Medflyer states:
"Even with proper manning, there's no way DL would be able to cover all that flying if 500 captains all retire simulataneously. It has nothing to do with forward thinking or manning, no company can afford to carry enough excess employees in the event of a freakish mass retirement. "
"If 50 doctors from your local hospital all retired at once, do you think the hospital could still cover it all without cancelling any appointments or surgeries?"
Unfortunately Medflyer, DAL Scheduling has been keeping all categories extremely short when it comes to manning. The only exception to this is the F/O B737 in ATL. There is currently a huge surplus -- but there will be a displacement probably in October.
The pilot training flow has been at a trickle pace due to cutting the Training Dept. practically by 50%. I believe the cuts in the Training Dept were deliberate so that the company can say to the arbitrator "we only have so many slots for training due to the capabilities of our Training Dept." And thus -- we can only bring back only so many furloughees (30 - 45 per month). But when we were hiring in 99 - 2001, we hired almost 120 per month.
Crew Scheduling knows that there will be a mass exodus of senior CPT's if bankruptcy looms large. Crew Scheduling continues to ignore the problem by not putting pilots in training for the inevitable.
Instead, DAL Management says there is a staffing problem, and we as pilots, decide to solve the companies problem through another side letter of agreement. We are once again, doing the work of others and getting no credit for it.
