DCI - 100, 50-Seaters and All Turboprops To Go.

[Ridgeback]

With this STC case, it seems even the Saabs can't make a profit sometimes. And, nobody else is going to challenge us on the 53nm route.


Bye Bye--General Lee

Are you kidding...Please read all the news releases!! As Delta has been pulling Mesaba out of STC, PAH, EAU...ect. United has been backfilling them with SkyWest out of ORD. It's not that Delta can't make money with the Saabs (see the 11 EAS cities to be served from Memphis before Delata pulled the plug...Federal guarenteed dollars) it's that they for some reason don't want to serve markets with turboprops...see RA's statment on all SF3's gone in 2-3 years. I understand that Delta may frown upon turboprops, but guarenteed dollars??

Too me it looks like the airlines are getting back to buisness as usual. SWA, UNITED, AA, and as of today CO is all going after market share. AA orders 25 RJ's for Eagle, oh and look where they are headed, ALL THE MIDWEST CITIES DELTA PULLED CAPACITY OUT OF! United Backfilling all the EAS cities Delta is pulling Mesaba out of. SWA anounces over 100 new daily departuers, mainly from Florida...Oh wait RA is still cutting capicity, parking airplanes. Expalin the wisdom too me?

 

[10nCLR]

A friend in St Cloud, MN said Delta just announced no more MSP-STC service as of Dec 31st. Slowly those routes are going away, just like our old Montana mainline service from SLC. Trying to see my sister in BIL has gotten a lot tougher since the RJ explosion of the early 2000s. It's time for that to stop and reverse course.



Bye Bye---General Lee

Same thing with BZN. They took away the SLC late morning/noon Mainline turn and the RON and added the crj7. Flights were always full during the summer but most pax were connecting from ATL-SLC-BZN, so they just got rid of the SLC leg and flew directly ATL-BZN during the peak season, then left the scraps for OO Crj.

 

[SSDD]

I remember not too long ago, a major that decided that they could be an all jet airline and got rid of their wholly owned turboprops, only to have to replace them a few years later with a number of progressively worse contractors

 

[General Lee]

Who is Fred Greed? Was he on the DAL MEC?

Fred "Greed" was Fred Reid, our President at Delta at the time. He thought businessmen wanted "frequency", and parked a lot of the mainline birds and then added 50 seat RJs. Fred then left DL to go start Virgin America, where he DID NOT add any 50 seaters. I guess he learned his lesson while watching Delta go down the toilet. Richard Anderson is now trying to clean up Fred's mess.


Bye Bye--General Lee

 

[General Lee]

Are you kidding...Please read all the news releases!! As Delta has been pulling Mesaba out of STC, PAH, EAU...ect. United has been backfilling them with SkyWest out of ORD. It's not that Delta can't make money with the Saabs (see the 11 EAS cities to be served from Memphis before Delata pulled the plug...Federal guarenteed dollars) it's that they for some reason don't want to serve markets with turboprops...see RA's statment on all SF3's gone in 2-3 years. I understand that Delta may frown upon turboprops, but guarenteed dollars??

Too me it looks like the airlines are getting back to buisness as usual. SWA, UNITED, AA, and as of today CO is all going after market share. AA orders 25 RJ's for Eagle, oh and look where they are headed, ALL THE MIDWEST CITIES DELTA PULLED CAPACITY OUT OF! United Backfilling all the EAS cities Delta is pulling Mesaba out of. SWA anounces over 100 new daily departuers, mainly from Florida...Oh wait RA is still cutting capicity, parking airplanes. Expalin the wisdom too me?

Southwest has NO RJs. Airtan flies ZERO RJs. Jetblue flies ZERO RJs. The only airline with RJs that is doing well is Alaska. All the Majors are having trouble thanks to the ridiculous contract agreements that were signed when the Majors were failing a few years ago to a worse degree. We were stuck paying higher gas for RJs that were losing us money, and the regionals had a guaranteed profit regardless, even when gas spiked at $147 a barrel. Do you remember when that happened? What is your stance on that? Let me guess---a contract is a contract. Well, time to pay the piper. And with new hiring rules coming from the FAA, regionals will shrink even more, since eleigible pilots will be harder to find, driving up costs along the way. As far as EAS routes go, well, Great Lakes and Mesa will have a bonanza. To the smaller cities we need to get rid of the 8 RJ flights we have a day to a hub, and replace it with 3 DC9s (1 morning, 1 afternoon, and 1 evening flight). Sounds like a plan.


Bye Bye--General Lee

 

[General Lee]

Same thing with BZN. They took away the SLC late morning/noon Mainline turn and the RON and added the crj7. Flights were always full during the summer but most pax were connecting from ATL-SLC-BZN, so they just got rid of the SLC leg and flew directly ATL-BZN during the peak season, then left the scraps for OO Crj.

Some of that will hopefully be changing. In the Summertime NWA has had A319s flying from MSP to BZN, GTF, FCA, and BIL, and then back to MSP. Well, we will add an A320/319 base in SLC early next year, and hopefully there will be flights to all of those cities from MSP, and then onto SLC. There is no excuse having just RJs to those cities in the Summertime.


Bye Bye--General Lee

 

[erikgigem]

RAH is a standalone competitor. Never were before. Never competed head to head for United or Delta or US Airways passengers. Now they are. However way you want to spin it, Major Partners are not happy about money coming out of their pocket to support Frontier or Midwest or whatever.
Trojan

There are many things that the Majors are unhappy about. I think they would be more concerned about their regional partners..

(a) crashing and killing their passengers (do we need to rehash the poor ADM skills by several regional pilots?)
(b) embarrassing the major airline by incompetent decisions (sleeping at the controls, drunk FA or crews on overnights, etc)
(c) undependable service (low DOT completion factor)
(d) untimely service (low DOT D+0, A+0, A+14).

From AP/Reuters sources and DOT sources, the public clearly knows what track record each regionals has. Certainly no major airline should reward any regional airline company that can't maintain a safe and reliable operation.

And since we are pilots, SAFETY and RELIABILITY is our major priority, not trying to pretend that we are calling the shots out our respective airlines (or for Delta).

 

[USCtrojan]

There are many things that the Majors are unhappy about. I think they would be more concerned about their regional partners..

(a) crashing and killing their passengers (do we need to rehash the poor ADM skills by several regional pilots?)
(b) embarrassing the major airline by incompetent decisions (sleeping at the controls, drunk FA or crews on overnights, etc)
(c) undependable service (low DOT completion factor)
(d) untimely service (low DOT D+0, A+0, A+14).

From AP/Reuters sources and DOT sources, the public clearly knows what track record each regionals has. Certainly no major airline should reward any regional airline company that can't maintain a safe and reliable operation.

more concerned about is.... Cheap. If they were worried about a safety record, one Regional would've been gone long ago. What they should be concerned about and what they actually are concerned about are 2 different things entirely. Cheap. Delta, United and anyone else will not want to financially support a competitor. I don't care what kind of quality you provide.

Trojan

 

[regionaltard]

All I know is that whatever RAH gets paid, they are still able to pay the employees without concessions

If a copilot in a 100 seat jet making 35 dollars an hour isn't a concession then I don't know what is.

 

[Willy21]

The big battle on the horizon is that of operational control. There is a growing group of people that want a Delta/United/American/ect. ticket to be flown by the company that sold it. It comes down to who holds the ultimate responsibility when metal gets bent.

This battle is being fought on the corporate/135 side of the house right now. When they get done with that you will see Mr. Babbit and his "one level of safety for all" move over and set up camp in the 121 world.

My guess is maybe Mr. Anderson sees this as a possibility and wants to get a head start.