PBS Frontline expose' on regional airline industry

[Jon Rivoli]

They could have said, "We'll fly those planes at mainline." Held the line on scope. Instead they said screw the junior guys, they haven't paid their dues, I want mine! Spin off the Barbie jets and give me a raise.

 

[Grey Ghost]

he is wrinkled and ORANGE!!!

 

[suupah]

HA HA grey ghost! hey, make a one of your world famous avatars featuring cohen!

 

[Nevets]

Not supporting Ted Kennedy.

You can't now. The genie is out of the bottle. ALPA is worthless at this point.

You feel that this was all because of deregulation?

ALPA fights to make your profession safer. How is that worthless?

 

[Stifler's Mom]

I applaud the two Colgan pilots for taking a chance to voice their concerns on camera.

Now for the rest of you that are at Colgan, hearing them say that the company is willing to falsify duty-in times, etc to keep you legal is VERY bothersome. Are these two guys pretty accurate in their accounts of Colgan Management?

 

[agonyairfo]

side note here...

from Jumpers away:

"...the regionals ought to be stapled to their respective carriers mainline seniority list. However, I have NEVER met a mainline pilot that thought this was an acceptable idea. They're worried about the talent of the pilots being stapled.

My solution is just do the staple, and let the weak fall through in the training process for other aircraft. As I've said prior- let the managements worry about hiring qualifications and let the pilots worry about the pay....."[/QUOTE]

The funny thing is that most wholly-owned regional pilots today, (Comair, Eagle, Mesaba) the ones who might be integrated with their respective "mainline" carrier, are very experienced. The contract airlines are the ones who seem to have gone on those recent hiring binges of low time pilots.

Flying with Comair now, I usually end up flying with a Captain who has around 20 years (I fly the CRJ7/9). I have 10.5 years of 121 experience and 8,000 in turbine alone and I am just the junior fo. I am not an anomaly either. There are a lot of Comair fo's who have come from Eagle, Mesaba, Midway, etc., who probably are pushing 10+ years in part 121 too. (The left seat in CVG starts at 12 years I think.) So, the moral is I think we frequently have more combined experience than our MD80 or 737 counterparts at DAL. Just a guess, not trying to make an empirical statement or speak qualitatively about that experience..although, we are not failing check-rides left and right either.

The point is that I think the wholly-owned's have drastically different experience levels than the contract carriers. So I hope PBS differentiates at least on that point. ...But, talk about pay and work rules all you like.

 

[CopilotDoug]

You feel that this was all because of deregulation?

By and large, yes. By that point, ALPA had become a little too comfortable on Capitol Hill and hadn't (and still doesn't) realize that the days of Dave B. and FDR chumming it up were over.

ALPA fights to make your profession safer. How is that worthless?

Open your eyes man, it's not a profession anymore. It's a hobby. When regional pilots need to work two jobs to make ends meet, and mainline pilots are retiring with no retirement....it's no longer a viable career for many and is anything BUT a profession. Do you think many of today's pilots are steering their children away from flying because of safety related issues or pay?

 

[Nevets]

By and large, yes. By that point, ALPA had become a little too comfortable on Capitol Hill and hadn't (and still doesn't) realize that the days of Dave B. and FDR chumming it up were over.

Open your eyes man, it's not a profession anymore. It's a hobby. When regional pilots need to work two jobs to make ends meet, and mainline pilots are retiring with no retirement....it's no longer a viable career for many and is anything BUT a profession. Do you think many of today's pilots are steering their children away from flying because of safety related issues or pay?

You want to argue semantics. Whatever you want to call it, what we do, is safer because of ALPA.

 

[J.Otto]

Its subtle but if you notice, Roger Cohen is telling the truth. No one is forcing you to work for Colgan. Another words, why would a company change their ways when people still show up for work? No one is forcing you to commute in the back of cargo planes. Average pay for a regional pilot is not 1200 dollars per month. Safety is the number one priority. Im not saying all of the above are OK but it is what it is. Roger Cohen is speaking on behalf of the company, what do you guys expect?

In a sense, hes right. if you have a trust fund or rich daddy, you dont have to rough it in a crash pad, just live in a base in a nice apt and can use your paltry take home pay as beer money.

sure, lots can do it on these wages.... the rich....

 

[CX880]

Not supporting Ted Kennedy.

You can't now. The genie is out of the bottle. ALPA is worthless at this point.

No they are not worthless, and the alternative is much worse like having to fake you mothers death to get out of a crew scheduling issue at Skywest. No one's there to support you. We are labor, and are completely worthless to management. The only reason why the non union carriers and others have some sort of success is because of ALPA. They want to keep alpa away so they one up the incentives. If alpa were gone with the rest of the unions we would be working for minimum wage. I think you are expecting too much out your union.

 

[CopilotDoug]

You want to argue semantics. Whatever you want to call it, what we do, is safer because of ALPA.

And I'm not here to debate safety. It's really secondary issue. When the pay is as horrendous as it is at the regional levels...safety is an after thought. I know you're here to tell me that pay is not really the top concern for pilots today. The pilots THINK it is...but they just don't know what's best for them. It's a shame that ALPA has such an ignorant membership.

 

[ultrarunner]

Why isn't ALPA standing up and making a bigger stink about this?

You're kidding, right???

 

[SeaCow]

Its subtle but if you notice, Roger Cohen is telling the truth. No one is forcing you to work for Colgan. Another words, why would a company change their ways when people still show up for work? No one is forcing you to commute in the back of cargo planes. Average pay for a regional pilot is not 1200 dollars per month. Safety is the number one priority. Im not saying all of the above are OK but it is what it is. Roger Cohen is speaking on behalf of the company, what do you guys expect?

Well first year pay at Colgan was at the time when i started working there, 20 an hour, 75 hour guarantee. 20 times 75 equals 1500, now take out uniform payment of 100 every month for six months, then dental and health insurance and I was left with just over 1200 a month. So most average new hire pay is around the 21 to 24 dollar an hour. Which is anywhere from 1500 to 1800 base pay per month. Take out taxes and everything else and the average is around 1200 a month. So I wasn't blowing sunshine up miles o'briens butt when I said that.

Nobody forced me to work there, but they were the first to call and I took the job flying a 1900. If I knew what I know now, I would have never went there.

 

[Rez O. Lewshun]

They could have said, "We'll fly those planes at mainline." Held the line on scope. Instead they said screw the junior guys, they haven't paid their dues, I want mine! Spin off the Barbie jets and give me a raise.

How? Don't just say coulda/woulda/shoulda.....

justify your post.

If outsourcing is such a common place practice.... and pilots as consumers in other industries patronize outsourcing.... how could/should ALPA have stopped all of this... the devil is in the details...

 

[suupah]

ra roh!!

http://abcnews.go.com/WN/Travel/ntsb-pilot-error-blame-colgan-air-flight-3407/story?id=9726879http://cs85.clearspring.com/u/4ae8d36a3102598f/4b68c7c8ad2554d1