Thread: News 8 Investigates: Airline mechanics who can't read

Originally Posted by MW

The root of the problem is money, mechanics say. A certified mechanic can earn upwards of $25 an hour in Texas. Technicians who can't speak English are often hired for less than $10, according to mechanics interviewed by News 8.

The FAA's primary mission is to ensure the safety, security, and efficiency of the National Airspace System. Well, looks like they're failing miserably in their primary mission. IMO, this is all about keeping the airlines afloat and the airplanes flying. Damned the risk to the American public.

That pretty much sums it up. I did ops for an airline that will remain nameless, and a 727 landed at DFW from Chicago with a small crack in the fuselage. The maintenance guys broke out the manual. They ended up using a grey apoxy type paste which took several hours to dry. I followed the aircraft for the next week, and it NEVER received the proper fix. It flew around for God knows how long with a rigged fix. All of our mechanics spoke fluent English though. Most of them worked on B-52's in the Air Force.

This is just plain scary. Pro-illegals say they just want to support their families, and only take jobs Americans won't do, blah, blah, blah, and now look at this. They are undercutting legal and American workers by more than 50%. This is a job that pays $25/hr being done for only $10/hr. True, not many Americans would do this job for $10/hr. I guess $10 is a lot for someone who is illiterate in English, and most likely in their mother tongue too, since most illegals never graduated from high school and are lucky to have completed the 4th grade. Just like in construction, jobs that used to pay well are going to the illegals for pennies on the dollar, and in this case, not only are the employees and passengers on these planes at risk, so is everyone on the ground. They need to find every person who knew about this situation and hired these cheap laborers, and send them to jail. They need to jail the illegals who didn't do the work they were hired to do, and who didn't keep a log. If they don't have a log written in English, the work wasn't done. They accepted the pay. I wonder what La Raza would have to say about this. How would they defend these illegals? Just trying to make some money and who cares how many lives they endanger? Crazy.

Here's how they'll fix this problem: All supervisors will have to be Bi-Lingual.