I see on ATP’s website it has a list of students that were recently hired and showed their route to get there. I noticed quite a few students were hired by the majors right after they graduated from ATP/finished their hours. From reading other post on here my understanding was that you needed to fly for a regional airline first and build captain time. Is it possible to get hired by a major right out of ATP?
McCade,
While it’s “possible” it’s highly improbable. The grads you see showing they’re now at Majors were either flying at Regional or corporate and that info isn’t appearing. Majors hire experienced pilots with thousands of hours of flight time. While again it’s possible there’s simply no reason they would when they can find someone whos already demonstrated their ability elsewhere.
Unless of course your the CEO’s kid 
Adam
McCade,
Most of the placements at the majors show the regional the pilot went to and then the major. But ATP alumni are under no obligation to report back to ATP where they are in their career, so sometimes there are gaps in their records, which generate the profiles yo are seeing.
Everybody goes to the regionals or a corporate operator first, but the time spent there before going to the majors can vary greatly.
Chris
Thank you,
I appreciate the fast responses and what you’re doing here. I’ve done a lot of reading on this forum and it has really helped me better understand the aviation industry and the benefits of going to ATP.
McCade,
Thank you for your kind words. Let us know how else we can help you.
Chris
Hi all,
When I went for a site visit at PIE the manager mentioned one of their instructors was about to head directly to Spirit. I believe this is still quite rare.
I know from considering the Southwest 225 program, to apply to Southwest afterwards you need a minimum of 1800 hours but would prefer closer to 2000, so you are instructing for longer than the ATP program.
Hope that is useful.
Matthew,
That is rare and I’d suspect if they were the mgr they probably had a few more hours than most instructors.
Great step for them though not sure anyone is calling Spirit a Major.
Adam
That would be the new Frontier program that ATP is developing, we indeed had four instructors from KPIE recently leave to join the program.
There is truth to the direct to Frontier program. It is a program that while not yet official, is currently available to select ATP instructors that show particularly good flying skills and work ethic. The ability to go straight to Frontier is an amazing opportunity.
1 Like