Wednesday, 04 May 2011 21:11 Recto Mercene / Reporter
Business Mirror
An aviation expert on Wednesday warned the government that the continuing flight of experienced Filipino pilots and airline technical personnel from the country might result in a shortage of aircraft captains in the country.
Former Philippine Airlines (PAL) pilot, Capt. Benhur Gomez, a founder of Omi Aviation, one of the country’s prestigious flying schools, made the warning.
“All major airlines are now competing against each other for services of good aircraft captains, and the Philippines is greatly affected by it because our pilots are lured by huge salaries being offered abroad,” Gomez said.?
Some international airlines, he said, are offering salaries of as much as $16,000 a month (P752,000) for Airbus A320 captains, and $18,000 (P846,000) to $20,000 (P940,000) for Boeing 747 captains.
Omni Aviation in Clark, Pampanga, hosts PAL’s pilot school.??
“The shortage of aircraft captains is also being worsened by the booming airline industry in the country, especially now that there are emerging budget airlines,” Gomez added.
He said that to be an aircraft captain of an international airline, a pilot or first officer must have at least three years’ flying experience, or ?the equivalent to 3,000 flying hours.??
This shortage of captains could result in delay in flights and, much worse, in scarcity of flights.??
Despite the situation, Gomez is encouraging students and professionals who want to have a career shift, to look at this opportunity to have a good-paying job.??
“Schooling is expensive, but once you are employed in the airline industry, in two years you would recover your investment because of the high salary,” he said partly in Filipino.??
Gomez called on the government to help resolve the situation by intensifying its crackdown on “fly-by-night” flying schools so as not to compromise the safety and quality of future Filipino pilots.
There are currently about 52 flying schools in the country.??
“There should be a renewed effort from the government’s regulatory body to go after these illegal flying schools,” Gomez added.??
He said these schools pad the flying time of?their “students” to enable them to get their pilot’s license faster. “The cheating is so blatant that some students log flying time even if they are not flying,” Gomez said.??
Training student pilots is very important because it helps them make the right decisions, especially during emergency situations, he said. “If the system fails, the judgment of an experienced pilot comes to play.”??
He said if the operations of these illegal schools continue, the integrity of Filipino pilots, who are known for their expertise worldwide, would be greatly affected.??
“The best the government could do is to assist and encourage legitimate flying schools to produce enough copilots who could be developed as captains in two to three years,” Gomez said.?
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