My current career plan A is to be a Captain at Southwest Airlines. There are several reasons for why I want to work at Southwest, and have a set plan to give me the best chance at achieving that job.
Being born and raised in Dallas, Texas, most of my family and friends live in the area and being able to stay local would be ideal. This is a large reasoning for wanting to work at Southwest Airlines. Another reason is that out of most legacy airlines, the Southwest pilot group tends to seem generally happier than others that I have spoke to. Pay at Southwest is also enticing, with starting salary around 75k, and the ability to make more than 200k a year towards the end of your career. The schedule Southwest can provide would allow for a desirable work life balance, which also factors into the decision.
Southwest has posted pilot minimums of 2,500 hours of total flight time, with at least 1,000 hours of flight time acting as the pilot in command of a turbine aircraft. You must also have a high school degree, first
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One of the distinguishing factors a pilot can have to help stand out from others is the amount of flight time, as well as the diversity of flight time. In order to achieve this, I am currently working at a part 135 on demand charter outfit, flying roughly five hundred hours a year. In a years time I will be eligible for upgrade, allowing me to work towards the one thousand hour of pilot in command time of a turbine aircraft requirement. Also, this flying is much more varied than airline flying taking me to all sorts of destinations, and different environments. Once, I achieve more than one thousand hours of turbine PIC time, I will begin to apply a operators with airframes and operational aspects that Southwest would find valuable, such as, Atlas Freight, Spirit, or Frontier. I believe this experience will aid me in my journey to Southwest