Every generation seems to think the next generation doesn’t work as hard, isn’t as talented, or doesn’t have the same motivation that their generation did when they were younger. I don’t think that has been any different in aviation training historically.

There are certainly things that younger pilots know and do better than generations before. There are probably skills and knowledge that older generations of pilots had or developed that new generations don’t, or don’t even need. But one thing that I can say is that from a metrics standpoint, it certainly seems that we are headed the wrong way in pilot skill and knowledge right now.

A statistic was recently shared with us that indicates that in the past approximately 6-months, it appears first-time pass rates on private pilot airplane single-engine land practical tests are hovering somewhere in the 50-60% range.

Take this to heart, please. It means that nearly half of our pilot applicants are failing their first attempts at a private pilot certificate.

This is bad. I don’t know how to say it any other way.

I am not going to say that it is entirely the fault of the students. It isn’t just that somehow the younger generation sucks or that they aren’t capable. I am also not saying that no training providers care. There are some very dedicated and professional leaders at many training programs working hard to counteract these trends. But they are fighting an uphill battle.

I hold us as an entire industry responsible. We need to hold the standards for our training and not send them to attempt practical tests until they are truly ready.

Some factors have come together in our industry that have resulted in VERY active hiring, high turnover of CFIs at flight training providers, and a lack of selective hiring when we “need to fill jobs with a warm body that can at least do the job” even if they aren’t candidates that really meet our highest of expectations. This has resulted in what I affectionately refer to as “warm body hiring.”

I have no doubt that the current trend is having a negative impact currently and will continue to do so in the future. One example is that if we look at reduced pass rates, we need more retests. In 2021 we did a little over 21,000 private pilot certificates in this country. If half of these fail on the first attempt, we need 11,000 more retests. This takes valuable DPE resources away from testing applicants who might actually be prepared and pass on the first try. This is but one administrative complication of what is happening. It says nothing about the potential that comes from a lack of base skill development for safety in the long run in our aviation industry.

As a DPE, I can’t help but feel like too many flight training operations have transitioned from a process of “training to meet and/or exceed a standard and happen to meet experience requirements along the way,” to a “train to meet experience requirements, and hope they happen to meet training standards.” This is a subtle difference in language, but it is a significant difference in the fundamental approach to training.

Talking with many DPEs around the country, the sentiment seems to be that many times instructors are “throwing a student at a practical test and hoping they will pass.” The logic is if they don’t, they can just retrain a few items and get them the certificate anyway. For so many reasons this seems to be the wrong thing to do in my mind.

There is a significant pull being felt from the airline environment on the CFIs to “get their time as fast as possible” so they can come work for them. This is creating an ethos in the CFI cadre who is providing the bulk of the training in this country that getting hours is more important than providing the students best training service. As those students become CFIs anxious to get to the airlines, the cycle will continue. Most of us who are actively engaged with daily training operations have seen this. We feel it. We are concerned.

Pushing lots of pilots through our training systems to meet airline hiring needs can be great as long as it is done without degrading safety and with a focus on true learning. Cutting corners or rushing people through who aren’t really ready doesn’t help us all in the long run.

Getting a pilot certificate or rating comes with a great deal of responsibility. It isn’t just a “test until you happen to get it right and pass” learning experience. We need our pilots to have built base skills, knowledge, and risk management awareness. Our system depends on these base skills being built in a way that they will support future learning and service in the aviation transportation industry.

Learning to be a pilot and then building the additional skills and experience to become a professional pilot isn’t something that is just a checkbox. It shouldn’t be something that you just get if you have spent enough on training or “happened to fly all the required experience events.”  We need our pilots to really meet and exceed the standards in full that the FAA and the aviation industry have set forth and collaborated on for each and every certificate and rating level along the way.

To put it bluntly, pilot certificates and ratings aren’t participation trophies.

“AOG (Aircraft on Ground)” is the term used in aviation to indicated the aircraft is grounded or unairworthy. While it could be for technical reasons, it’s more often referencing a mechanical issue of some variety. In my case, after taxiing on to the ramp at the Bozeman Yellowstone International Airport (KBZN), the capable line service technician at Yellowstone Jetcenter discovered a screw in one of our nose tires.

In my 25+ years of flying, I had never experienced, or even heard of an aircraft tire picking up an errant screw.  After all, the aviation environment should be generally steril. But, believe it or not, this is the second screw this year. The first came just a few months ago at the Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport (KOPF) in Miami – in this case, a main tire.

Suffice it to say, a compromised tire is a grounding item and yes, given our modern supply chain issues, a new tire is not easy to procure. In both screw incidents, the tire remained inflated, but aircraft tires are subjected to extreme pressures and temperature during takeoffs and landings which can occur multiple times per day while supporting the full weight of our 40,000 lb. airplane. A much worse scenario would have been a high-speed blowout which would have resulted in controllability issues, damage to other aircraft parts or structure, fire, or even worse.

While fortunate to not have experienced the worst-case scenario, here we were thousands of miles from home base in an AOG situation with a scheduled departure looming. The team at Yellowstone Jetcenter were quick to offer assistance in changing our wheel and tire assembly, but also acknowledged the difficulty in obtaining replacement parts quickly.

Because of the complexity of aircraft wheel and tire design, many operators maintain spare parts on hand and even full wheel and tire assemblies that can be changed quickly. Our aircraft wheel design features an inboard half and an outboard half which do not function identically. The inboard wheel half accepts the rotors of aircraft brakes and also include thermal plugs to deflate the tire during excess temperatures before an explosion can occur. The outboard half of the wheel bolts to the inboard half to finish mounting the wheel onto the tire. The outboard wheel half also has a valve stem for inflation. Needless to say, building a wheel and tire assembly takes time and specialty equipment.

We actually maintain a spare assembly for the main wheel and tire, but not for our nose. After a call to maintenance at the home office, we were in luck. Surprisingly, in short order, maintenance was able to locate a full nose wheel and tire assembly that could be shipped to our location and the onsite maintenance could so the quick swap. Or so we thought.

After much anticipation, two days later our package arrived, but missing the actual tire. The supplier, either mistakenly or purposely, only sent wheel halves and no tire. Back to square one. And time to involve our greater aviation community to keep our on-time departure.

After several calls to friends in the community who operate identical aircraft, we were connected to an operator in Missoula, MT (only a few hours drive) who had a full assembly for our aircraft on its shelf – exactly what we needed. Thankfully, our mutual friend vouched for our ability to return a new wheel and tire assembly at some future point to the good Samaritan operator. And, after no more than a virtual handshake, a technician from Missoula, MT began a drive toward Bozeman and us, a drive toward Missoula for an exchange of our vital part in halfway in Anaconda, MT.

We were back to the FBO by the close of business with a new wheel and tire installed the same day and made our scheduled departure the following morning after a check of tire pressure and signed maintenance release. Nothing brings together the generosity and kindness of the aviation community quite like an AOG event away from home!