Concerns Raised About Proposed ATP Certification Requirement For All Part 121 Air Carrier Pilots

The National Association of Flight Instructors (NAFI) has developed a briefing paper addressing concerns with the proposal contained in HR3371 to require an Airline Transport Pilot (ATP) certificate for any pilot flying in a Part 121 Air Carrier operation.
 
NAFI does not agree with the simple proposal to require an ATP certificate as a base level of entry to Part 121 Air Carrier operations flight crew employment.  This proposal does not address quality of experience; instead it addresses only a quantity of experience that is not necessarily directly applicable to the type of flight operations that the pilots will encounter in Part 121 Air Carrier operations.

NAFI's Executive Director, Jason Blair noted that, "The result of this proposal will be to increase the number of hours a pilot has gained in experience prior to employment in a Part 121 Air Carrier job, but not necessarily improve the skill sets such a pilot possess, in fact, the potential exists to degrade safety with this proposal."  Blair went on to indicate that "The emphasis should be on training and quality of training, not just on total flight experience.  In most accidents over recent years, this requirement would have made no difference at all. Further, we are unaware of any research that indicates any significant degree of correlation between raw hours of flight experience and performance in a jet cockpit environment."

The briefing paper that NAFI developed addressing its concerns will be forwarded to members of the U.S. Senate who will be working with this issue.  NAFI urges the Senate to reconsider this well intentioned but misguided law that we strongly believe will, in the long run, do little to improve air carrier safety and may well negatively adversely affect general aviation safety.

FMI: www.nafinet.org