USAir = Perpetual junk

[OnTheDole]

Has any airline furloughed or went backrupt more times than US Air... Seriously as long as I've been in aviation thats really all they've been good for. So do they hold the distinguished title?

 

[PuffDriver]

Has any airline furloughed or went backrupt more times than US Air... Seriously as long as I've been in aviation thats really all they've been good for. So do they hold the distinguished title?

About as much worth as America West was.

 

[~~~^~~~]

Hard to say in this business. You know there were a variety of airlines that sprang out of the Eastern meltdown; Carnival, Kiwi, and even some that lived, like ValuJet. Then you have Kalitta, Buffalo Airways, Mesa, Nations Air, etc ....

US Air is doing so much better than I ever expected they would. Of course, they do this as a result of not paying their people what they are worth for the work they do.

 

[get2flyin]

About as much worth as America West was.

I don't think anyone expected a ticker-tape parade for saving USAir, but a simple "thank you" would have been nice.:laugh:

 

[hockeypilot44]

Usair was the place to work in the mid eighties. They had the best contract of anyone, great duty regs, a great pension, were making money, and the company treated all of its employees well. Now it is a terrible company. The thing about this industry is that a lot of the Usair pilots could have chose anywhere to work that they wanted, but they chose Usair. It is not their fault that Usair has been screwed up by management just like it is not the Southwest pilots fault that Southwest has been successful. While Usair was thriving, no one in their right mind would pick Southwest over Usair. Southwest had no pension, paid the least of all airlines, and only offered you one aircraft to fly for the rest of your career. My point is that things change. In 15-20 years, we could be saying the exact same thing about Southwest, etc. Things change. All we do is fly airplanes. We are labor. We have very little impact on whether our company succeeds or not. United has a very similar story to Usair. The answer to your question is no, and America West has never been an airline of choice. Usair has. Thankfully, I do not work for Usair, but I will not bash that pilot group.

 

[satpak77]

Pan Am was "the place" to get hired in the late 70's, early 80's as we all know too. Ditto TWA.

Todays "great" airline could be tomorrows failure.

 

[WSurf]

US Air is doing so much better than I ever expected they would. Of course, they do this as a result of not paying their people what they are worth for the work they do.

And what airline does pay what the workers are worth? Besides Southwest.....

 

[reepicheep]

USAir was a great place in the mid 80's - unfortunately while the visonaries in the rest of the industry were placing their bets on international expansion and high O & D hubs (Delta, United) or fueling expansion via low costss (Piedmont, Southwest) USAir made exactly the wrong strategic moves at exactly the wrong times. Bet the Farm on the PIT hub. Bought F100's. Business as usual circa 1976. Acquired PSA and Piedmont and immediately set about dismantling whatever it was that made those airlines work. And spread the high-cost USAir brand of "cool northern efficiency" throughout the decades-old route networks they'd just bought, essentially rendering them non-competitive and dead.

Too bad; with a progressive and proactive upper management USAir could be Delta today, or Southwest.

 

[hockeypilot44]

USAir was a great place in the mid 80's - unfortunately while the visonaries in the rest of the industry were placing their bets on international expansion and high O & D hubs (Delta, United) or fueling expansion via low costss (Piedmont, Southwest) USAir made exactly the wrong strategic moves at exactly the wrong times. Bet the Farm on the PIT hub. Bought F100's. Business as usual circa 1976. Acquired PSA and Piedmont and immediately set about dismantling whatever it was that made those airlines work. And spread the high-cost USAir brand of "cool northern efficiency" throughout the decades-old route networks they'd just bought, essentially rendering them non-competitive and dead.

Too bad; with a progressive and proactive upper management USAir could be Delta today, or Southwest.

Exactly. The pilots had nothing to do with this. If pilot pay would have kept up with inflation, a captain would be making $500,000/year in today's dollars. A pilot used to make more than the President. Southwest pilots never took a pay cut other than an inflation beating. Southwest pilots have also never signed an industry leading contract. I'm not picking on Southwest intentionally. I just get sick and tired of hearing how airlines should be like Southwest when I heard for years how no one in their right mind would want to work for Southwest. This industry sucks. There is no skill involved in making a successful career. Just dumb luck.

 

[DCAA320]

Has any airline furloughed or went backrupt more times than US Air... Seriously as long as I've been in aviation thats really all they've been good for. So do they hold the distinguished title?

Yo "onthedole" what's it like having a single digit IQ?

 

[AA717driver]

In their heyday, the USAir employees (for the anal-retentive, no, not ALL of them...) looked down their noses at we lowly TWA people trying to bum jumpseats or non-rev.

From agents to rampers to pilots, they made snide remarks and even openly wished TWA would "just go away".

Funny, I always got the opposite from SWA...TC

 

[reepicheep]

Exactly. The pilots had nothing to do with this. If pilot pay would have kept up with inflation, a captain would be making $500,000/year in today's dollars. A pilot used to make more than the President. Southwest pilots never took a pay cut other than an inflation beating. Southwest pilots have also never signed an industry leading contract. I'm not picking on Southwest intentionally. I just get sick and tired of hearing how airlines should be like Southwest when I heard for years how no one in their right mind would want to work for Southwest. This industry sucks. There is no skill involved in making a successful career. Just dumb luck.

I would partially agree. The USAir, Piedmont, and PSA pilots hired in the 1980's can hardly have forseen the train wreck on the horizon.

For the US Airways pilots hired during the Wolf training float "heyday" of 1999-2000 - they should have known better. All the signs were there. And they were amply warned by the realists among the pilot group. Not just a case of "bad luck".

 

[ColKurtz]

Has any airline furloughed or went backrupt more times than US Air... Seriously as long as I've been in aviation thats really all they've been good for. So do they hold the distinguished title?

Continiental, twice in BK.

 

[ironspud]

In their heyday, the USAir employees (for the anal-retentive, no, not ALL of them...) looked down their noses at we lowly TWA people trying to bum jumpseats or non-rev.

From agents to rampers to pilots, they made snide remarks and even openly wished TWA would "just go away".

Funny, I always got the opposite from SWA...TC

Funny. I always got the "TWA screwed the OZ guys because we only gave them DOH" lecture from every USAir jumpseat I got.

 

[Ky.BrownBourbn]

In their heyday, the USAir employees (for the anal-retentive, no, not ALL of them...) looked down their noses at we lowly TWA people trying to bum jumpseats or non-rev.

From agents to rampers to pilots, they made snide remarks..."

Hell, they did the same thing to their own employees, I get treated better now then when I worked there...It was pretty sad!

I cleaned airplanes at Piedmont AIrlines before the age of 10, a friends father took us there for fun quite often, I remember what a real airline was like! Management has just beat down the employees for everything, It's kind of what happens when they combine so many airlines and place all the employees to fight for whats theres (and use the groups againist each other to lower pay benefits etc.) It's been going on since 88-89 (the first merger I can remember with Piedmont PSA and USAir) and it continues, The unions should have had merger plans in place as soon as the first merger happened! (probably somewhere around 1920 when one mail carrier took anothers mail over the hump or something similar!)

Just my 2 cents!
Later,
KBB

 

[PreContact]

just like it is not the Southwest pilots fault that Southwest has been successful.

I think the Southwest pilots would tend to differ with that argument. They're a productive lot.

 

[donvag]

You guys have to remember that Southwest pilots are paid the most because every other airline pilots have taken paycuts and concessions. If Delta and United pilots where paid what they were paid 5 years ago there wouldnt be that much hype on their pay.

 

[BeCareful!]

I don't think anyone expected a ticker-tape parade for saving USAir, but a simple "thank you" would have been nice.:laugh:

Thank you.

Now......Gear Up!

 

[JT12345]

My dad had TWA stock. I think they take the record. 2 Bankrupts. I think the stock was junk twice and reorganized and reoffered.

Never say it can't happen here. I am wondering about all the LCCs.

If a passenger doesn't have money because of the recession to travel it doesn't matter what the ticket price is. There are other expenses to traveling, and airline tickets going up $100 is just one thing.

 

[get2flyin]

Thank you.

Now......Gear Up!

Wake up, go put your tie on, and get out to your aircraft. Your 170 is double parked! Embraer division, HA! That never gets old!