AirTran

The trigger has been pulled my friend. We are about 10 months from SOC. Codeshare begins in the fall. Station alignment (gate, counter, and ops) begins with BWI and FLL in a couple of months.

Elvis90

Perhaps I'm naive and have a hard time believing this, but...I heard a rumor this week that SWA intended to keep the companies separate, sell the B717's, and get rid of Airtran crews as aircraft are divested, while simultaneously hiring on the SWA side. Any comments? Confirm or deny? It might be that data concerning this rumor was posted earlier and I simply missed it.

MatthewAMEL

They spent $3.4B to purchase an airline to park 2/3 of the fleet and fire most of the employees? I'm fairly certain Gary Kelly is a bit more savvy than that.

OscartheGrouch

Scambo,

First of all, I see that Carl is back and has of course been spending his time in a productive manner.

With my lack of desire to know every detail and therefore my limited amount of understanding with the SLI I can only say that each side has its arguments. There are supposedly benchmarks in the negotiations that must be reached in a certain time period or we go to arbitration. For most of us the expectations are just that - Arbitration. With three arbitrators, any one of which might have a blind spot towards a position presented by a either side, I hope that the three will consider all info. At the very least if we put the blame on the arbitrators we won't be pointing fingers at each other. I could be surprised and the pilot groups might work out something that we could vote on. I will not be betting on it though.

A few years ago I jumpseated on DAL (around the time your SLI was announced) and it was described to me that except for the real senior folks everyone felt some sort of pain. I equate it to trying to stay married. While I have been married for 22 years it was not without compromise on both of our positions over the years. When our SLI with our Airtran brethren happens I don't just want to get along in the confined spaces of the cockpit, I actually want it to be pleasant. If we fail to create that type of work environment then it might truly be said that the SWA culture is indeed dying.

My two cents which isn't worth much.

The Oscar

ClipperJet

Unlikely, but not beyond the realm of possible…

I think after you factor in the stock swaps and the cash AirTran had, the "out of pocket" number SWA paid is closer to $400M. That's a pretty good price for 52 737s, gates, and slots--not to mention eliminating a major competitor....

I think most of the 717s are leased. Assuming you couldn’t get out of the leases, you could fly them a couple of years until the leases were up and then turn them back in.

mulcher

Codeshare wont happen until SWAPA gives SWA a waiver to allow it. I dont think that will happen. Station Alignment I think has started already, the first being RDU. The SOC would be after the arbitrated ruling in our case. So see it may still be upto GK to decide what happens.

AirTran

GK has already informed SWAPA that the CBA does not prohibit codeshare with a wholy owned, it only prohibits codeshare with an outside airline. The codeshare begins in September.

The process agreement compells GK to file for single carrier status and combine under a SOC. There can be no liquidation of Guadaloupe prior to that. This agreement was signed by all four parties.

So there is no "leverage" on either side to accept a one-sided ISL. It will be arbitrated and we will all learn to live with it while the company doubles in size over the next 10 years.

tsquare

Your 2 cents is worth more than mine here that is for sure. I would have to say though, that the culture isn't gonna die, but it definitely will change. No matter how much you want it not to.. it will. That is a fact of life...

MY worthless 2 centavos....

forgot to bid

If God doesn't destroy Hollywood Boulevard, he owes Sodom and Gomorrah an apology. And that's my two cents.




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Elvis90

I agree that Gary Kelly is savvy...I'm thinking about American and TWA in 2001, where TWA was purchased for $2 Billion (cash & liabilities) then American immediately furloughed most of the junior TWA pilots. Obviously a completely different situation today with two profitable companies, but a similar order of magnitude with it's own challenges (i.e., $100+ oil).