Regional life: is it even an option any more?
09-22-2014, 06:42 AM
#11
Banned
Joined APC: Apr 2014
Posts: 1,291
The crj700s will be next on the chopping block,but it will be several years down the road.Before long,you wont see anything smaller that an emb175 or crj 900 mainly flying at the regionals. Maybe a small handful of 200s or 700s still around but you will probably be able to count them on one hand.I don't like it but it seems that's where its headed.If I had my way,all the 900s and 175s would be at mainline to open up thousands of jobs for us who are looking to move on.
09-22-2014, 09:59 AM
#12
Gets Weekends Off
Joined APC: Dec 2005
Posts: 8,920
Either he's a prima donna or you are making him sound like one.
Regionals are not low stress. Very low pay for lots of flying into usually smaller airports/runways and add the bad weather. 5 leg days are a PITA when every single approach is IFR and some down to mins. I'd hardly classify this as "low stress." My "stress" at a regional came with low pay and wondering how to start a family with that type of income. Plus, losing flying/contracts to other low-ball regionals, management asking for concessions, the race to the bottom, etc. Everything about the regional model today adds to stress.
Never worked for an airline and already is imagining making 100k and at a regional? Good luck with that.
Curious, what's wrong with not seeing a left seat at a major? Plenty of pilots today will retire from Delta, AA, and United as FOs and quite a few of them by choice. Once you realize that 2nd year FOs at AA/DL/UA make more than pretty much any regional CA (once you add pay/retirement/etc) then it makes sense to move up. Why do you "have" to retire in the left seat or "have" to be a CA?
If the thought of an airline interview is stressing to him, the regional life stress will really get to him. As for reserve, he will be reserve FO at the regional and then a reserve CA at the regional. Nothing is guaranteed. But to say he doesn't want reserve is a pretty big demand and reserve time depends on the specific airline, base, economy/recession, etc.
However, he wants a low stress life,
this is a second career for him and he says he'd be quite content making $100k as a regional lifer somewhere for the 15 or so years he has left.
I can see why he'd do it, if he upgrades in 12-18 months after he starts in January, he'll be looking at 13-14 years on an average salary of somewhere around $80k. In his position he'd probably never see the left seat at a major.
He doesn't want the stress of another interview and he doesn't want to go back to reserve.
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