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Several pilots who fly planes for Amazon Air said they thought an accident was inevitable.

The rapid growth of Amazon's air-cargo empire, coupled with low pay, has led to inexperienced pilots in the cockpit, veteran pilots said, adding that it could lead to safety problems. The pilots described difficulties in attracting experienced pilots, training they considered shoddy, experience with fatigue, plummeting morale, and pay that's considerably lower than at other cargo carriers. ( Altro...

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So one pilot had 11,000 flight hours, the other had 5,000 (1,800 hours between the two on the B767), and the story is about how inexperienced pilots are inevitably going to cause a crash?? Seems legit...

Cansojr -5
I agree with your point. A friend and former colleague flies 757s and 767s all over North and South America. He said the quality and skills of the new pilots is not sufficient. People with 500 hundred hours on the wet ink on their licenses are simply not prepared to handle a 400 thousand pound aircraft. That's why we are having these accidents. I remember when you needed 1000 hours twin time before anyone would look at you.
erisajd 0
so can a pilot with 11,000 hours fly a 400,000# airplane? Seems like you contradict your own comment by not acknowledging what you are responding to . . . .
depends on which pilot is flying the plane, and since the older voice was communicating from the start and the younger voice was last heard communicating and sounded stressed one could come to the conclusion that the captain had taken the controls, but maybe too late and could not recover from the dive.
Business Insider is a left wing organization, with questionable motives.
LOL, a “left wing organization” ......American media has 1 motive, to generate ad sales.....
Chris B 3
I hate Always generating click bait type stuff.
It is sad when journalists are more interested in getting "eyes" on a story instead of getting a "story" correct!! Maybe the article was meant as a political hit???

It is incorrect to lead, even say, that "An Amazon Air plane crashed..." This WAS NOT an Amazon plane! It was an Atlas Air plane! With Atlas Air employees and maintenance handling safety, etc.!

Even in the body of the article it is stated, "These planes aren't owned by Amazon, and the people maintaining and flying these jumbo jets aren't Amazon employees. They're employees of Air Transport Services Group (ATSG) and Atlas Air Worldwide Holdings and their subsidiaries."

So to lead with "An Amazon Air plane crashed..." is just plain WRONG!!!

Sad when so called "journalists" cannot, nay WILL NOT, lead with correct information! They should be ashamed to call themselves journalists!
As a Houstonian, I think this crash has generated too little interest. Obviously because 200+ ppl didn’t lose their lives. Thousands of ppl ride 767s daily. Weather? Sure, we get storm fronts, but a typical “winter storm” around here is nothing. Pilot error? Something wrong with 767s? Inquiring minds want to know.
Cindy the NTSB reported that the pilots lost control more than likely the young inexperienced co-pilot lost it due to turbulence and IFR conditions and in the video you could see the plane almost level out but seems he ran out of altitude. see my post below. have a great day. Retired airline pilot.
Now my question is this. Amazon does not have a flight department, Atlas Air does. So shouldn't it read "Several pilots who fly planes for Atlas..." since Atlas is the aviation company providing the services and would be monitoring pilot times, aircraft usage, etc... While I am not a fan of Amazon and how it treats their workers, in this case, seems Atlas would be the one in question.
I think this article is just trying to stir people up, or create fear, or generate ratings, because when I read the preliminary NTSB report it certainly doesn't appear like inexperience caused this pilot error.

"Shortly after, when the airplane’s indicated airspeed was steady about 230 knots, the engines increased to maximum thrust, and the airplane pitch increased to about 4° nose up. The airplane then pitched nose down over the next 18 seconds to about 49° in response to nose-down elevator deflection. The stall warning (stick shaker) did not activate."

That last sentence speaks volumes in my mind "The stick shaker did not activate", maybe I'm incorrect and the 16,000 combined hours between then caused an issue in IMC, or something else caused them to lose focus on the airplane. However, I find that hard to believe, maybe we are looking for another "I" word, "intentional".

