Many lifers at SKYW are indeed worried about the future, aircraft orders in the hundreds, but the pilot pipeline into SKYW has a serious restriction, as in not many pilots want to come to an airline that has a 2-3 year reserve before being able to hold a line, much less upgrade. Upgrade in the EMB, FAT base is 6.5 years. SKYW's challenges will be almost exclusively based on personnel, and the ability to staff flight ops. Bid packages minimum are running at 87.5 hrs aprox, and many bids are approaching 100 hrs block, even the simplest of the simple can see the problem, add the new rest rules into the mix and SKYW will have an immediate issue in the new year.
Scheduling had predicated the block hour abuse based upon the calendar year totals, driving the peak hours to 100 during the summer and allowing the non peak portion of the year to drop below 83.333, keeping the total slightly below 1000. Now with the rolling block, attrition and regulatory changes, coupled with SGUs inability to change spells a rolling puppet show.
It's getting interesting, fast, January should provide some Shakespearian grade comedy.
Oddly I am getting a chuckle from it all......