NWA Recalls 35 more

[NuGuy]

Hi all,

In NWA news, 45 were recalled for May (old news) and 35 for June. Between the recall bypasses and MIL committments, the total number of recalls go past the 100 mark.

In other news NWA has made hats OPTIONAL.

Best,
Nu

 

[ILStoMinimums]

Sure nice to hear that. How many more does that leave? 7-800?
Did all their FE's from the 727 get furloughed?

 

[NuGuy]

Hi ILS,

From what I understand, the FE position was a junior/senior thing...yes some junior people were on it, but there were also some relatively senior FEs also enjoying QoL. The senior people probably bailed to the 320 or the back seat of the -10 or 74 when the 727 was phased out. The -10 and 74 FE/FO spots go very senior at NW. Many widebody FOs can hold -9 or 320 captain.

I'm sure most of the furloughees fell through the 27 FE spot before getting furloughed, but alot also were furloughed from the -9 after the 27 went away. Comming back, everyone gets trained on the -9, but the last few position awards have shown alot of upward movement, so these folks might be able to move back up into the 320 or the -10 SO spots.

There are probably around 800+ that are still out. Mil committments and recall bypasses are running about 5-10% of the people recalled, increasing the absolute number of people notified. OTOH, when the company first annouced recalls, it was supposed to be 10-20 a month, and its been closer to 30-40.

But even at that rate (and it probably won't stay that high) and the percentage of bypasses, it would still take 2+ years to get everyone back, meaning the bottom most pilots would have been out 4+ years.

Best,
Nu

 

[spanky2]

Excellent...both on the re-call and the hats.

 

[jobear]

Are the recalls due to retirement or growth? Just wondering.

Jobear

 

[MsFan]

If I'm not mistaken, the company has said the recalls would not quite cover retirements, that we'll end up with slightly fewer pilots on the payroll at the end of '04 than there were at the end of '03. But that was based on the original "10-20" pilots recalled per month. If I remember correctly, NWA has said they want to grow some this year (4%?), and having less pilots on staff at the end of this year doesn't seem to square with that. So to answer your question, the recalls seem to be covering both attrition and a little growth.

The bottom line is the company is in no hurry to do anything until they get a favorable response from the unions (pilots especially) regarding concessions. The pilot group recently made them an "investment" proposal, hopefully that will lead to some progress in negotiating the new contract.

 

[SMMustang]

Are you kiddin' me about the hats! That is kinda cool. Now all we need are some leather jackets which I'm sure is in the near future since AA did it.

MsFan, yeah, I remember the company saying that we'd have less pilots at the end of 04, but that would mean that recalls are going to come to a screeching halt soon. I'm not trying to guess what is going to happen next anymore.

From my rough calcs it looks like 132 pilots have been contacted total...does anyone have a definite #?

 

[festus]

According to the union, for the May flying month 52 letters were sent out and 42 will start training in Apr (the rest deferred or had MIL). For June, 35 letters have been sent out with no firm number for training annouced.