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SWA retirement number questions

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enigma

good ol boy
Joined
Nov 26, 2001
Posts
2,279
I just ran a search and couldn't find any current info. Someone posted a couple of months ago, that SWA was looking at about one hundred fourty retirements a year for the next five to seven years.

Is this an accurate number?

How many retirements in total for the next five years?

Just trying to figure out when the peak hiring will be, and whether or not to continue the quest. I don't want to get hired after the peak and find myself a fifty-five year old FO.

regards,
enigma

PS, I wouldn't mind retiring as a senior FO, but I want/need the Captain MONEY:D
 
southwest retirements are approx 150 in 06 and about the same for five years out then they steadily increase to approx 220 in 2022. Right now SWA retirements are just beginning to rise. However, growth is the best way to ensure a left seat position.
 
enigma said:
I don't want to get hired after the peak and find myself a fifty-five year old FO.

regards,
enigma

PS, I wouldn't mind retiring as a senior FO, but I want/need the Captain MONEY:D

IMHO, hedging your bets would be best. Get a job where being an older FO is not unacceptable. But definitely get a job where upgrade to Capt is not out of reach.

One could argue the best shot to Captain is Airtran and CAL right now. I guess JetBlue counts. UPS and FedEx look pretty promising too. SWA is a predictable but not quick path to Captain at this point, unless something changes. And something always seems to happen in this business.

.
 
FlyBoeingJets said:
SWA is a predictable but not quick path to Captain at this point, unless something changes. And something always seems to happen in this business.

.

What do you call a quick path to Captain? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I understand the newest Captains at Southwest have started their 6th year there. That's not so bad, IMHO.
 
FlyBoeingJets said:
IMHO, hedging your bets would be best. Get a job where being an older FO is not unacceptable. But definitely get a job where upgrade to Capt is not out of reach.

One could argue the best shot to Captain is Airtran and CAL right now. I guess JetBlue counts. UPS and FedEx look pretty promising too. SWA is a predictable but not quick path to Captain at this point, unless something changes. And something always seems to happen in this business.

.

What I meant to convey was that I am too old to take a job at a company where it'll take a long time to upgrade, and that I'll sit junior for a long time in either seat.

In my case, I'd walk away for the left seat of an A321 to go be a SWA FO. That is a swap that I'd make now, but might not make in a few more years. I am trying to decide how long to continue pursuing a job at SWA. History smiles on those who get hired early in a boom, but the late come-er's may sit reserve a long time. I'm fortunate enough to be able to actually attempt to calculate the percentages in make the decision. i.e., If I do nothing (Lord willing and the creek don't rise) I'll be all right. If I get hired at SWA in the next few years, I'll retire well. If I get hired at SWA, say, seven years from now, I would be hurting myself in comparison to my present situation. I'm trying to determing when the time that I can expect diminshing returns from SWA will occur, so that I can develop a plan. I can't go on hoping for a SWA call. At some point, I've got to accept that it wasn't meant to be and focus on other areas of life.

Thanks all,
enigma
 
[QUOTE='72Gremlin]What do you call a quick path to Captain? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I understand the newest Captains at Southwest have started their 6th year there. That's not so bad, IMHO.[/QUOTE]

Don't get me wrong. Personally, I think 6 years is great. Especially with the generous FO pay at SWA.

But you can be a Captain at Airtran or JetBlue in 3. You can also be a widebody FO at FedEx in 3. I think the projection with current fleet growth plans at FedEx is Capt in less than 5 years. UPS looks to be growing the fleet and I'm expecting their upgrade to Captain to beat 5 years too.


But all this growth, at SWA and elsewhere, is variable based on the economy, competitors and revenue projections.
 
I spoke with the Chief Pilot in charge of hiring at SWA a couple weeks ago. He said next year SWA will start hiring pilots due to attrition. I was told there are a large amount of retirements coming up. Apparently this will be the first time they have had to increase pilot hiring for this reason.
 
BMW said:
I spoke with the Chief Pilot in charge of hiring at SWA a couple weeks ago. He said next year SWA will start hiring pilots due to attrition. I was told there are a large amount of retirements coming up. Apparently this will be the first time they have had to increase pilot hiring for this reason.


Don't know exactly what the CP said but SWA hires every year for attrition. The exception was right after 9/11 when they decided not to furlough with the slowdown. I'm sure there were other times in SWA's history they did the same.

The numbers have been slowly rising and will be 140-150 per year for the next 5 years. It will go even higher after that. Pilots can only see this number at the union website which shows them the number of pilots retiring AHEAD of them every year until they reach retirement age.

Those with more seniority than me will see lower numbers. I'm just now getting so new hires will see higher numbers than I see.
 
One thing to keep in mind is the possibility of the age 60 rule being changed.
 
enigma said:
In my case, I'd walk away for the left seat of an A321 to go be a SWA FO.



Just curious- but do you have a strong preference to be at WN, or are you concerned about the future of the company at NK?
 

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