To fulfill the growing demand for air travel around the world, Cathay Pacific Airways has a goal of hiring 4,000 people by the end of the year. In order to meet its future needs, additional positions have been created for pilots and cabin personnel.
According to a statement made on September 5, 2022, the airline, which is based at Hong Kong International Airport (HGK), plans to hire hundreds of cabin crew members by the end of 2023. Additionally, the airline will hire 700 additional pilots, 400 of whom will likely be cadet grads who will work as first officers.
“Since the inception of our Cadet Pilot training program, Cathay Pacific has trained more than 1,000 cadet pilots from Hong Kong. We look forward to welcoming candidates who will be starting the new cadet courses and becoming part of the Cathay Pacific team upon graduation,” the airline said,
“Overall, we aim to train more than 1,000 cadet pilots by 2025,” the airline added.
The airline and the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) recently agreed to work together for three years to develop a new integrated course for Cathay Pacific’s Cadet Pilot training program. The integrated course consists of three stages: theory, simulator training, and flight training, and it lasts between 55 and 60 weeks.
According to Cathay Pacific CEO Augustus Tang, the course is expected to help the airline become the world’s “leading center” for aviation training, providing cadets a “world-class instruction and training for prospective”.
“Conducting the majority of cadet-training activities in Hong Kong will ensure that the training regime is specifically suited to meet the needs of Cathay Pacific,” the air carrier’s statement concludes.
Midway through June 2022, Cathay Pacific acknowledged that it was having trouble controlling a high rate of post-pandemic pilot resignations.
The carrier had considered enhancing benefits and allowances to address the staffing issue, reasoning that doing so would please the flight crew whose pay had been reduced to assist the airline in surviving the pandemic.
“We still have resignation rates at much higher levels than we’ve historically had,” Chief Operations and Service Delivery Officer Greg Hughes said in an interview with Bloomberg at the time.
