Piedmont Airlines

Piedmont Airlines is a wholly owned subsidiary of American Airlines operating as American Eagle, flying around 80 Embraer E145 regional jets from bases including Charlotte and Philadelphia. Headquartered in Salisbury, Maryland, it is the smallest of American's three wholly owned regionals and among the oldest names in US regional aviation.

Flying for Piedmont Airlines

Like its sister carriers, Piedmont's appeal is the flow: pilots in the American Airlines Flow Program secure an American First Officer position without an interview, which turns the regional job into a defined route to a mainline seat rather than a destination. Direct entry needs a current unrestricted FAA ATP with multi-engine rating and, in practice, 1,500 hours, alongside the standard medical and vision requirements.

Because the flow removes the mainline interview, the assessment that matters is the one at the regional door — application screening, aptitude and personality testing, a technical interview and a simulator evaluation. Candidates arriving at the published minimums are competing against a field with the same paperwork, so performance in the cognitive stages is what actually differentiates them.