CaptainCarl

He's moved on to greener pastures and beyond that I'll let Copperhead field this question however he chooses. I miss shootin' the sh!t with ya' man

Copperhed51

After 9 months (plus 2 years of being furloughed) at TSA, I missed a phone call on reserve because my phone didn't have service plus I was sick anyway (had called in sick the day before). I called in sick around 7am (my reserve started at 5am) and said I should be good to go the next day but just wasn't healthy enough yet. They told me they had already called and tried to assign a trip to me that had a show time in a few hours. I said I never got a call and I was too sick to do it and they had to report that I was "uncontactable on reserve" to the CP.

I flew the line for a few more weeks and had a meeting with the CP immediately after I finished a trip. I landed in STL, got in my car, drove straight to the CP's office and they asked me for my badge, books, and brass. Unfortunately since I was on probation (even though I was hired in '08) I couldn't do anything about the situation. Another pilot off probation was in exactly the same situation as me a couple days before me and just had to write a "letter of commitment" to the company. Fact of the matter is I had checked out of the career long before any of this happened. I wish I'd had the balls to get out sooner.

XDriverX

..I think if you worked for a better airline and not a sack slapping bottomfeeder, you would have different experiences and different feelings towards staying in this profession. I almost left aviation after being monkey slapped at Mesa for 7 years, but I went on to work at Netjets and found aviation (at the right company) was by far the best job in the world. IMHO.

Copperhed51

You are probably right and when I started this whole thing, my plan was to get hired at Netjets or somewhere similar. A few months later, everything went to hell and my plans were screwed. 3 years later and things are only slightly better. I may be back to flying if things go well but I'm done settling for the possibility of an ok future. When I was sleeping on an air mattress in a room with a 45 year old man in his tighty whities who has kids in high school that he rarely sees and who was just furloughed from a good job to come back to fly at Great Lakes, I pretty much decided the future instability was not gonna work for me. We'll see though. Good luck to you, glad you found something that works for you!

osuav8r

I know it probably stung to have them fire you, but I think someday you're going to feel like you should buy them a round of beers for the favor they did you That place sucked so much a$$ I can't believe any of us tolerated the way they treated us. I'm sorry you had such a rough go of it and hope your new venture works out well for you. Handing in my resignation there was the single most gratifying thing I have done in my professional life so far. I'll never work for a company that treats me that way again. It's like one of those awful girlfriends I had back in the day. I don't regret dating the ****ty ones because I know what to stay away from in the future. Cheers man! I'm happy for you because better things lay ahead almost for sure!

TonyWilliams

Those "better things" are unlikely to be in the Part 121 world.

osuav8r

Yeah that's what I meant..... My family members that gave up on the flying thing were able to go into business for themselves and in a few short years have surpassed what I can reasonably expect to make as a pilot. And I'm one of the lucky ones.

pilotca86

Good move for getting out of aviation. These people love to treat pilots like crap. Best of luck to you in your new carreer. I can't wait until this nightmare is over.