For those who wish to be hired at Pinnacle right now please be informed that there will be more airplanes coming. The carrot is being held as negotiations are worked through. This is fact. Just some inside information.
Well here is some outside information. I have been at Mesaba for 7 1/2 years and this is what I saw happen. I interviewed in summer of 97, express was getting kicked out of MSP and shoved down to MEM, while the next 2-3 yrs Mesaba grew with new saabs and Avros, and opened a base in MEM, imagine that. Mesaba got close to starting contract neg. and it hit the skids for the next five years. "New planes are coming" what a joke. They started that with us in the first few YEARS of the neg.'s then it turned into we are parking the Avro's and early retiring some of the saabs. Many of us were use to the growth and it was hard for us to go through this moral busting period. Now we were the bastard children. At this same time Express grew like crazy, and opened a base in DTW and MSP(again, imagine that). After years of neg.'s, here we are again. Mesaba is growing and Pinnacle(Express) is in contract neg.'s and they are getting their 139 plane in sept. and the YEARS of neg. are rolling. No matter how much the pilots give or take, no matter how much Man. gives or takes, it will be years, and Man. will continue to try to beat down the pilots. NWA calls the shots at Mesaba and Pinnacle, its their baggage handling, ticket sales, advertising, flight schedules, FUEL, glycol...Everything. They tell us where we will eat sleep and SH!T. People can think they will break away from the mother ship, IT WON"T HAPPEN! Take a guess what the next few years at Pinnacle will be like.
Your upgrade will be 5-6 years, if you get hired today. BUT, after all that has been said, it is better than being a CFI, really nice planes, a good paycheck and I agree that they will be around for a long time. To the Pinnacle guys, I hope you do well in your neg.'s, hold tight it is going to suck, when it comes time, I'll walk laps with you guys anytime.