MESA on 60 day notice?

[rightrudder]

Well, UAL was the one that told ZW to park the 328s and brought Mesa in with the DASH-8s and then the CRJ-700s.

The 328's are still sitting up in Canada with ZW colors on them, so if UAL really wants to reduce what Mesa is doing, they can approve ZW's 4th request to purchase CRJ-700s and let them bring back the 328s.

Not true. ZW wanted to get rid of the 328's. When Fairchild declared BK, ZW was able to get out of the leases, and UAL agreed to let them. They did not want to operate the aircraft because of very expensive and difficult to find parts.

Regarding the 700's, ZW never even bid to fly them for UAL.

 

[Rottweiller]

Well, UAL was the one that told ZW to park the 328s and brought Mesa in with the DASH-8s and then the CRJ-700s.

The 328's are still sitting up in Canada with ZW colors on them, so if UAL really wants to reduce what Mesa is doing, they can approve ZW's 4th request to purchase CRJ-700s and let them bring back the 328s.

Most of them are sitting in OKC.

 

[DrRaptor]

According to the ZW pilots I was talking to at DEN last year when Mesa first started service with the 700's for UAL (which pissed off Frontier after they refused to even paint their 200's in JetExpress colors), ZW was trying to get the CRJ-700 and CRJ-900 to start replacing some of the BAe-146's since UAL wouldn't let them buy ARJ or place an order on the RJX prior to that program being abandoned.

The thing most people forget with ZW is that under the current marketing agreement UAL has to give permission to ZW to purchase aircraft for use on the UAL contract because UAL is the garunteer on the loans for the aircraft. So if UAL won't approve a purchase, ZW can't get them, no matter whether they want to bid on larger aircraft runs or not. MESA already had CRJ-700s and weren't confined by the same marketing agreement, so they were able to buy a bunch of CRJ-700s and then tell UAL they had them, not get permission first.

 

[rightrudder]

According to the ZW pilots I was talking to at DEN last year when Mesa first started service with the 700's for UAL (which pissed off Frontier after they refused to even paint their 200's in JetExpress colors), ZW was trying to get the CRJ-700 and CRJ-900 to start replacing some of the BAe-146's since UAL wouldn't let them buy ARJ or place an order on the RJX prior to that program being abandoned.

The thing most people forget with ZW is that under the current marketing agreement UAL has to give permission to ZW to purchase aircraft for use on the UAL contract because UAL is the garunteer on the loans for the aircraft. So if UAL won't approve a purchase, ZW can't get them, no matter whether they want to bid on larger aircraft runs or not. MESA already had CRJ-700s and weren't confined by the same marketing agreement, so they were able to buy a bunch of CRJ-700s and then tell UAL they had them, not get permission first.

Wrong again. Perhaps you should stop speculating when you do not know the details.

We will not put any aircraft into service with UAL unless 1. They want us to, and 2. The terms are agreeable to our Owners

UAL does not guarantee the financing on our aircraft. As a matter of fact, our aircraft loans are backed by the Canadian government, which started a big legal battle between Canada and Brazil. Our Company did not bid on any 700 flying because they did not believe it would be profitable enough for them (plus, UAL wanted five year contracts, which was too much risk for our Owners who are quite conservative). We have financing and options on 20 additional 50 seaters, but the Owners will not put them into service with UAL at the present time because UAL can only offer a 5 year contract.

 

[DrRaptor]

Wrong again. Perhaps you should stop speculating when you do not know the details.

We will not put any aircraft into service with UAL unless 1. They want us to, and 2. The terms are agreeable to our Owners

Umm... I said that. What was so wrong with that?

UAL does not guarantee the financing on our aircraft. As a matter of fact, our aircraft loans are backed by the Canadian government, which started a big legal battle between Canada and Brazil.

Well, the last time I checked on the situation was February of this year (when I was working for ASIG), and that was what the Captain I talked to said, which is what the situation was in 2000 when I worked the Ramp at DEN for ZW. If your own Captains don't know what the situation is, then there's something up with it.

Our Company did not bid on any 700 flying because they did not believe it would be profitable enough for them (plus, UAL wanted five year contracts, which was too much risk for our Owners who are quite conservative). We have financing and options on 20 additional 50 seaters, but the Owners will not put them into service with UAL at the present time because UAL can only offer a 5 year contract.

Again, I understand with the 5 year contract risks, however back in 2002 and 2003 when ZW was pushing hard for the BAe replacement or at least a suppliment, the CRJ-700 was pushed hard (and UAL was giving 10 year contracts). At that time UAL said there was not a need for a 70 or 90 seat regional jet in the fleet, and that it was felt that the BAe's would last long enough before requiring replacement. Also, apparently UAL liked the -300s since they could almost replace a 737-200 on some of the routes.

 

[DirkkDiggler]

You are both correct I think. If you look at the registration documents on some of the aircraft they list United as the owner and I believe back in the day United used to actually purchase or at least back the loans required to purchase the aircraft. I also think that this hasn't happened for quite a while and now ZW has secured its own financing through the Canadian government. This has been controversial because the Canadian government will only give this financing, which is at a much reduced rate, to a private company and not one with stock holders. This has caused a bit of commotion among the publicly held regionals who obviously don't qualify. Despite the great financing the Canadian government has offered, our owners don't want to take their 20 options because they haven't found a lucrative enough contract for them. I wouldn't be surprised if they were a bit scared to purchase any more aircraft for the United ticket at this time. Too much uncertainty.

 

[DrRaptor]

Oh, and the thing with the 328's being too expensive to maintain, then why is it that in 2000, ZW purchased almost $10 million in parts for the aircraft to put in stores?

Most of the parts that these planes use on a normal are still produced, because they were all bought by Fairchild-Dornier (or Daimler-Chrysler-Dornier depending on which plane you were looking at) to be put on the aircraft (engines, fasteners, tires, brakes, hoses, etc), so the aircraft going out of production didn't equal the price going up as was previously claimed. If that was the case, then -

AAL wouldn't be flying F-100s
PSA wouldn't be flying 328Jets
Air Tahoma wouldn't be flying Convair 240s and Convair 580s at 2/3 the price of an ATR-42 and ATR-72 respectively.

Just because the company that built the plane isn't around anymore or doesn't build the plane anymore doesn't necessarily mean that the cost of maintenance goes up. If that was true without fault, then many of the Douglas DC-3, -6, -7, and -8 aircraft wouldn't be flying still. You wouldn't see the 727 in such numbers on the freight lines, you certainly wouldn't see our Convairs in the air.

 

[BoilerUP]

double post, deleted

 

[BoilerUP]

AAL wouldn't be flying F-100s
PSA wouldn't be flying 328Jets

While I agree in principle with what you are saying, hasn't AA parked or sold all their F100s, and didn't PSA only operate the 328 prop, not the Dorkjet? Aren't all the Dorks parked now?

 

[DrRaptor]

Who's operating the Jet for US Airways and Midwest? I thought that was PSA because I remembered reading that PSA was the first operator of the Jet.

As for the F-100s, they've parked most of them now, but remember that immediately after the TWA merger, AAL chose the F-100 (which by that time Fokker had been out of business for a couple of years) over the B717 saying that the B717 would cost more to operate and that they'd invested too much into the F-100 to make it "economical" to retire a (then) 4-year old aircraft for the last deliveries.