Pilot Selection Process

European Pilot Selection and Training

Can anyone become a pilot? 

 

Part one: Ab Initio training.

 

One of the greatest concerns about Ab initio training is taking anyone and turning them into a pilot. But, EPST does more than take anyone. They select the best. I'm thinking anyone who has money could go out and rent a plane and eventually learn to fly. Take hundreds of hours to grasp the basics. But the process with EPST is a bit different...

"The selection turned out to be the least of the problems, although considerable effort was required to solve that challenge. The much bigger challenge was the fact that the approved aviation training syllabus was about 40 years old and absolutely did not produce the training required by the airlines. In Europe there was no GA anymore at this time, so pilot students completing their license training where typically required to go to a B737 or A320 operation.

There were many problems to make this big step from Cessna to a B737, not the least that the training which they completed was for Single Pilot (SP) only. In 1999 the European JAA demanded an Multi Crew Cooperation (MCC) course to be conducted, however, they forgot to define the outcome of the course (exam demands) and also the MCC course good be provided on any multi crew simulator, causing most of the schools to perform this on a King Air simulator, which obviously did not contribute to the flying of a jet such as a B737 at all.

With the MCC on a King Air simulator the gap between the training and the airline demand of the new pilot remained very large....