Bill Lumberg

More rumors from the line. This time, from 2 320 Capts, one of which is a checkairman.

The fatigue/rest rule changes will now result in 750 newhires, supposedly stated by ES, a senior linecheck guy. Very few or no hiring this year, but approx 600 next year and a few after that due to those new rules and retirements. I mentioned that I thought the fatigue/rest rule changes would only result in modest hiring, to which they said the 750 was the new number.


Contract is pretty much negotiated, but someone way up there wants initially a two year contract, due to those fatigue/rest rule changes, which will need a 4 year contract addressed when the rules become affective in 2 years. So, status quo rules wise with exception to what has recently been negotiated, and a 20% pay raise effective July of this year.(another rumor)


About 50 old A320s that flew for NWA starting around 1988 are quickly approaching the cycle limit put out by Airbus. How can you replace those quickly, they run out of cycles in about 1 1/2 years. Could a merger or buying more used planes help? Who knows?


That's all I have for rumors today, building on last week's DFW rumors. Have fun!

scambo1

Did you just watch Atlas Shrugged?

NuGuy

OK, I'll say it again....*** happened to the vacation allocations this year?

It's not even like I'm asking for Thansgiving or Christmas off...one random week in September and one in April is hardly asking for too much.

I've easily held these weeks for the past six years.

The stupid thing GAVE me Thanksgiving off, because none of the other, seemingly worthless-to-everyone-else weeks were already gone....

Grrrrr......

Nu

gloopy

That is way higher than I would have guessed and I just can't believe it. If its true though, and 600 are hired in 2013, permanant hiring will be the result (not including economic pulldowns which are very possible going forward) because 2014 starts the retirement waterfall that rapidly starts to build after that. Bring it on, but I still can't see 750 from the rest rules but we'll see.

That's still below SWA in rates but like many others have mentioned, the difference can be made up for in work rule improvements and I'm more concerned with scope at all 3 levels anyway. 20% even with positive work rules is a giant NO vote from me without at least some gains in all areas of scope (RJs, AS code share abuse and current and more importantly future JV's). Show me the scope.

Um, buy airplanes maybe? I mean its not like we're one of the largest airlines in the history of the world or anything. Did these 320s cycle out by suprise or something? What's next, we'll need to buy jet-A and pay landing fees? Who could have forcasted such unreasonable, unmanageable, rogue expenditures? As an airline if we need airplanes we need to buy or lease the airplanes we need.

If, after 80 years, this is suddenly become some unmanageable act of freakonomics then we need new managers who know how to buy or lease airplanes for an airline. I'm not against used planes, and would love to get the 71's that SWA is dumping anyway as well as the 20 or so in the desert, provided the terms are right. Other than those, I don't see very many used planes we would want.

A merger just to get the metal is some of the lamest stratedgy I've ever heard of. Yeah we get the metal, but we also get the current capacity its flying. Capacity we have to essentially pay to get along with the metal, and if we dump the capacity the LCC's and start ups will add every single seat we dump and we still have the costs of buying or leasing their planes anyway. If we merge with AA, in whole or in part, we get a ton of old metal that needs replacing anyway so back to square one and then some. Either way we need new planes and any manager or executive that pretends this is some crisis point is incompetent in this industry.

I don't see the point about a 2 year bridge deal regarding the new FTDT because the rules are what they are and there is very little relief we could give the company to help offset them even if we were in the mood to give up work rules. The only place I see is the 9 hour block unaugmented stuff, but if it remains true that time is a hard non waiveable 9 hours from throttle up of each segment like we're told it is, relief of our current 8 hour limit wouldn't amount to very much of anything and certainly not enough to warrant 2 years to think about it. IOW what is the incentive for the company for the bridge deal WRT the new FTDT's?

gloopy

So other than a bit more 88/90 positions, what do your tea leaves suggest this bid will be about? Do you think it will contain some of the 777/747 pulldowns coming back because of the lie flat mods or were those positions lost to the great rift of the universe?

Elvis90

Bill, thanks for the update...good info.

Timbo

I can't speak to the 747 fleet, but I know all our 777's have had the lie flat seats done, for a while already, so I doubt we'll see any openings posted there.

hockeypilot44

I would vote for a 2 year contract with a 20 percent raise upfront followed by another 10 percent the following year if reserves are paid the same as lineholders per trip, and vacation and training credit is raised. That's not a bad raise upfront. 2 years will come and go in no time. I would do this because it looks like United, US Airways, and American are no where close to getting a contract. Someone has to lead the way. This is a good start to buy us some time for the other carriers to outdo us. Then we can outdo them in 2 years.

iceman49

Goes against the recent aviation week article which stated that no new pilots would be required by the industry for the fatigue/rest rules. I would believe hiring just to get in front of the bow waving coming

Contract almost completely negotiated, coming from a LCA that came from a LCA meeting....wouldn't think so.

I would imagine that the life cycle of the bus will be extended
Airbus begins tests to extend service life of A320 family

Continue on with the DFW rumors

Airbus plans A320 life-extension - Asian Aviation

newKnow

I'm not trying to be a scavenger here, but maybe one of you guys can explain it to me. How are American's Airbus and Boeing orders effected by the bankruptcy filings? Can another airline (Delta) swoop in and offer more money and get them?