BeCA Unhappy about hiring of foreign FOs

Brussels Airlines recently hired six foreign First Officers holding an MPL (Multi-Crew Pilot Licence) with an Airbus A320 type rating acquired from Lufthansa Flight Training. Apart from some licensing issues (an MPL is linked to an ATO and an operator), this raised a question: why does Brussels Airlines hire foreign pilots when so many freshly graduated Belgian pilots are looking for a job? No need to remind that hiring at this moment is very rare in Belgium.

As BeCA was not convinced by the official answer of the company (“we cannot find in Belgium pilots with the same competences”), we sent a letter to Mr Gustin, b.air CEO, to ask him explanations about these statements. We also expressed our disappointment and regret about this decision. We are still waiting for his answer. But 4 Belgian Avro First Officers were hired recently.

EFB

EFB are now distributed to all pilots. It is a Windows Surface Pro 3 tablet identical to the ones used by the Lufthansa and Austrian pilots. However the project is still far beyond planned schedule (the implementation had already be published on the Lufthansa intranet in May… 2012). The use of the EFB in flight is restricted to some instructors and only a few aircraft are equipped with holders and power plugs.

For the moment, its content is limited to the Lido charts and En-Route Manual (not even aircraft documentation, which is available on the company intranet “SharePoint”). It takes some time between the publication on SharePoint and the update of the official paper documents on board.

Unfit to Fly

It seems that the number of crews reporting unfit is increasing over the past few years. More than 300 crews reported unfit on a one year period of witch 40% were cockpit crews. This tends to confirm the results of the recent BeCA safety survey over fatigue.

Avro

No changes foreseen this year. At the moment the phase out of the 12 Avros is still planned for May 2016 (to be completed in November 2017). A Wet Leased aircraft has been added recently on this fleet. A320 conversion of the crews will start in November 2015.

A320

8 First Officers upgraded to Captains, with a 3-year contract.

A330

14 years after the first flight to Nairobi, operations to the Kenyan capital will stop in October. Flights will be operated by Swiss. Frequencies to some West African destinations will increase and flights to Accra will be operated again after 3 years of interruption. But still no fleet expansion in sight despite the promises of the plan “Beyond 2012”.

Temporary/contract pilots

Temporary/contract pilots are currently flying on the Brussels Airlines fleet and aircraft are still wet leased to operate several destinations.