Alaska officially furloughs 32 today (05JAN09)

[check6]

QX also furloughed more yesterday. . .in addition to the 40 already gone back in November.

 

[RedRum]

Thanks wcsrj! It felt odd turning in my ID badge this afternoon.

Best of luck to you. I have been through a 5 year furlough and it was not pleasant at the start.

However, if there is one thing that it showed me it was that the sun did not rise and set on this industry. You will find something to do in the meantime and the sting of the furlough will lessen everyday.

Your furlough won't last that long if everything I am hearing about Alaska Airlines is true. It's too bad that management plays politics with people's lives and careers.

Again, keep up the good fight and best of luck to you.

 

[andyd]

Hopefully not a single one of you pick up open time or answer your phone on your day off...those who do should find all 4 of their tires flat at the end of the trip....

 

[Going2Baja]

Hopefully not a single one of you pick up open time or answer your phone on your day off...

I'd love to pick up a CUN overnight. Oh yeah - I can't, I got KICKED down to RES and soon to be KICKED out of LAX to SEA where I'll bid 400+ and then maybe KICKED to ANC where I can freeze my balls off REALLY wishing I could pick up a CUN.

So - No, I won't be picking up anything but the want ad's.

Baja.

 

[Green Banana]

Ah, come on up Baja. I'll leave the light on in the igloo.

 

[AK737FO]

ANC is the best base we have, although it is nothing like it use to be. If you come with an open mind you just might learn a few things and enjoy it enough to stay. If it were easy to live here, ANC would be more crowded than L.A. There is a reason the state poplulation stays under 750K - there are not that many people left in America who can survive in anthing less than an air conditioned, seat belted, politically correct, governement regulated society.
So, since I will soon be going back to FO school, which I plan on failing at least once, maybe twice, after which I will try to bid the tuff stuff up here so you can fly on the straight purple line for 6 hours, slowly going brain dead and breaking into a cold sweat at the mere thought of a flight director failing, just so you can drink beer in HNL with a few thousand tourist from Japan.
Sorry to seem grumpy, its been a long day as I hate the idea of being an FO again. My thoughts and prayers go out to the 79.
Come on up and enjoy - seriously, I guarantee you will learn a few things - if you want.

 

[DOVPILOT]

Has any of AS guys/gals heard the rumors that RAH will be flying E-190 for you guys???

 

[bluefin]

I'd love to pick up a CUN overnight. Oh yeah - I can't, I got KICKED down to RES and soon to be KICKED out of LAX to SEA where I'll bid 400+ and then maybe KICKED to ANC where I can freeze my balls off REALLY wishing I could pick up a CUN.

So - No, I won't be picking up anything but the want ad's.

Baja.

Still surfing? SkyWest was great, the industry was good once upon a time!

 

[Fubijaakr]

Agreed. ANC is a great base. Everyone knows everyone else (and their business). Very familial atmosphere.

However, if you don't hunt, fish or fly light airplanes, you probably won't fit in with the majority of the pilots. But, generally, they don't hold it against you.

The flying up there is just about the most fun there is on the system in general although my experience up there was pre-Hawaii. The downside is that you become so familiar with 8-10 airports you tend to fall into the "been there, done that" attitude. After all, familiarity breeds contempt.

Taking shortcuts becomes the norm and is, to a certain degree, expected. If you take "too much fuel" the base Chief Pilot will probably hear about it before you get the wheels in the well. There is a certain amount of cowboyism up there that has come to be accepted and expected because, after all, we're "Arctic Eagles."

All that said, the pilots and F/As in ANC are virtually all good folks and care deeply about each other. There's a LOT to be said for being in a small base that is geographically isolated from the knuckleheads on Angle Lake.

I thoroughly enjoyed my two basings in ANC and would probably go back if I could convince the wife to move back up North. Commuting to/from ANC can be a challenge even on line.

 

[AK737FO]

No, I have not heard any rumors about 190's. We are dangerously close to being released to self help, probably around May, if the company does not start changing it's tune at the table. The mediator has just about had it - and has told our management such.
So, the idea of 190's, flown by somebody else, coming on property - well that would just about guarantee a total melt down and the end of Alaska Airlines.
Maybe that is what our management wants. I don't know. I do know we really under estimated them in May of 2005 - I don't want to make that mistake again - so if 190's show up, if we go on strike, if, if, if - I bet our managment wil have it all planned out to the letter and we will be a puppet on their stings doing exactly what they want and or expect.