Flight Options AIN story!

[Answerguy]

Good day everyone, here is a story I came across on AIN about Flight Options. It has some great info! Enjoy

http://ainonline.com/issues/05_02/05_02_glovescomeoffpg1.html

 

[Turbanhead]

I have read the very nice article

This is a great article about Flight Opts. I read it thoroughly, and at the bottom of the article, there is a link you can click on for "boxes"...that gives some more info about your company. It is a quite interesting comment on the Dedicated Crewing concept. Here it is:

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Dedicated Crewing?
One of Flight Options’ claimed advantages over the competition is what it calls “dedicated crewing,” a dispatch system under which captains are assigned a particular airplane they always fly. Flight Options CEO Kenn Ricci, himself a 6,000-hr business jet pilot, notes that the military pairs pilots and airplanes in this manner.
Company literature says, “Our owners feel better knowing that the person flying the plane knows the plane–its feel, its tendencies, its history and pedigree–like nobody else could.” Ricci further noted that the practice, introduced at Flight Options 2.5 years ago, has reduced “no fault found” maintenance squawks, and with a mixed fleet of pre-owned airplanes it neatly solves the standardization challenges facing the company.

But just how dedicated is the crewing? While Flight Options asserts in its marketing that its pilots fly just one airplane all the time, company pilots say otherwise. A recent poll of 83 Flight Options captains on an unofficial and publicly accessible Web message board for Flight Options pilots claimed to reveal that 90 percent of them (75 captains) have flown, or were flying at the time of the poll, an aircraft that is not their assigned aircraft. Only 9 percent (eight captains) said they have never flown any airplane other than their assigned airplane.

Commented one Flight Options Hawker captain, “If you get [an] aircraft other than your assigned aircraft, it may take two or three phone calls to different guys to find the guy who flew it last. Sometimes you can’t get a hold of the right guy in time, so you hit the deck running and hope for the best. There has been more than one tour where I have flown at least three different N-numbers in an eight-day period. Not a big deal if you have been flying that type a while, but a little more unnerving when the ink on your IOE sign-off is still drying.”

Flight Options pilots also privately express concern about the company’s claims (page 20 of the buyer’s guide currently downloadable from the company Web site) that, as of last December, it has accumulated more than 450,000 accident-free hours in the air. The December cutoff date avoids accounting for the (injury-free) overrun accident involving a Flight Options Diamond landing at Cleveland Cuyahoga this past February 10 (AIN, April, page 91) on a positioning flight with no passengers.

Flight Options chief pilot Joe Salata told AIN that while the company does adhere to dedicated crewing, the merger with Raytheon Travel Air had caused “quite a bit of turmoil [in dedicated crewing] during the first four weeks of combined operations.” He said that as of April 1 some 30 percent of RTA captains were not airplane specific, but that by April 19 the figure had dropped to 10 percent. When asked whether there is a clause in owner contracts that would excuse Flight Options from 100-percent dedicated-captain operations because of, say, “circumstances beyond company control,” a company spokeswoman said there is no such clause. –N.M.

 

[Answerguy]

Go away Turbanhead! You have way to much time on your hands. Why you so bitter anyway?

Anyone have a suggestion for a new hobby for Turbanhead?

 

[Turbanhead]

Balancing the hype

Thank you, Flyalear35 for shining some light on this situation.

All I am doing is balancing the hype...is there anything wrong with that?

I think what Flight Options is doing is great. I know Mr. Ricci is doing his best to build a strong company that will someday compete in the same league as Net Jets. Until then they will have growing pains.

Thanks for the thought Answerguy...but I have enough hobbies, thank you. Between all of my Camels, etc....I'm a very busy person.

Bye for now.