CMR-Votes In, Results SOLD!

[been-there]

Now that the concession package is done it is only a matter of time (weeks, months?) that Comair is bought by MESA.

Info comes from "a friend that works at the law firm handling DAL's bankruptcy".

 

[surplus1]

Would it be a bad thing if Comair is sold?

 

[CapnVegetto]

It would be if Mesa bought it.

 

[737 Pylt]

Would it be a bad thing if Comair is sold?

Wouldn't that depend on the buyer?? Would you really want to be bought by Mesa?? Even you might be brighter than that! OTOH, you will probably fare a lot better than staying on with mutha Delta!
737

 

[PCL_128]

Even you might be brighter than that!

No, he's really not.

 

[WSurf]

Don't worry, it ain't gonna happen! He heard the same crap on the US Airways side about Mesa buying our WO's.

 

[surplus1]

Wouldn't that depend on the buyer?? Would you really want to be bought by Mesa?? Even you might be brighter than that! OTOH, you will probably fare a lot better than staying on with mutha Delta!
737

At one point in time it would have depended on the buyer and unfortunately for us that buyer turned out to be Delta Air Lines. You were then too big and too powerful for us to stop you. The end of Comair didn't come yesterday, it came on the day we were acquired by Delta Air Lines. Personally I would have preferred to die with dignity like Indy rather than to be mauled and crippled by Delta as has been the case.

It took Delta just 5 years to destroy our company, with your help. The pilots at Skywest don't realize how lucky they were to have been excluded from the benefits of an acquisition by Delta Air Lines. One day they may figure it out. The ASA people may also eventually figure out that they were lucky to get out of your clutches, at least for awhile.

In that same 5 years of time the same idiots from ATL have also severely damaged your company and cut your pay by 50%, with more to come; putting you and many of your peers on the street in the process. If you are back at work, it is only because 2300 of your senior pilots have been forced to retire early. Delta Air Lines is a failed entity mismanaged to the brink of oblivion. We're just one of the smaller victims of your incompetence.

No, I wouldn't want to be bought by MESA but even if that should happen you are correct in saying it would probably be better than being owned by Delta. You see there is a chance we could eventually change the culture of MESA. In contrast, there is no way we can overcome the incompetence of Delta. That will be up to you; good luck.

I'm not "happy" with this event but I am smart enough to realize that without it we would cease to exist in short order. This won't necessarily prevent that because there is no guarantee that anyone will buy Comair as a whole. If someone doesn't, there is little doubt that Delta will piece it out until nothing is left. Neither seventeen millions from Comair pilots nor seventy millions from all of Comair is enough to save us from the Delta debacle. The lower wages we have agreed to accept are not intended to help Delta. It is hoped that it may encourage someone to get us out of being owned by Delta. Hell the 17 million we just gave back is only 1 million more than your incompetent CEO walked away with. All that our pilots have really done is pay for Leo Mullen's retirement, which keeps you from having to pay for it. You're still paying for all the other feather merchants that populate ATL, to the tune of 1.5 billion a year.

This isn't a good thing and we all know it but perhaps this way there is, although remote, a possibility that someone will come along and pick up what's left, which isn't very much. You've already used up all of the assets we once had in the effort to plug the holes in your Titanic. The only thing this roll of the dice gives us is a seat in one of the lifeboats while we hope that someone will pick us up. Maybe that ship will be MESA, maybe someone else, or maybe we'll just freeze to death while we wait in vain for rescue.

Maybe if you're lucky NW will come along and pick up what's left of your airline. If they do and assuming you've already been recalled, you may keep your job or you may be furloughed again when your position is filled by a NW pilot. That is left to be seen. Maybe they'll call you Yellow Book as they add another color to their flag. What is certain is that your company cannot continue to lose the amount of money you are now losing daily and survive as Delta Air Lines. That you have dragged us into the abyss with you is your fault, not ours.

This forced agreement is not a solution to our problems, it is only a temporary stop gap; a lifeboat. We have bought a little more time (perhaps) and a chance (if the other groups give concessions) to get out from under the Delta yoke. It's a slim chance and very slim at that, but it is better than the certain sudden death of being dragged down by your sinking ship. It's a gamble we had to take, nothing more.

We may not survive, which I am sure will make you happy. Nevertheless, keep in mind that you may not survive either. There really isn't that much difference between Comair being acquired by MESA or Delta being acquired by NWA.

 

[~~~^~~~]

The pilots at Skywest don't realize how lucky they were to have been excluded from the benefits of an acquisition by Delta Air Lines. One day they may figure it out. The ASA people may also eventually figure out that they were lucky to get out of your clutches, at least for awhile.

I'm not sure I understand the "at least for a while" comment.

 

[Rez O. Lewshun]

I'm not sure I understand the "at least for a while" comment.

The feeder carriers are simply venders that must be cost effective. ex. UFS. Super senior 15+ year pilots at a vendor kinda defeats the purpose... Why pay a CA 100/hr when you can pay a 2 year CA 50/hr. That's a 50% savings!!!


Surplus1, your post is detailed for Comair, but it also applies to what is going on to labor in general in this country.

Are you on the GWB Admin's 5 year airline career program..... Hate Clinton if you will, but ALPA had open communication with the White House in the 90's. Today, the WH won't take ALPA's calls.....

Your 401k is portable for a reason.....


Mind if I plug ALPA-PAC?

 

[rjcap]

Hell the 17 million we just gave back is only 1 million more than your incompetent CEO walked away with. All that our pilots have really done is pay for Leo Mullen's retirement, which keeps you from having to pay for it.

Correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't Delta lose approximately 17 Million a week ??

 

[737 Pylt]

At one point in time it would have depended on the buyer and unfortunately for us that buyer turned out to be Delta Air Lines. You were then too big and too powerful for us to stop you. The end of Comair didn't come yesterday, it came on the day we were acquired by Delta Air Lines. Personally I would have preferred to die with dignity like Indy rather than to be mauled and crippled by Delta as has been the case.

This statement just proves just how stupid you really are! You didn't have a choice as CMR management saw to it themselves to be bought out by DL! Welcome to the world of corrupt management. Are you telling your junior f/o's its all the DL pilots's fault?!

It took Delta just 5 years to destroy our company, with your help. The pilots at Skywest don't realize how lucky they were to have been excluded from the benefits of an acquisition by Delta Air Lines. One day they may figure it out. The ASA people may also eventually figure out that they were lucky to get out of your clutches, at least for awhile.

Again, your beef appears to be with CMR management, tell them!

In that same 5 years of time the same idiots from ATL have also severely damaged your company and cut your pay by 50%, with more to come; putting you and many of your peers on the street in the process. If you are back at work, it is only because 2300 of your senior pilots have been forced to retire early. Delta Air Lines is a failed entity mismanaged to the brink of oblivion. We're just one of the smaller victims of your incompetence.

No argument here..Management has been putting the screws to the people since the days of RA!

No, I wouldn't want to be bought by MESA but even if that should happen you are correct in saying it would probably be better than being owned by Delta. You see there is a chance we could eventually change the culture of MESA. In contrast, there is no way we can overcome the incompetence of Delta. That will be up to you; good luck.

Kind of like your peers (I'm sorry, I forget you're cmr and better than ASA) at ASA are?? How long have those folks been working without a contract, and now SKYW wants them to take a paycut?? You are dilusional!

I'm not "happy" with this event but I am smart enough to realize that without it we would cease to exist in short order. This won't necessarily prevent that because there is no guarantee that anyone will buy Comair as a whole. If someone doesn't, there is little doubt that Delta will piece it out until nothing is left. Neither seventeen millions from Comair pilots nor seventy millions from all of Comair is enough to save us from the Delta debacle. The lower wages we have agreed to accept are not intended to help Delta. It is hoped that it may encourage someone to get us out of being owned by Delta. Hell the 17 million we just gave back is only 1 million more than your incompetent CEO walked away with. All that our pilots have really done is pay for Leo Mullen's retirement, which keeps you from having to pay for it. You're still paying for all the other feather merchants that populate ATL, to the tune of 1.5 billion a year.

Again no argument here! We seem to agree that DL mismanagement is ruining this airline!

This isn't a good thing and we all know it but perhaps this way there is, although remote, a possibility that someone will come along and pick up what's left, which isn't very much. You've already used up all of the assets we once had in the effort to plug the holes in your Titanic. The only thing this roll of the dice gives us is a seat in one of the lifeboats while we hope that someone will pick us up. Maybe that ship will be MESA, maybe someone else, or maybe we'll just freeze to death while we wait in vain for rescue.

Didn't you forget to blame this all on the mainline pilots!?!

Maybe if you're lucky NW will come along and pick up what's left of your airline. If they do and assuming you've already been recalled, you may keep your job or you may be furloughed again when your position is filled by a NW pilot. That is left to be seen. Maybe they'll call you Yellow Book as they add another color to their flag. What is certain is that your company cannot continue to lose the amount of money you are now losing daily and survive as Delta Air Lines. That you have dragged us into the abyss with you is your fault, not ours.

What you're really saying here is this: I'm miserable in my career. I'm an old man, never having aspired to do what I wanted. I'm stuck, and I'm blaming all my problems on the rest of the world. Guess what old man...Welcome to the reality of the world. RJ's and your mighty company can't self survive. If airlines come to the fact that "fee for departure," doesn't cut it any more, you'll be the likes of Indy air. Your company is not profitable, any more than ours is. How come JB, AAI, and WN are all profitable?? I'll give you a hint....NO RJ's!

This forced agreement is not a solution to our problems, it is only a temporary stop gap; a lifeboat. We have bought a little more time (perhaps) and a chance (if the other groups give concessions) to get out from under the Delta yoke. It's a slim chance and very slim at that, but it is better than the certain sudden death of being dragged down by your sinking ship. It's a gamble we had to take, nothing more.

Sell it to the new hires old man! You are a miserable person looking to take all your life's failures and blame them on someone else! I'll bet you never speed, and if you do, you blame it on the guy in front of you that you were following!

We may not survive, which I am sure will make you happy. Nevertheless, keep in mind that you may not survive either. There really isn't that much difference between Comair being acquired by MESA or Delta being acquired by NWA.

That's where you're wrong old man...I wish no harm on anyone losing their job. There have been enough people put out of work in this miserable industry. I have been out of work in this business. This is not my first, nor my second airline. I only can assume by that last sentence, that you are wishing DL to fail, but that's ok, they may, but there is other work for me. This is not my primary job any more. If we fail, then we fail.
737
I feel for the poor f/o's that have to fly with this miserable old jerk!

 

[surplus1]

I'm not sure I understand the "at least for a while" comment.

You are no longer owned by Delta but your new owners have not integrated you and perhaps they never will. Additionally, your new owners are totally dependent on not one but two bankrupt airlines. They are gambling on your acquisition just as we (CMR) are gambling on the chance to be acquiried by a new landlord. Who our new "masters" happen to be, if any, will have a lot to do with our future, if any.

You are negotiating. You want more and you are entitled to it. Will you get it? I don't think so. That won't be due to anything that you do wrong it will simply be a product of the environment in which we all live. Your new owners are just as subject to FFD, "portfolios" and ALPA's anti regional policies. Your company is far more flexible because it is not controlled by Delta, but as long as you remain vendors of a comodity (seats) you remain subject to the RFP's that these mainline entities generate. In other words you are dependent. The only thing that has changed is that you are no longer exclusively dependent upon Delta, you have the flexibility to seek other buyers of your comodity. Sadly, all of those vendors are equally dependent on some other mainline carrier and a busily underbidding us and you for the scraps. What you have is therefore determined by your ability to match the "lowest bidder". All regional airlines are in that same box.

At least for a while, you enjoy the luxury of not having to compete with a new RFP. That will change. How long your "while" lasts is unfortunately determined by entities other than your own company, regardless of how "good" Skywest management may be. That's what I mean. When the only buyer of your product is WalMart, you either sell to them at their price or you don't sell at all. Those of us who work for "regional carriers" are all subject to that malady, provided mostly with the assistance and certainly with the complicity of ALPA. Even though Skywest is not ALPA itself, all of the potential buyers of its product are either ALPA or the APA. You, like us, have no voice in what those organizations decide is your fate.

Until you become truly independent that will not change. You enjoy a higher degree of freedom than we currently do, but it is only for a while. Mainline pilots are already underbidding in an effort to take your work for themselves. For as long as they continue, the only way you can keep what you have or get more is to underbid them in turn. They have created the "perfect storm" and you, like us, are victims of it.

JetBlue, which pays its 190 pilots less than you currently make for your smaller airframes, is the current low bidder on the high end. MESA enjoyes the distinction along with PCL and PSA on the other end. You can't compete unless you lower your costs. That little gem was another creation of ALPA, when the USAir pilots bid to fly the 170 for $58 dollars in the left seat. While MDA fizzled, they now have to match JB and they have (as reflected in the AWA/USA agreement). That sets the level under which we have to fall to stay viable. Jet Blue pilots in the 190 have little or no longevity so you're not competing with their top rate, you're competing with their bottom rate. Delta and NW pilots are currently bidding for the seventy-seaters you now fly and they are underbiding your rates (and ours).

ALPA's plan is to take back as much of the flying that was outsourced as they can. They are carrying out that plan by systematically underbiding the regionals for the same work. Either we match or underbid them or we lose the game. They can afford to do this because they have other options, i.e., larger equipment to which they can progress. We are prevented from doing the same by their predatory Scope. Many of us are happy with that either because we are unaware or we believe that crap they tell us about protecting their jobs so that maybe one day they will hire us.

Perhaps you'll say I'm paranoid and perhaps I am but I'm not stupid. What they have done and are doing is obvious to anyone who isn't awed by their BS. The downward spiral will continue until regional pilots wise up and figure out that a bird in the hand is worth more than two in the bush, or until they succeed in taking our jobs. You either fight fire with fire or it will eventually consume you.

There are reasons why regional pilots (in general) don't understand this but that's another thread.

 

[surplus1]

Mind if I plug ALPA-PAC?

Why support ALPA-PAC? Are you hoping to buy a corrupt Republican or two?

 

[surplus1]

This statement just proves just how stupid you really are! You didn't have a choice as CMR management saw to it themselves to be bought out by DL! Welcome to the world of corrupt management. Are you telling your junior f/o's its all the DL pilots's fault?!

The DL pilots are the least of my worries. You're entitled to be creeps if you want to be and you sure don't need my help. You appear to have made the grade on your own.

As for our acquisition by Delta it was an unfriendly takeover. Delta was big enough to force it at the time and we were too small to prevent it. That's just the way it is in corporate America. If there was any corruption it originated in Atlanta.

Again, your beef appears to be with CMR management, tell them!

Comair hasn't had any management for me to tell anything in five years, and still doesn't. I know which management is responsible for this and it is yours. I couldn't care less if you get upset by being told that.

No argument here..Management has been putting the screws to the people since the days of RA!

Aren't you still paying Allen to be one of your "consultants"?

Didn't you forget to blame this all on the mainline pilots!?!

Nope, see my post to Fins.

What you're really saying here is this: I'm miserable in my career. I'm an old man, never having aspired to do what I wanted. I'm stuck, and I'm blaming all my problems on the rest of the world. Guess what old man...Welcome to the reality of the world. RJ's and your mighty company can't self survive. If airlines come to the fact that "fee for departure," doesn't cut it any more, you'll be the likes of Indy air. Your company is not profitable, any more than ours is. How come JB, AAI, and WN are all profitable?? I'll give you a hint....NO RJ's!

You're right, I'm old(er) but I've done what I wanted and would venture that I was doing it while you were in grade school. I realize you think you're hot stuff because you got hired by Delta, but that doesn't impress me at all and it never has. You may not know it but a 737 is just another small airplane. I don't expect you to understand that and I really don't care whether you do or not. If I'd wanted to wear a double breasted suit I would have joined the Navy. I chose the Air Force instead.

Sell it to the new hires old man! You are a miserable person looking to take all your life's failures and blame them on someone else! I'll bet you never speed, and if you do, you blame it on the guy in front of you that you were following!

Go ahead and vent puppy, it's like water on a ducks back. I don't need you to like me and don't care if you do or not. I've never had a need to be popular with the Widget club, never sent you a resume and never would. I don't like your "culture" and never did. I'm sorry if that ruffles your pin feathers. I'm glad that you're happy with your "status" as a mainline pilot and I wish you no harm, I'm just not impressed by you or any of your peers and it doesn't bother me to tell you. That seems to be what YOU can't handle.

That's where you're wrong old man...I wish no harm on anyone losing their job. There have been enough people put out of work in this miserable industry. I have been out of work in this business. This is not my first, nor my second airline. I only can assume by that last sentence, that you are wishing DL to fail, but that's ok, they may, but there is other work for me. This is not my primary job any more. If we fail, then we fail.

It pleases me to see that you have a human side behind your normal bravado. That's a good thing; foster it. You've been out of work in this business, well bravo and welcome to my club; BTDT. You're not talking to a cherry kid, like I said earlier, I reckon I was "out of work" before you were out of grade school. I don't need you to tell me how difficult this industry is, I've lived it. You're still wet behind the ears.

I feel for the poor f/o's that have to fly with this miserable old jerk!

None of those that I've had the privelege to fly with share your feelings. If you had had the opportunity to share a cockpit with me, my guess is you wouldn't say that either. I'm sure your personality isn't really anywhere near as obnoxious as you pretend it to be.

Perhaps I'm old and bitter, but you are young and angry and it shows. Well, I'm sorry things didn't go as you expected at the big D and I hope it gets better and you get a second chance.

Meanwhile back at the ranch, I still wish that my little company had never become embroiled in your big mess. Delta is responsible for the destruction of Comair, whether you like to hear it or not. Stomping your feet won't stop me from saying that, nor will it change the truth. Capiche?

 

[Tim47SIP]

Explain!

Are you on the GWB Admin's 5 year airline career program..... Hate Clinton if you will, but ALPA had open communication with the White House in the 90's. Today, the WH won't take ALPA's calls.....


OK, I'll bite. Please let us know how you came up with this conjecture. As far as I am concerned, their both bad in this department.