"henri Arsenault" wrote in message
...
Hmmm, OK...How long does it take from scratch for a pilot to train as
an passenger airline pilot for a major airline?

It varies widely. Some of the bigger flight schools have two-year "ab
initio" programs, I believe. Some airline pilots take a less structured
route, and have as much as a decade of flying (or more) under the belt
before an airline hires them.

Not that airline pilots have anything to do with your comment.

How many hours of training does it take a novice before he is qualified
to solo in the worst IFR conditions?

You have to define "novice". A private pilot in the US needs only 40 hours
of instrument training before they are granted a rating that allows them to
fly in the worst IFR conditions. You can, of course, debate whether they
are truly "qualified", but once you start equivocating on that, you've gone
down a very slippery road.

The fact remains that plenty of people "correctly" fly IFR with much less
than a year of training.

Pete