What companies are bidding on midwest?

[labbats]

My brain has been elsewhere lately. Apologies all around.

Trying to juggle 18 things a day in real life and then debate something properly without spouting foolish things is something I'm incapable of.

 

[Propsync]

Apology accepted. Take care.

 

[fam62c]

Skyway Pay

The interesting thing is that Skyway actually has 50 seat pay rates in their contract and they are fairly low. If Midwest subcontracts their 50 seat flying they will probably end up with pilots who make more than the Skyway pilots would make to do the same job. Obviously pilot pay is just a small part of the overall cost of operating an airplane (I think we forget this sometimes) but It's still interesting; kind of a reversal from the "race to the bottom" mentality as far as pilot pay would be concerned. Skyway pilots may be one of the first groups to see expansion opportunities taken by a pilot group that gets paid more.

At one point Skyway had orders for EMB's and was ready to get the planes but 9-11 intervened and the orders were cancelled. Apparently Midwest doesn't want to spend the cash that would required up-front to start a 50 seat operation from scratch so they are looking at a subcontractor. Additionally, Midwest is not very confident in their decision making and, as always, frightened of risk so they leave themselves an "out" by using a subcontractor and not being tied into long-term aircraft leases. In the end, we'll see if a deal actally gets done. They sound pretty serious this time but at Midwest/Skyway talking about a deal is a lot different than actually doing it; this has been proven time and time again. Midwest/Skyway has never had a viable long-term fleet plan. Their fleet plannning has largely been a patchwork of poor, overly conservative moves that have resulted in a fleet mess at both carriers. I still wouldn't be surprised to see some sort of equity investment in Midwest by AWAC and/or AWAC buying/operating Skyway (after the 1900's are gone) as a condition to be a long-term Midwest partner. I still don't see the logic of Midwest continuing to operate Skyway as a tiny carrier if their small jet growth will be done by a subcontractor. With a small number of 328's Skyway must have a very high CASM.