AdiosMikeFox

Bunch of armchair quarterbacks here conveniently forgetting the bankruptcy and the closure of all but two bases in a few short years. How Glass & co. literally said they were doing everything possible to break us. How the other WO's were being offered our aircraft and new aircraft while we watched our flying disappear. The company kept hammering us with sucker punches with one hand and offering us concessionary contracts with the other.

All this while other carriers were growing, being offered hefty signing and retention bonuses, hiring like crazy and upgrading commensurately. All while we got nothing and our pilots scattered to the other regionals being offered our former bases and equipment, faced crappy reserve rule changes and our schedules went to hell in a handbasket.

We held out. Longer than most. But in the end, the company won. Tell me, what other regional faced such immense pressure over such a short time? Sure, others shrank. Slowly. Over years. But none had to withstand a concerted attack like we faced except maybe Comair, and everyone knows what happened to them. We were literally threatened with the same fate.

Literally.

So all you keyboard warriors out there are free to throw your opinion around, but until you've actually sat through the battle and watched your airline be systematically destroyed and dismantled by the might of AMR you can go pound sand.

Is our contract great? Hell no. Is it still better than many? Yes. We watched everyone else reap the benefits of our downfall, now it's our turn to pull ahead.

RANGER211

Stupid is as stupid does. I'm sure that was psa's "strategy". My point is and has been that u guys took a concessionaire contract to spur said growth. You are trying to spin it now. And your contract still sucks.

jbizon

With a 24 month upgrade to the Captains seat, you'll be making 3rd year CA pay, which is $69/hr.

chrisreedrules

Troll on

pagey

Why does our contract suck and what negative impact did our deal have on the industry?

You never answered my question, exactly as I said you wouldn't.

billyho

First off as a contract carrier "Your flying doesn't exist!" It's the Legacy's flying. They just let you fly the routes they own.
I'm assuming you work at AWAC right? Well let me tell you about Piedmont. We combined with ALG and had almost 100 dash 8's. That got taken down to 40 planes so don't think your rocky road is something many will have a bleeding heart for.
While PDT/ALG combined they saw their planes go away while all the contract carriers got all the RJ's. How do you think we felt at PDT when our guys were leaving for Republic to fly the 170's for less then what the Dash 8 FO's made? Really?

Piedmont Pilot were probably the most Hammered Pilot group EVER! We looked like zombies walking around the CLT airport.
Lose Half your fleet then come arm chair Quarterback.
It's the same song and dance.

RANGER211

You signed a concessionaire contract after both republic and envoy voted them down. You started the slide downward. Your Heath care, vacation, pay is what sucks. 2 year upgrades will only last so long so $69 an hour is not a fair comparison on top of the fact that it below the industry avg for regional capt pay and you fly long lawn dart.

billyho

Bottom line is many Pilots have always gone to Regionals with less pay and benefits because of one thing. They wanted a fast upgrade to get to a Legacy Carrier. Many do this and it's worked for them nicely.

The days of the career regional pilot is slowly coming to an end. Bottom line with all the hiring if you have a choice of a top pay regional with a 5 year upgrade versus a regional that pays less with a 1-2 year upgrade you'd be an idiot in today's market to pick the 5 year upgrade. Unless you lived in one of there bases.

billyho

I mistaken you for AWAC. Sorry, looks like your Eagle.

PilotJ3

The issue is that our training department has lost a lot of the instructors to the flow. They were senior and part of the training department for long time.

They are increasing the amount of instructors, that's why the classes has being going up slowly as the training department it's being increased.