ASTAR'S Race to the Bottom

[HeavyjetDC8]

In the grand scheme of things, we pilots are all pawns and all of us are just trying to keep our jobs, our homes, and our families fed.

We're not the enemy. The guys who reap the millions off of our labors are.

The guys milking the industry for millions certainly are the enemy, and the constraints imposed by the RLA aren't obvious until a fight for career or QOL becomes necessary.

Astonishing really, if not simply wrong, that the RLA is still intact. Under deregulation the airlines lost their protected status - opening the market to economic Darwinism should have commensurately allowed a free response by labor to the new demands imposed upon it. Managements however continue to play games shielded by a law which has us fighting with one hand tied behind our backs.

 

[rotor&wing]

AVIATRIX,

Once again, you show your ignorance.

I have neither resorted to name calling nor defamation of women.

YOU, on the other hand, have published extremely erroneous and slanderous remarks about our pilot group. Your posts are inflammatory, crude, and devoid of facts. You have clearly and decisively been proven wrong and yet you are too weak to own up and admit it. You dishonor hundreds of decent ABX pilots.

You should be ashamed.

Very well stated.

 

[Fly Astar Jets]

Here in lies the rub Trix

Here in lies the rub Trix.

You chose to publish knee-jerk reaction rubbish and refused to own up to it's errors.
You choose to respond only to posters who (by all rights) are angry with you, with misplaced indignation.
And now you have chosen to hide behind the fragility of womanhood? Shame on you.


Face it. You posted that crap addressed to "Attention all pilots/union members" on multiple boards for one reason only. To do as much harm as possible to the individual pilots here at AStar. To tar any AStar pilot who might ask for a jumpseat somewhere from a hard line union Capt. and be denied because of your diatribe. To lessen the prospects of any AStar pilot who might be sitting in front of a hiring committee with that same hard line union Capt. looking down her nose at some misperceived union weakness in front of her.


FAJ

 

[erichartmann]

ABXbooger,

I THINK what is being primarily referred to is Hete's refusal to negotiate with Dasburg about Astar's buyout proposal. Apparently, even your teamster council now thinks that was a bad idea - this observation based on the Teamster 1224 website "ask Joe Hete":

"Why did the management of ABX Air refuse to discuss ASTAR’s expression of interest?
An indication of interest from ASTAR Air Cargo Holdings, LLC, to acquire ABX at $7.75 per share was made on June 26, 2007 – an offer above the trading price at the time. When considering the largest shareholder of ASTAR is an affiliate of DHL, the largest customer of ABX, a merger seemed likely to produce meaningful synergies. The Board of Directors rejected ASTAR’s offer without disclosing to shareholders the opinion of the Company’s financial advisor, thus providing shareholders no basis for the Board’s decision."


ABXDX,

I agree that in big business, people work along side others that they don't care for every day, but this is very different from a personal problem. Hete is making business decisions that go against the desires of their biggest customer. For better or worse, DHL pays ABX's bills for now and Hete won't do their bidding. Yes, DHL's problems may not be due to ABX, but that doesn't mean that Hete can ignore DHL's wishes without repercussions. We can all quickly agree that DHL has made some very bad decisions even if we do not agree on which decisions were the bad ones - the fact remains that DHL has severely damaged the US operation. The question now is; What do they do about it. They are supposed to have "THE Answer" in the upcoming May announcement. What that announcement will be I have no idea. Hell, we may all be on the street after that for all I know, but this may be their last chance to straighten things out over here.


"fob727 wrote: Right, that's it. Extension to ACMI??? Investing in 49% of who??? Backed a buyout of who??? Signed off on a contract of who??? Demanded repayment of $93m from who??? Withheld payment of $8m from who???"

It really does NOT matter WHY DHL has chosen to do these things that they have done. The fact is that they have and there's nothing we can do about it. The bottom line is that Joe Hete has chosen to take a path that has not promoted a positive relationship with DHL and that pisses off the employees of ABX and rightfully so. As an Astar pilot working for a company with a ACMI agreement with DHL, my own position is FAR from certain. Based on my intimate observations of how DHL has operated over the past 13 years, I would be far from surprised if I found myself on the street a year from now.

I'm pretty sure that we ALL got in the wrong line when we ended up under the DHL umbrella.


... and finally


AVIATRIX,

You contribute nothing useful or intelligent to these boards. Your 15 minutes of fame are up.

Either SHUT UP or APOLOGIZE or BOTH.

It should be obvious to all who have read any of ABXA's financial reports that the ACMI & Hub Service agreements are not terribly profitable. Under them, ABXA would stagnate and be totally at the mercy of DHL. The only hint of daylight, so to speak, was the ability of ABXA (per the agreements) to engage in outside business. This suggests that DHL WANTED or was at least agreeable to ABXA garnering outside business.

Hete's (& ABXA's) choices were and are somewhat stark. They could be good little workers, do as DHL wanted or grab the opportunity and try to become independent enough to survive without DHL. I think this was something of a carrot. I believe DHL expected Hete to grasp the carrot and rapidly overextend ABXA. Further, reading between the lines, it would seem DHL expected that with the failure of ABXA the aircraft and crews would effectively fall into their laps. There are a number of implications in this, not the least of which would be a possible reduction in labor costs. This may yet happen, but it seems DHL is annoyed that it hasn't happened yet. This appears to have been plan A. It would seem DHL got tired of waiting and decided Hete wasn’t going to fail quickly enough. Therefore, Plan B.

Plan B appears to have been a buyout by Astar. Hete blew that off. It would seem clear that Hete doesn't really like DHL anymore than they like him. Why should he? They appear to have set him up to fail. He may well be trying to set up an exit strategy that will allow him to pursue ACMI business outside of DHL and get DHL off his back by selling them a portion of the 767 fleet and severing the current agreements. I think he blew off the Astar offer because he hadn’t yet pulled all of the pieces of his possible exit strategy together. Now he has. Selling a portion of the 767 fleet to DHL would give ABXA liquidity it currently doesn’t have. I’m not convinced that is what Hete really wants though. Far to many of his eggs are tied up in ILN. Most of ABXA’s staff live in the ILN area. While they are not irreplaceable, if he expects to continue to operate ABXA, which he appears to need for the ANA operation, he won’t want to lose ILN, at least not yet.

I don't know what Plan C is though I could speculate. Unfortunately, the options run the gamut from further attempts to encourage the failure of ABXA to "seeing the light" and working with ABXA to try and stop the flood of red ink DHL has managed to engender here in the US market. Personally I expect DHL to park a number of aircraft, most of them DC-9’s. This will free up crews for ABXA to move to the 767. I expect ABXA to put the parked -9s to DHL.

I wonder what DHL will do with them. Despite the rhetoric on this board and others, over typical stage lengths the -9 will carry ¾’s the freight of the 727 while burning only 2/3’s the fuel and using only 2 crew. Further, they are cheaper to maintain. They really are a good fit for the current system. DHL really needs to park the 727’s. They are far less efficient that the -9s, particularly given the amount of freight currently being carried. Problem is, there really isn’t a good replacement for the 727’s readily available at reasonable cost. I wonder if DHL is contemplating cutting doors in the -9s and giving them to Astar as a stop gap measure?

 

[erichartmann]

ABXbooger,

I THINK what is being primarily referred to is Hete's refusal to negotiate with Dasburg about Astar's buyout proposal. Apparently, even your teamster council now thinks that was a bad idea - this observation based on the Teamster 1224 website "ask Joe Hete":

"Why did the management of ABX Air refuse to discuss ASTAR’s expression of interest?
An indication of interest from ASTAR Air Cargo Holdings, LLC, to acquire ABX at $7.75 per share was made on June 26, 2007 – an offer above the trading price at the time. When considering the largest shareholder of ASTAR is an affiliate of DHL, the largest customer of ABX, a merger seemed likely to produce meaningful synergies. The Board of Directors rejected ASTAR’s offer without disclosing to shareholders the opinion of the Company’s financial advisor, thus providing shareholders no basis for the Board’s decision."


ABXDX,

I agree that in big business, people work along side others that they don't care for every day, but this is very different from a personal problem. Hete is making business decisions that go against the desires of their biggest customer. For better or worse, DHL pays ABX's bills for now and Hete won't do their bidding. Yes, DHL's problems may not be due to ABX, but that doesn't mean that Hete can ignore DHL's wishes without repercussions. We can all quickly agree that DHL has made some very bad decisions even if we do not agree on which decisions were the bad ones - the fact remains that DHL has severely damaged the US operation. The question now is; What do they do about it. They are supposed to have "THE Answer" in the upcoming May announcement. What that announcement will be I have no idea. Hell, we may all be on the street after that for all I know, but this may be their last chance to straighten things out over here.


"fob727 wrote: Right, that's it. Extension to ACMI??? Investing in 49% of who??? Backed a buyout of who??? Signed off on a contract of who??? Demanded repayment of $93m from who??? Withheld payment of $8m from who???"

It really does NOT matter WHY DHL has chosen to do these things that they have done. The fact is that they have and there's nothing we can do about it. The bottom line is that Joe Hete has chosen to take a path that has not promoted a positive relationship with DHL and that pisses off the employees of ABX and rightfully so. As an Astar pilot working for a company with a ACMI agreement with DHL, my own position is FAR from certain. Based on my intimate observations of how DHL has operated over the past 13 years, I would be far from surprised if I found myself on the street a year from now.

I'm pretty sure that we ALL got in the wrong line when we ended up under the DHL umbrella.


... and finally


AVIATRIX,

You contribute nothing useful or intelligent to these boards. Your 15 minutes of fame are up.

Either SHUT UP or APOLOGIZE or BOTH.

It should be obvious to all who have read any of ABXA's financial reports that the ACMI & Hub Service agreements are not terribly profitable. Under them, ABXA would stagnate and be totally at the mercy of DHL. The only hint of daylight, so to speak, was the ability of ABXA (per the agreements) to engage in outside business. This suggests that DHL WANTED or was at least agreeable to ABXA garnering outside business.

Hete's (& ABXA's) choices were and are somewhat stark. They could be good little workers, do as DHL wanted or grab the opportunity and try to become independent enough to survive without DHL. I think this was something of a carrot. I believe DHL expected Hete to grasp the carrot and rapidly overextend ABXA. Further, reading between the lines, it would seem DHL expected that with the failure of ABXA the aircraft and crews would effectively fall into their laps. There are a number of implications in this, not the least of which would be a possible reduction in labor costs. This may yet happen, but it seems DHL is annoyed that it hasn't happened yet. This appears to have been plan A. It would seem DHL got tired of waiting and decided Hete wasn’t going to fail quickly enough. Therefore, Plan B.

Plan B appears to have been a buyout by Astar. Hete blew that off. It would seem clear that Hete doesn't really like DHL anymore than they like him. Why should he? They appear to have set him up to fail. He may well be trying to set up an exit strategy that will allow him to pursue ACMI business outside of DHL and get DHL off his back by selling them a portion of the 767 fleet and severing the current agreements. I think he blew off the Astar offer because he hadn’t yet pulled all of the pieces of his possible exit strategy together. Now he has. Selling a portion of the 767 fleet to DHL would give ABXA liquidity it currently doesn’t have. I’m not convinced that is what Hete really wants though. Far to many of his eggs are tied up in ILN. Most of ABXA’s staff live in the ILN area. While they are not irreplaceable, if he expects to continue to operate ABXA, which he appears to need for the ANA operation, he won’t want to lose ILN, at least not yet.

I don't know what Plan C is though I could speculate. Unfortunately, the options run the gamut from further attempts to encourage the failure of ABXA to "seeing the light" and working with ABXA to try and stop the flood of red ink DHL has managed to engender here in the US market. Personally I expect DHL to park a number of aircraft, most of them DC-9’s. This will free up crews for ABXA to move to the 767. I expect ABXA to put the parked -9s to DHL.

I wonder what DHL will do with them. Despite the rhetoric on this board and others, over typical stage lengths the -9 will carry ¾’s the freight of the 727 while burning only 2/3’s the fuel and using only 2 crew. Further, they are cheaper to maintain. They really are a good fit for the current system. DHL really needs to park the 727’s. They are far less efficient that the -9s, particularly given the amount of freight currently being carried. Problem is, there really isn’t a good replacement for the 727’s readily available at reasonable cost. I wonder if DHL is contemplating cutting doors in the -9s and giving them to Astar as a stop gap measure?

 

[AV8OR]

Excellent post EH. But I would be truly stunned to see 9's get cut for doors, and then turned over to AStar.....but we've all seen stranger things with DHL.

 

[HeavyjetDC8]

Yes, it was an excellent post, but one based upon sensible commercial logistics - which have to date been in short supply. There's an assumption that there was a plan: but perhaps there wasn't.

Never ever, I suppose, underestimate the single minded drive of those with a desire to tribally protect or promote their particular piece of the pie. With DHL disregarding logistic and financial realities and CEOs who become obstructionist to remain in the game I'm left with little faith in the ability to acquire a business model which will bring success.

It has also occurred to me that the two man aircraft (as per the Astar CBA) could be DC-9s/767s after an Astar/Abx merger. With gas prices the way they are the 727 must be well on its way to becoming a liability.

 

[nitefr8dog]

AVIATRIX,

Once again, you show your ignorance.

I have neither resorted to name calling nor defamation of women.

YOU, on the other hand, have published extremely erroneous and slanderous remarks about our pilot group. Your posts are inflammatory, crude, and devoid of facts. You have clearly and decisively been proven wrong and yet you are too weak to own up and admit it. You dishonor hundreds of decent ABX pilots.

You should be ashamed.

The only thing "proved" is a huge dissagreement as to the facts as each group has been told them. Lots of phone calls between Mec's before either pilot group even heard of the proposal. I think that is what Avatrix was trying to say.

 

[hvydriver]

Join Date: May 2005
Posts: 50
Civ/Mil: Civilian (almost went AF though...doesn't that count?)
A/C Flown: You name it, I've flown it
Ratings: Yep, I've got 'em!
Total Time: 10K +
Posts: 50


ASTAR'S Race to the Bottom
ASTAR'S Race to the Bottom! Attention all pilots/union members:

In an effort to influence DHL’s decision on the home for the 6 future 767-300 aircraft purchased from Boeing, the ASTAR MEC has executed the "race to the bottom" plan. In order to prevent these aircraft from landing at Atlas, Polar, ABX, or even EAT, the ASTAR MEC leadership is currently negotiating concessions in pay and work rules. This means they are willing to fly a heavy for less pay than the narrow body pay. This plan violates several ALPA national codes of ethic and at least one resolution.

The industry would like to thank you.
__________________

Doesn't look to me like that is what she was trying to "say" at all. She got what she deserved.

 

[nitefr8dog]

Join Date: May 2005
Posts: 50
Civ/Mil: Civilian (almost went AF though...doesn't that count?)
A/C Flown: You name it, I've flown it
Ratings: Yep, I've got 'em!
Total Time: 10K +
Posts: 50


ASTAR'S Race to the Bottom
ASTAR'S Race to the Bottom! Attention all pilots/union members:

In an effort to influence DHL’s decision on the home for the 6 future 767-300 aircraft purchased from Boeing, the ASTAR MEC has executed the "race to the bottom" plan. In order to prevent these aircraft from landing at Atlas, Polar, ABX, or even EAT, the ASTAR MEC leadership is currently negotiating concessions in pay and work rules. This means they are willing to fly a heavy for less pay than the narrow body pay. This plan violates several ALPA national codes of ethic and at least one resolution.

The industry would like to thank you.
__________________

Doesn't look to me like that is what she was trying to "say" at all. She got what she deserved.

I guess we can agree to dissagree?

 

[AV8OR]

"I guess we can agree to dissagree?"


We almost always seem to do just that.

 

[LarryinTN]

Despite the rhetoric on this board and others, over typical stage lengths the -9 will carry ¾’s the freight of the 727 while burning only 2/3’s the fuel and using only 2 crew.

Actually, it's less than 2/3's the fuel.

The 727's have the -15 and -17 engines while our DC9's have -7, -9, -11, and -15 engines. The smaller engines burn less than the bigger engines.

 

[LarryinTN]

But I would be truly stunned to see 9's get cut for doors

A number of the DC9's already have doors. They are the old freighters from the Navy.

The doors are currently deactivated but there has occasionally been talk of reactivating them for various charter opportunities, none of which have ever materialized.

 

[hvydriver]

Join Date: May 2005
Posts: 50
Civ/Mil: Civilian (almost went AF though...doesn't that count?)
A/C Flown: You name it, I've flown it
Ratings: Yep, I've got 'em!
Total Time: 10K +
Posts: 50


ASTAR'S Race to the Bottom
ASTAR'S Race to the Bottom! Attention all pilots/union members:

In an effort to influence DHL’s decision on the home for the 6 future 767-300 aircraft purchased from Boeing, the ASTAR MEC has executed the "race to the bottom" plan. In order to prevent these aircraft from landing at Atlas, Polar, ABX, or even EAT, the ASTAR MEC leadership is currently negotiating concessions in pay and work rules. This means they are willing to fly a heavy for less pay than the narrow body pay. This plan violates several ALPA national codes of ethic and at least one resolution.

The industry would like to thank you.
__________________


I guess we can agree to dissagree?

I can agree with you that attempting to defend the above statement, esp. in light of the fact there has been nothing close to the way of apology from the stay at home mom that made it, is foolish. Barring that, yes, I suppose we'll agree to disagree.

 

[DC8CRIVER]

The only thing "proved" is a huge dissagreement as to the facts as each group has been told them. Lots of phone calls between Mec's before either pilot group even heard of the proposal. I think that is what Avatrix was trying to say.

nitedog,

Please reread all of AVIATRIX's posts and reconsider your defense of her position. As all the discussions in question were between our owners and our MEC, unless AVIATRIX is on our MEC, she would not have anything even close to a first hand report of what those discussions contained.

What she clearly did was to take a shred of a rumor and post it in the most defamatory way on as many message boards as was possible. Now, whether the information she posted was given to her incorrectly or she herself twisted the information is irrelevant. The fact remains that what precisely happened was known to the Astar MEC and the Astar pilots only and not precisely known by her. So, without verifying her facts to any length whatsoever, she chose to slander and defame our pilot group in the most profane and public way possible. If I were to make a post like the one she made, I'd have to be dead nuts positively certain of ALL of my facts before I puked that kind of poison all over several hundred professional pilots.

It would be as though Joe Hete wrote a letter to your union asking if he could paint swastikas on the tails of your airplanes and then one of our pilots posting for all the world to see that all ABX pilots were Nazi's - which would obviously not be the case.

The "transparency" our MEC discussed to was in reference to the Astar MEC's communications with the Astar pilots - not with your pilots or your union. Quite frankly, I do not believe that any of our union's activities are any business of ABX's until our plans are public record. It is a sign of the integrity of our MEC that they provide your union with anything at all prior to finalization. Attacks like AVIATRIX's do great harm to the efforts of our unions efforts to establish an open line of communication. She is inflicting severe damage to the ABX and Astar unions collective efforts to rally against DHL corporate anti union tactics.

And just to be perfectly clear, the crap posted by your fellow pilot had nothing at all to do with our pilot group's decision to turn down the offer made by Astar management. It is pathetic to think that she would flatter herself with such megalomaniacal sewage. It is my belief that she acted alone and is an infinitesimal representation of the ABX pilot group's regard of Astar pilot's integrity. For sure we have our differences, but I've never met an ABX pilot who would spit in the face of Astar pilots the way she has.

In commercial aviation, one of the most important and valuable traits of a professional pilot is the ability to admit a mistake and take corrective actions. Apparently, that character trait is painfully absent in one of your pilots.