Welcome to Flightinfo.com

  • Register now and join the discussion
  • Friendliest aviation Ccmmunity on the web
  • Modern site for PC's, Phones, Tablets - no 3rd party apps required
  • Ask questions, help others, promote aviation
  • Share the passion for aviation
  • Invite everyone to Flightinfo.com and let's have fun

Island Air sold

Welcome to Flightinfo.com

  • Register now and join the discussion
  • Modern secure site, no 3rd party apps required
  • Invite your friends
  • Share the passion of aviation
  • Friendliest aviation community on the web
Register   Log in
I wonder how this will affect Aloha's interisland flying?

I bet so many pilots would be p*ssed off about this.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't think that the pilots currently working at IA wouldn't be pissed off at all. Getting five new planes and retaining the current employees sounds quite good in fact. Also may mean a lot of movement for some that have been waiting to upgrade.
 
I think that is the best news! Hope things will move a little bit more for all of us! Plus new routes will be great.
 
Why would the island air pilots be mad?

Why would Island Air pilots be mad? From what i've heard, they're getting 5 more planes adding more routes and hiring more pilots.
 
I thought many pilots who fly for Island Air works there so they would be able to move up to Aloha. Because of this, could there no longer be anyone moving to Aloha automatically? Pilots maybe happy with faster upgrade time but for pilots who want to work at Aloha would not be very happy about this.
 
Re: Why would the island air pilots be m

topdawg said:
Why would Island Air pilots be mad? From what i've heard, they're getting 5 more planes adding more routes and hiring more pilots.
Click to expand...

OK, ill be the first to say it then.. This could be a way to introduce regional jets to Hawaii's skies. Maybe somebody out there thinks the CRJ-700 can handle the cycles and abuse with its new Boeing style landing gear. The first generation RJ's were too fragile for hawaii flying.

I could think of another theory or two on the source of the "5 new airplanes" but i'm probably way off.
 
Last edited:
Aloha

First of all, there was never a flow though to Aloha with Island Air. What's the difference between taking a an Island Air pilot now and a pilot from United, Hawaiian, anybody? They aren't going to stop hiring Island Air pilots just because they have different owners now.
 
I wonder how this will effect poolies like myself and others.....
Click to expand...

I was thinking the same thing.
I could see it going either way...... :cool: or :( Hopefully :cool:
 
Think positive, Island gets 70-90 seaters, does more HI flying while Aloha takes its 737's and branches out more on the west coast and US domestic scene. Aloha become next big US discount carrier.

Good Luck
 
island air is getting 5 more dash 8s, they will be doubling the size of their pilot pool to ~100 pilots. they will be competing directly with aloha on some routes. the transaction is completed on march 1st pending approval of the powers that watch over this kind of stuff.

it was sold to the son of the guy who owns the leasing company that leases island air their planes, Willis Leasing.

this sale is good for the WP (island air) pilots, but it opens a can of worms for what will/can happen with the inter-island market, aloha, and hawaiian. with hawaiian airlines in BK, its extra competition they dont need when they are barely breathing, for aloha it could be signalling a lot of possible changes for what may come. some of these possibilities are huge and drastic, while others arent so much.

topdawg is correct that there's no flow through....officially. there has always been an unoffical flow through, aloha has an unofficial preferred hiring policy for WP pilots. in the past they have taken so many WP pilots that WP had to cancel flights because of a sudden shortage of pilots. aloha still unofficially allocates up to about 4 slots per class for island air pilots, which is great for them, especially in a market with so many over qualified pilots looking for jobs.

its too early to tell how things will pan out. the sale and the statements that the aloha ceo has made are very odd. i dont think we are done seeing strange things happening here in hawaii. fasten your seatbelts and stand by for some interesting times.
 
LearLove said:
Think positive, Island gets 70-90 seaters, does more HI flying while Aloha takes its 737's and branches out more on the west coast and US domestic scene. Aloha become next big US discount carrier.

Good Luck
Click to expand...

I too believe this is the beginning of having RJs for interisland. CRJ 5/7/9 is perfect (except for JHM). I suspect selling Island Air has a big part to do with AQ MEC's not allowing island air to fly Aloha's routes. For the short term, this seems like a good deal for everybody. But in the long run, AQ pilot group can expand less, and that means if you want to see the big bucks, you may have to wait longer. Afterall, why do you put up with all this bullshxt being a commuter pilot and CFI-because you want to make it big time. Well, the finish line just being pushed back 5 yards. And having RJ for WP is not a good thing, because that could be used as potential leverage to negotiate a cheaper contract for AQ pilots; such as having a substantially differed two tier pay rate, interisland and transpac, much like hawaiian 717 vs 767. This is all speculation right now, but lets hope the code share contract and the next AQ ALPA negotiation is restrictive enough to not hinder hiring at Aloha. I wonder what AQ MEC is going to do? I think the best case would be Island Air flies the flights that Aloha havent been flying or flights that have low load factor, just to compliments Aloha and increases flexibilities, but not reducing its (Aloha's) schedule. In any case, Hawaiian and Pac Wings are in worst shapes than they were yesterday.
 
Last edited:
It'll definitely be fun to watch this unfold. It's no wonder the company tried to push our new contract so quickly. I dont see any reason why you poolies wont get hired...although there are still dozens of dash typed HA guys stil on the street. Good luck.
 
Originally posted by dash8driver for aloha it could be signalling a lot of possible changes for what may come. some of these possibilities are huge and drastic, while others arent so much....

its too early to tell how things will pan out. the sale and the statements that the aloha ceo has made are very odd. i dont think we are done seeing strange things happening here in hawaii. fasten your seatbelts and stand by for some interesting times. [/B]
Click to expand...

Your post reminded me of a rumor floating around AQ crew rooms the past couple months. The rumor was "something big" was going to be announced, "something all the AQ pilots would be happy about". I'm still not quite making the connection between the recent rumor and today's news but... maybe this is just the first of a chain of events about to take place in Hawaii Air Transportation.
 
This is gonna be interesting for sure. I know A LOT of guys here aren't real happy with this. I imagine there's gonna be a big fight over the scope issue (placing AQ flight numbers on Island Air flights on disputed routes).

But then again... why would our own CEO create another competitor here?! This whole thing is WAY weird. If he did it just to get around the scope clause, this whole kumbaya with the company comes to an end real fast especially since we gave up 10% of pay to get company to profitability.

Another thing that doesn't make sense - when Zander came to our ALPA meeting this spring, he said that every aspect of the Airgroup including Island Air was expected to be profitable this year. Why dump it? Puzzling....

Another funny thing... there was a rumor of a big announcement in December that was supposed to make us all "happy." This announcement pissed off A LOT of people.

As for Island Air people trying to get on with AQ, I don't know. I hope it doesn't affect the hiring of Island Air guys here, but then again... who knows. If we fly less, naturally, there will be fewer jobs here.

I don't think we're getting the whole picture here...
 
Last edited:
There has been talk around the crew lounges about UAL came to SkyWest and was asked to look into flying routes in Hawaii as a UnitedExpress carrier? Maybe this rumor now has some weight behind it??? This one started about 10 years ago when I first herd the rumor now it is surfacing again? This is not flame bait, just "talk" in the crew lounge.:confused:
 
From the advertiser: Island Air has a code-share partnership with Aloha Airlines that allows them to share frequent flier miles, and officials said they also hope to establish a code-share partnership with Hawaiian.

Hawaiian spokesman Keoni Wagner said, "If partnering with Island Air would benefit our consumers, we would be inclined to pursue it."

Also code-sharing with HAL???? Is that another way of saying: We will fly interisland for you since you bigger guys can't seem to make it profitable. If thats the case, thats bad news for all three pilot groups (unless you want to fly a freaking Dash8 for the rest of your natural life). I hope Im wrong.
 
Hey Jim,

One thought we had a strict scope, and look what happened. Besides, if Gotbaum wants it, all he has to do is go see the BK judge and get it approved...

By the way... congrats on $3M bonus. It makes a nice Christmas present.
 
Well, I don't know... last numbers we had was that we had $12.6 mil net profit in 3rd quarter alone, and that we're paying off $10 mil this year off of ATSB loan. Actually, according to Zander, this has been the best year for the company ever - go figure.

Also, we're finishing the year sufficiently enough in the black that the company would have to pay out profit-sharing. The speculation is that this is a simple way to go around our scope which the company apparently has been trying to get around for a while. Secondly, ATSB had to give approval for this purchase, they could have blocked it.

But somehow, I'm STILL having a difficult time understanding why our management would create another competitor by selling 100% of Island Air. There has GOT to be more to this that we're not hearing about.
 
no one ever knew if it was profitable or not. it was a well kept sercret and they burried any financial information into aloha air group. the management was always doom and gloom about their finances... "re-use your paperclips and staples, bring your own toilet paper, we need to save money". thats not literal, but not far off from their attitudes.

the loads on the planes varied widely.. sometimes you'd have 5 people, sometimes full. i think the average load is roughly 20, give or take. the average varies depending upon what season it is and what route. molokai usually has a lot of room, but during the canoe races, you can forget walking up to get a ticket.... they even make extra sections to keep up with the demand.
 
I know what the big announcement is for the Aloha guys----"Mesa and Jon Ornstein are going to buy you and then ship you and the airplanes to Philadelphia to feed USAir."

Bring a jacket.


Bye Bye--General Lee:rolleyes: ;) :cool:
 
Hey guys, don't usually speak up, but...

Why would a company sell off a portion of itself to have that portion become a direct competetor? To allow that portion to grow as Zander stated? Makes no sense, its money in someone elses pocket. To get around a scope? Once again why, its money in someone else's pocket. The "we're broke" argument doesn't wash in light of our 3rd Qtr, debt paydown, and solid loads both inter-island and -700 club. Perhaps its a prelude to Aloha being sold to another airline which doesn't want to be in the prop business. Rumors have been more rife than usual concerning this same topic the last few months. Even flew with a guy who told me while jumpseating a SWA Capt said "Looks like we're buying you" so rumors have reached there as well. This theory also jibes fairly closely to Zander's "everyone will be happy" statement.

Just another log to throw on the rumor fire. Don't we go through this every Chrisymas?
 
asdf

Here's somthing to think about. If SWA were to buy out Aloha, all Aloha pilots would go to the bottom of the list seening that SWA is not part of ALPA. That can't be the "good news" Zander is talking about.
 
Well , lots of rumors and speculation out there... but on Tues the IA pilots have a meeting with the CEO and the new owner. After that we should have a lot more facts.

FWIW, on Fri the CEO came over to the IA ops area and had a little meeting /annoucement. (I wasn't there, but here is what he said )
- we have a new owner, no one is going to loose their job, we are getting 5 new airplanes, in March we will start flying to the Big Island (Hilo and Kona), sometime after that flying to Lihue, plan to hire about 100 new employees.

and for the rumor mill:
I heard from a good source this deal has been in the works for awhile, like since the beginning of the year.(man can they keep a secret!)

for you IA poolies, I wouldn't worry, in fact I would start making plans. Just consider this:
currently it takes about 2 months to get a pilot on-line at IA. Even if they only put 3 new planes on-line in March, that would double the fleet. They need to start training soon. It would take time to set up interviews, so my guess is they will first contact all the poolies and see who is interested.

It will be interesting to watch how they handle some of the logistics of this:
-there are only 4 parking spots on the IA ramp, and only two
have fueling. Will be fun with a fleet of 9.
- need to hire a bunch of mechanics and get them trained
- need a bunch of FA/s and get them trained
- get some stations set up and train the people to run them
- get things set up in dispatch (right now there are a bunch new
dispatchers just learning the current system)
the list goes on...
all this in 2.5 months to start up in March.
 
from the local paper:


The airline will add six new routes -- Kona to Maui, Hilo to Maui, Maui to Lihue, and Honolulu to Hilo, Kona and Lihue. The fares on these routes have not been determined.

"We will be flying more directs and nonstop flights," Takekawa said. "But we don't expect to see an exponential change in operation. We are trying to improve service that is out there."

The DASH-8 seats 37 passengers and makes more economical sense to operate in the interisland market than the 120-seat jets Aloha and Hawaiian fly, Takekawa says. The first priority will be to open the Hilo and Kona offices and hire about 20 people, he said.

Island Air's new owners will add five more aircraft -- either buy or lease -- to meet expansions. On average, a DASH-8 aircraft costs abut $4 million, Takekawa said.

(sorry, no RJs in HI)
 
Concerning AQ pilots to bottom of the list. As part of our ATSB concessions, we were given contractual language that prevents any sale to another carrier were such a thing to occur.
 
I.A.

I think the thought of selling a profitable part of your company is very suspicious. But those of us who know the Air Group, probably know that even though Island Air is about to be sold, there is definitely more to the story. Island Air along with the E.R. routes and cargo operations have been profitable the last 2 quarters. Another thing that was mentioned on Friday was that if Island Air becomes profitable Aloha will benefit. Chew on that one for awhile, you'll get even more confused.
 

Share this page

Latest posts

Latest resources

Latest media

Carbon Cub FX-3 Shenandoah Valley
Carbon Cub at Kittyhawk
FX-3 in the backcountry
IFR Panel in a Carbon Cub FX-3
Cub-Provo-UT-c.jpg
Back
Top Bottom