Colin Croft

Port-of-Spain: These are good times for commercial pilots in the Caribbean ? British West Indies Airways (BWIA), for example, has announced a hefty 50 per cent increase in salaries. Colin Croft, though, isn’t sure whether he’s going to benefit.

The one-time tearaway, it may be recalled, flies the De Havilland 50-seater turboprops for BWIA subsidiary Tobago Express. It’s a regional carrier.

“I don’t know whether even I stand to gain... I’m, of course, on leave till the end of the India tour (July 4),” Croft, who does quite a bit of Media work, told The Telegraph on Sunday. He has a convenient arrangement with his employers whereby he’s off duty during the West Indies’ commitments.

“I don’t take any other leave. In an emergency, however, I could be called up,” Croft added.

He qualified as a commercial pilot as early as 1981, from the Flight Safety Academy in Florida, but began flying professionally only in 1994. “I had to first get a conversion license from the UK,” was his explanation.

Croft started off as an Air Traffic Controller (in Guyana, Puerto Rico and here), in fact he held that position even while playing for the West Indies from 1976-77 till the early 1980s, and worked with Pratt and Whitney in the US before returning to fly as a pro in the West Indies.

“I was an engineer there (Pratt and Whitney), between 1988 and 1992,” he said. Well, there’s much about Croft that’s interesting.