Preferential hiring for Comair pilots

[waveflyer]

Hawaiian is in pretty much continual hiring mode for the foreseeable future (retirements and projected arrival of A/C over the next 3 years. We have embarked on selective international expansion that is working even better than they anticipated so by all accounts it will continue.
E-mail with my rep today and he confirmed that the MEC will request priority interviews for you guys. No promises yet but they were very receptive to giving the AQ and ATA guys priority under the same circumstances.
We had a change in the MEC Chair position and your chair had a hard time contacting us as a result. It's being rectified.
Gotta go or I would elaborate.
Good Luck guys

Though not hiring at the moment, I will call our union and people department as well. For those qualified, this is a good gesture for a group of pilots who did attempt to stand up to outsourcing and make regionals livable places to work.

Agreed, class move Dan.
And maybe start a thread on your flying in the day- a lot of us don't know these companies and how they operated.

 

[maru657]

It seems like the Delta MEC should insist that all Comair pilots are hired. Aren't both groups ALPA and wasn't Comair owned by Delta? It will be interesting to hear what the ALPA MEC has to say regarding this.

 

[waveflyer]

I don't know about that- what about all the other delta connect pilots flying trying to get on with big D- it'd be nice if skywest, (all 3) and republic would help out the FOs and everyone help out the capts based on quals-
Just do your best where you are- going out of business is something we all can face and seniority means pilots can't just hop to the next company we're qualified for and be fine. it'll be tough enough even with help.

 

[Jim]

I'll go against the grain here...

There are a lot of furloughed airline pilots out there. To single Comair plots out for preferential treatment is unfair to those that have been on the street longer. If there is any preferential treatment, it should be for all furloughed pilots.

I'll also go so far as to say that furloughed major airline pilots should get preferential treatment at the major airlines over furloughed regional airline pilots.

I also think military pilots should get preferential treatment due to their service to our country and the sacrifices they have made.

And I think that anyone with an internal recommendation should get preferential treatment as they are a known quality by someone already at the airline.

So maybe what I'm really saying is that hiring should be based on qualifications, not preferential treatment.

And yes, having been furloughed twice, I have "walked a mile in their shoes".

 

[titans10]

I'll go against the grain here...

There are a lot of furloughed airline pilots out there. To single Comair plots out for preferential treatment is unfair to those that have been on the street longer. If there is any preferential treatment, it should be for all furloughed pilots.

I'll also go so far as to say that furloughed major airline pilots should get preferential treatment at the major airlines over furloughed regional airline pilots.

I also think military pilots should get preferential treatment due to their service to our country and the sacrifices they have made.

And I think that anyone with an internal recommendation should get preferential treatment as they are a known quality by someone already at the airline.

So maybe what I'm really saying is that hiring should be based on qualifications, not preferential treatment.

And yes, having been furloughed twice, I have "walked a mile in their shoes".

agree.

 

[waveflyer]

The difference is a furloughed major airline pilot still has a # somewhere-
But overall I agree with your post-

 

[CheapFlyer]

There are 1437 furloughed United pilots who are not getting preferential treatment. They do have a dibs at UAX carriers, but no respectable airline has given them preferential treatment.

 

[Mad Dog 80]

Right on 100%. I have been furloughed 3 times, living on unemployment for up to 6 months at a time. Let the best qualified pilot get the job.

 

[bluechunks]

For those qualified, this is a good gesture for a group of pilots who did attempt to stand up to outsourcing and make regionals livable places to work.

I propose that DAL give Comair pilots the same preferential treatment afforded to furloughed DAL pilots when the shoe was on the other foot and a flow back was suggested.

ps I'm not sure that I'd agree that the Comair guys stood up to outsourcing. Even if not by choice, they were the outsourcing.

 

[waveflyer]

I understand the notion in your first paragraph- and certainly not all comair pilots are qualified-
But here's the source of all my criticism towards delta, DALPA, and outsourcing-: the creation of and validation by pilots of a whipsaw market, designed to introduce artificial competition that subverts seniority that major airline pilots live by.
So when one of your whipsawed companies go out of business, in large part bc they got a good contract and had pilots with significant longevity- there is an increased responsibility on DALPA's part to right that wrong- esp for the average line pilot that had nothing to do with the comair MEC's decision that most thought was ludicrous.
most regional pilots want to move on to a major, and so most could see themselves furloughed-
But the flip side to the lifer's argument is that the whipsaw market DALPA had a hand in creating treated comair as second class citizen's.
This is not a chicken or egg debate. DALPA started it by allowing the morph from codeshare with independent airlines to multiple airlines under an overlord airline.