but not a copilot. So, half the number of jobs.

Many of my friends in the industry have been laid off indefinitely. The airlines have always been used to these cycles, but this is different for obvious reasons. On the private side of aviation, domestic travel is down considerably because we are all in lockdown from state to state. International travel has been stopped because most countries are barring foreigners. Most aircrews have certain exemptions when it comes to arriving on foreign soil, but would have to be quarantined if they leave the aircraft.

Having been in the Unmanned Aviation business since 2003, I can tell you that aviation is the most welcoming environment for unmanned operations.

Land, underwater and other complex environments present thousands more variables per miles than aviation. Airlines fly in very tightly controlled airspace with strict regulations...the perfect environment for a machine.

There are lots of reasons why but advances in avionics in the past twenty years make everything I flew (gyros, control systems, auto-pilots, Health and Usage Monitoring Systems, etc.) look like a Model T compared to a Tesla. Power and weight requirements for these systems have also been dramatically reduced and enable system redundancies that are incredible.

I used to go out to the LSO Shack at Patuxent River and watch my Global Hawks land. They hit the same spot, regardless of weather and winds, every time. We also found that retrofitting auto TO/land capability in UAVs dramatically decreased accidents.

All I need upfront is one rated pilot to monitor the "system". This from a former pilot.

I do miss flying commercially a lot - it was the best job in the world when the wheels were in the wells but everything else about it sucked (crummy schedules / hours, crummy pay, sleazy companies and business practices, lousy layovers, on-and-on... I loved doing it and I’m glad I got out of that game after 9/11. I have no desire to spend half my life on furlough and the other half running myself ragged trying to make up for the losses incurred during those “down” times.

Respect to all who still are in the game but I’ll stick to doing my flying as a part-time hobby now.

FWIW, there is a shortage of cargo capacity out of O'Hare right now. Lot's of weird never seen before cargo planes parked on tarmacs here.

^^

Many passenger planes are flying with empty seats but the belly full of cargo. They've always flown some cargo in addition to the baggage but now more focused on freight to make ends meet.

All the cargo carriers are going at max capacity. Its such a crazy business and Im glad Im out of it.