shackone

Once again, AA73 has given a sober but fair answer.

One of those issues you speak of should be to ensure that nobody ever has to suffer the indignities of an integration such as the TWA stapling. If we all are to be professionals that we would like to think we are, then we should make every effort to find the least onerous way to merge pilot lists.

I'm no expert...but for me, that would be DOH.

B757200ER

Oh, yes there are. A good benchmark merger would be Delta/Western, 1986. All got seniority, job protection, and all advanced quickly. Noone got furloughed, and all got raises.

How about USAirways and their predecessors? PSA, Piedmont and USAir all merged with DOH, and they survived long enough to get bought by AWA. That integration is undecided as of now, but without a doubt it will be better, more equitable and less destructive than AA/TWA.

Other winners would be '98-'99 AA hires, who would have all been furloughed if AA hadn't bought TWA and stapled 1300+ pilots below them. With the greatest furlough in the history of aviation, AA would have wiped out almost all new-hires from late '98 until '01.

aa73

B757, true. You are referring to ALPA-ALPA mergers, where stapling is usually not a part of the equation. In an ALPA/non ALPA merger, unfortunately, the company doing the buying pretty much calls the shots, as it is in the corporate world as well.

As I mentioned earlier, had we not had the huge recession and 9/11 after our merger, many, many AA and TWA jobs would have prospered. Sure, there would have been bitterness and disgruntled employees, but nowhere near what we have now because of the massive furloughs.

As FliFast said, let's work on the issues we can change - such as taxi speed.

73

Velocipede

Can you please explain the difference between "loose" and "lose"?

FXDX

TWA/AA wasn't a "merger".

shackone

In the context of that 'profession' that most of us like to lay claim to, does it matter?

Or is the deliberate screwing of fellow pilots going to come down to semantics?

B757200ER

What was FederalExpress and Flying Tigers? And what did you think of that integration?

jetblaster

No, you weren't. I too remember that thread.

Several congratulated the crew and at least one wondered why the Name of The Captain was not known on the news, as he and his FO were the heroes. (The line of thought on that thread was that we do our best work yet remain uncredited, but let a jet crash and the pilot is to blame immediately and his name is certainly said on the news.)

However, in the thread, non-union, ATA-Beta-Test-Trial-Balloon-Labor-Grind-Down-Experiment-Petri-Dish JetBlu was then justifiably criticized for outsourcing their maintenance to El Salvador.

(Certainly anyone who said something like "wish they had caught fire" A) didn't really mean it and B) in any case was WAY out of line).

If I remember correctly, the gear problem WAS attributed to corner-cutting outsourcing to the inferior maintenance outfit.

America first.

Jetblaster

B757200ER

Good post. Outsourcing MX to third-world contractors is a BAD idea, whether it cuts costs or not. What a joke.

As far as someone saying they wish the B6 A320 had 'caught on fire', that sounds like the majority of those militant hate-everybody posters on C&R.

jetblaster

Militant is a relative term. (Thesaurus: confrontational; combative; activist.)

If airline pilots had valued and respected the hard work and sacrifices made by past confrontational airline pilots, that handed them a lucrative career on a silver platter, and been more combative about defending that value from collaborative management (ATA, etc) initiatives, and been the activists that they needed to be to mount a successful defense, the career would not be in the shape that it is in presently.

Also, it is my experience that the term "militant" is used by one of two groups:

1) Cheesy "union" leaders-cum-management wannabees seeking to scare line pilot voters into actually thinking there are a raging group of barbarians within their midst that "just want to burn the house down." This characterization is used to ensure that men and women who collaborate with management for rewards, such as Employee Relations, Cockpit Security, Corporate Communications or Check Airmen and Chief Pilot positions remain in office as union negotiators, union communications and union base representatives, counting on the benign nature of the average airline pilot and his/her reluctance to actually take a stand to preserve career value. (It is puzzling that a group of otherwise intelligent men and women would believe this myth of "radicals"; but the voting record shows that this is an effective scare tactic.)

2) The other group is the Scared Scotties who fail to realize that being a moderate while management is being arrogantly unreasonable is not the way to preserve long-term career value.

I challenge anyone to demonstrate to me an example where union radical pilots burned down the house; or, conversely, where milquetoast leaders preserved career value (I'll even go one further and define "preserving value" as remaining above the CPI for the last 30 years.)

Jetblaster