Independence Air to cease all operations in Jan.

[skyaddict]

Hear hear on "long live the DoJet", it will always be my first love as turbines go. And as for the now clearly silly gamble - as the British SAS say, "who dares wins." True, even without hindsight some of the marketing mistakes were catastrophically stupid from the get go, but at the time I was a little giddy too, and to this day don't regret our saying no to Orneryscheme.

With hindsight, most of us would have been spared misery by being furloughed much earlier (and moving on that much earlier!) but at least preserving the company as a future player. To burn half a bill in a year is truly amazing. The ACA/Indy story, though small compared to the dead or dying legacies, would make a great chapter for a follow-on volume of "Hard Landings." But what a great employee group it was... I had such great times there, even with the downslide it was for almost 3 of my 4 years. I have non-reved and jumpseated for 9 months now since leaving you guys and my heart goes out to the amazing job the remaining employees have done to make it a popular (albeit money losing) operation with pax even as the cliff approaches and morale plunged.

It was a hell of a ride guys and gals... good luck out there, shame on management for being so dishonest down to the last hour while packing those golden parachutes, and good luck to all those who are still being played as pawns in the Regional airline whipsaw game too. Cheers.. and here's to the memories...

P.S.- are they really going to play those tired and worn comedy safety announcements on the last day?!

 

[j41driver]

They weren't all that bad, it was just a really bad time to go it alone. I'll bet fuel costs will be on the epitaph of IDE.

Yep, you're right. A really bad time to go it alone was all...a start up with 87 RJ's...16 times a day everywhere...with no advertising...and no way to get tickets except flyi.com (flyi who??) sounds like a solid plan to me. Must have just been the expensive gas.

The truth is that mgmt at this company made a ton of mistakes beginning on or before day 1 that when compounded together killed the airline.

 

[satpak77]

My question is what banker is loaning/funding/supporting these yahoos and others to get A319s and RJ's in the fleet, when in hindsight it was mismanaged from the start.

Above managers then walk away with zero repercussions or personal accountability

WTF

 

[Drill Sgt. Dad]

From the first day I walked onto the property at ACA, I saw how incompetent mgt was. I saw how this company wasted money like you would never beleive. Too bad we didn't have UAL and DAL to finance our constant incompetence after both parties seperated from us. It cracks me up how mgt still made the same stupid idiotic mistakes over and over and only tried to correct them after it was too late. When we borke away, we still kept the same clowns in middle mgt that squandred alot of money and we still ran this place like a commuter airline. Now, Tom and Kerry are laughingstocks. Thier egos led us down a path of destruction. Forget high fuel prices, we should have raised the fares. When oil was $37/bbl they still cried high costs of fuel, and they blame the competition for matching thier prices? Hello? Did you think the US Airs and UALs were going to sit back and do nothing? How stupid did Tom and Kerry get? And bringing on two of the biggest losers, Mark Z. and Bill B. into this operation as well. Ask anyone at Midwest and Abex what kind of people they were. I have and heard a few horror stories. Why would they leave such companies to come to FLYI?
The only reason FLYI failed was due to mismanagement and the incomptetence of our upper mgt to get a grasp on what was going on. Each day, idiotic decisions were being made and it was one SNAFU after another. Oh did I mention the lies and deceit? Even fter it was sworn this wouldn't be on the employees backs? Tom Moore blasted the pilots after the comapny approved of people attending the AIR INC job fairs. He cried we're quitting on him. no they quit on us furloughing over 700 and downgrading some 350-400 pilots who were CAs for many years. when I was furlughed, the most junior CRJ CA had an 8/98 hire date. Did I mention during the summer, the scores of flights being cancelled due to a shortge of FOs? I used to get clls on my days off begging me to come in and help. Once again, gross mismanagement.
Too bad thier egos go in the way, this had the potential to be a gold mine. I can only hope Tom, Kerry, Bill, Mark, Jeff R, Justine Y and the rest of the clowns who couldn't even manage a brothel in a Navy shipyard never get back into the airline business again.
And yes, I am angry about it, because I was only able to watch and couldn't do a thing about it!

 

[SkyWench]

after listening to the hotline for Ifly, your right, i think its hysterical that he asks everyone to continue to come to work thru the holiday and be cheerful. I love that, id be calling sick for the rest of the year.

 

[Diesel]

i allways thought to myself tha furloughing 700 pilots was the plan from the begining. They knew they couldn't get the i air plan off the ground with that many pilots and nobody would go for them laying off that many pilots and still show up for work. So they make a whack at it for a few months and then decide to throw in the towel for 700 pilots brining the company down to the size they wanted.

Only problem is it doesn't look like they stopped downsizing.

 

[Rez O. Lewshun]

It makes me chuckle reading the post of how proud the pilots/FAs/employees were to kick UAL to the curb. Get a reality check! A paycheck is a paycheck. The bank doesn't care were your mortgage payment comes from...just get it in and on time!

The employees had no choice. They were along for the ride....any ride that the clown management put them on. So any suggestion otherwise is misguided...

What was so bad about flying for UAX? Sure it was a jacked up operation, but that didn't seem to stop any of us from applying to ACA. Heck some of us were ready to pay 10K just to fly UAL paint around. Was it the expectation of leaving ACA in a few years for a career carrier? Anything Tom and Kerry did/does will be a failure. Except maybe fee for departure. So if Tom/Kerry [stupidly] tells UAL to pound sand how smart is it to say "Hel! yeah, we employees are-are own man!" This is like an amature boxer stepping into the ring with Ali. Sure he was is own man...for a minute, but then he got the beating of his life.

In a few days 15+ year employees making over 100K will be out of a job. And for what?? Corporate ignorance, ego and greed.

Tom and Kerry are now simply available for employment. And they will show up somewhere, maybe at YOUR next carrier....

FLYI was nothing but a facade. Trying to make it anything more is rediculous..

Look, man, I have all the repsect for FLYI crews and employees but it is what it is.... Give it a few months and the reality will kick in like a migraine headache

 

[GuppyPuppy]

Didn't ACA start this venture with around $300,000,000 cash in the bank?

Seems to me that they should have relieved themselves of the expensive-to-operate CRJ's ASAP and started taking more Airbi ASAP, even if if meant entering bankruptcy soon after starting operations. With a CASM of over 15 cents for the CRJ, how can a business plan call for a low fare operation?

Yes, it would have been painful, but totally shutting down has got to be more painful.

I am truly sorry for all those affected. I have been furloughed twice in this industry and don't wish it on anyone.

Good luck and God Bless.

GP

 

[8AF]

Surprised the media hasn't picked this up.

 

[GuppyPuppy]

Surprised the media hasn't picked this up.

It was mentioned on Squawk Box this morning on CNBC.

GP

 

[h25b]

While I have nothing but sympathy for those about to be on unemployment, but like Rez, this noble cause striking it out alone BS is remarkable... People act like the management from United was coming in to their homes and kicking their cats.

FlyI is yet another failed attempt at an airline, nothing more/nothing less. No one is going to chisel the FlyI logo in to the side of a mountain in rememberance.

 

[aa73]

Surprised the media hasn't picked this up.

8AF...Is that an avatar of the J41 cockpit I see?

Ahh, the memories.... Good luck Indy pilots.

 

[Always deferred]

People act like the management from United was coming in to their homes and kicking their cats.
quote]


Do you remember Bain? Do you remember Mesa, CHQ, TSA, Shuttle American, etc all swooping in to take our flying? DO you remember what UAL did to Air Whisky? I think you should check your facts, son.

 

[skyaddict]

"Now, Tom and Kerry are laughingstocks. Thier egos led us down a path of destruction."

That and the part about the employees being entirely along for the ride says it all. The fact is the pilot group voted overwhelmingly for concessions- yeah, very modest concessions but we voted for them nonetheless around 90% in favor- to *stay* with UAL because, bravado aside, we were very scared of the idea of going it alone, rightly so. Yet it was egos- both at ACA and UAL- which prevented compromise on a deal. And those egos chose the worst possible time to try and give the finger to the mothership. Incredibly, later as the bad timing for the industry became even more obvious, T&K even said no to a codeshare proposal with Virgin, the last straw that *might* have saved the day but also forced them to give up consideable control. Then they maintained total control of a ship that is the equivalent of the final scene in Titanic where it is pointing vertical, while Tom kept spouting off weekly briefings about pride in operational excellence and redskins picks of the week. Thereafter, the employee group's alleged bravado/arrogance had nothing to do with it... we were truly along for the ride, and our giddiness was simply nervous laughter and the hope that "surely" those brilliant (ha) minds at the top had some sort of plan to emerge from this, some secret upcoming deal with Virgin or somebody, lol, they couldn't be *that* stupid to run it into the ground, surely... but they were.

And these big (arrogant) egos are as foolishly addicted to running airlines as we are getting our paychecks from flying, so I wonder how long after liquidation it will be before we see the same senior management creating a startup with one or two airbuses (the business model that might have worked)... i.e. will these guys really be banished from the industry or not? Tons of senior airline execs have been with several failed startups before hitting paydirt. You have to wonder what these guys were sniffing this round, though.

 

[dalegribble]

Regardless of the mgmt sucking, the crews, pilots and fa's are top notch dedicated folks. Flew with IDE last night and received outstanding customer service from smiling fa's. Good Luck!!!