nwaredtail
Well-known member
- Joined
- Mar 5, 2005
- Posts
- 622
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nwaredtail said:NWA mailine ALPA has already offered to NWA mgmt to fly 70 seaters at basically Comair's rates and contract so I would not get too excited about getting any 70 seaters at Mesaba or Pinnacle. They would be crewed by furloughed NWA pilots. No flowup or flow thru at all. NWA has indicated that they are not in any hurry to buy 70 seaters because with the new lease payment, the DC-9 is close to the same operating cost and is paid for. In Chapter 11, who knows but RJS are not the answer and are definately part of the problem with the legacy carriers. PNCL and Mesaba would be hurting big time if NWA didnt pay for their fuel and gaurantee them a profit. Crap, I'll start a RJ operation if they will do that for me. Also, there is a 4-5 year wait for the e170 and 3-5 years for the crj-700, which I was told NWA doesn't care for.
My opinion is that they will order E-170-e190's and slowly replace the DC-9 and have a sliding, increasing payscale for the larger model. Mesaba and Pncl will just have to be happy with the growth that they have had. The junior pilots out number the senior ones now at NWA and there is no way they will vote to give away their narrowbody flying. It's like voting yes to furlough yourself
nwaredtail said:Yeah, you are right. They don't cost 30-40% more to operate on a seat mile basis and don't slow things down in the ATC system. NWA didn't lose 100 million plus last year on their RJ operation, UAL/DAL/USAir have all done much better since transferring so much flying to their RJ affiliates. Yep, you are right.
Rj's are not the cause of the problems, but they are a problem and will never be the solution.
Pilottodd2 said:Actually, I agree with redtail. I think the RJ's are NOT efficient utilization of the ATC, landing slot, and gate utilization. I think the EMB 190's are the next big 'thing' at airlines. We will see with jetBlue.
As for any 70-, 90-, or any other new type aircraft, I firmly believe they should all go to mainline, instead of us. From a pilot's point of view, that is why we all got started in this business anyways. To make it to the big-time. I would much rather give up my captain's seat and 200 out of 1200 senority to be a lowly FO at a major (with better work rules, and, hopefully, better pay), than stay at the regional level the rest of my life @ $60.00/hr and flying 90-seaters.
Unfortunately, new aircraft choices do not get decided by considering a pilot's point of view. Management wants the largest income with the lowest labor costs, and the public does not give a crap who is flying the airplane, as long as they get their $39 round trip.
To put it another way, if you were looking for some lumber to build a deck and you could save one penny per 2x4 at Lowes vs. Home depot, and you knew Home Depot employees had a slightly better pay and work rules, who would you go to? Lowes to save the penny per 2X4? Or Home Depot, which costs you more, to continue to provide their employees with better pay/work rules?
jehtplane said:Well if you are flying 90 seater's at 60 dollars an hour than yes I would probably go somewhere else to. But I do have some news for you , the major's are not all that anymore. Pensions are going away slowly, which was a main draw, pay is 20-50 percent lower than is was a couple of years ago. Again personal preference. If I am making 6 digits flying a 70 seat passenger jet, fine by me.
General Lee said:Even with a lack of pensions, the Majors will always be a better place to be than the regionals. There may be mergers in the future, and some more cost cutting, but thanks to the new benchmark---the Jetblue E190 rates---the regional pay will go down eventually too. Face it, how can those bean counters justify a higher rate for a 50 or 70 seat aircraft, when Jetblue currently offers 12 year payrates on 100 seaters far below yours. That won't float. And, you can't blame it on us---we didn't cause it. As our pay rates go down, yours will too--UNFORTUNATELY.
Bye Bye--General Lee