When would majors hire again?

[Launchpad]

Actually 330 on bypass.

 

[jonjuan]

Actually 330 on bypass.

He meant roughly 150 on bypass who would be accepting recall.

 

[RightTraffic]

18 years from solo to a job? Yikes!

lol...my thoughts exactly.

 

[Launchpad]

oh I see. That's the question of the day, how many will come back.

 

[filejw]

In the year 2525
if man were still alive
if woman can survive

 

[Cruncher]

SWA is overmanned anywhere between 200 - 500 pilots (depending on what metric you use: contractual minimums vs. historic monthly averages). Our schedules have taken a beating these last 11 months. We have about 20 guys who took the Freedom 09 that will retire in the first half of 2010 woo hoo!

2010 is predicted to be flat wrt to growth. We expect the summer schedules to increase up a bit, I hear averages will be back above contractual minimums systemwide (but we'll see). We are opening Panama City North Florida Beaches Airport (?) in a few months and there is a rumor floating around with adding 4 total cities in '10. However, that is an unsubstantiated rumor (GK latest message mentioned only the N FL city).

We have about 25 aircraft sitting somewhere (535 total aircraft running a 511 plane schedule). We are installing "Row 44" 2nd qtr '10; installing 15/month initially surging to 25/month to retrofit all aircraft by early '12 (so that could "utilize" these spare aircraft).

We are getting 10 aircraft from Boeing this year, but as of today, these aircraft are going to replace older ones / expiring leases. GK says we don't have to retire these aircraft, so we could flying a 545 aircraft schedule by Dec '10.

Our break-even load factor is at a historically high level, almost to an unbelievable level I might add! We are writing off 250 large from our fuel collars we sold off in '08. My #s could be a little off, but those write downs should end in 2011 (with 2012 the 1st year without the burden). (For those who have not followed, we sold off fuel collars that had a real lost of $1 billion in '08, writing off $250 million per year for 4 years).

Opening new cities is very expensive, with a certain period of time before the city becomes profitable. Adding to our schedule, WITH a corresponding reduction in LF will result in red quarters (with the special charges I mentioned above)! Given these two aspects of our current state (in very rudimentary terms) GK's team is moving very cautiously.

MSP, MKE, LGA, and BOS have done fantastic (at least according to GK). We have the capability to really grow these airports in 2010 (if Gk sees the need). DEN is our fastest growing market, and will have over a 140 flights / day by August '10!

With all that being said, SWA has the capability to surge 10% almost overnight (with our overmanning, underutilized aircraft and our sitting aircraft) and not grow our seniority list one member.

IMHO, if first half '10 shows signs of steady growth we probably won't add anyone until late 2010 or early 2011 at the earliest (I hope I am wrong-on the conservative side). If 2010 is flat / another economic dip it could be late 2011 (or later) before we hire again. However, when we do hire, considering all the city growth we've had and projected, we will probably be in the 300 - 600 / year hiring boom (my guess is 2011/12 before we see this, and not really picking up until 2013 - age 65 but I won't open that can). But the farther one looks out, the cloudier it becomes.

For those in the pool, keep your head up, hope your on the Master Pilot Seniority List before long!

PS gotta run, this is by no means a complete analysis, for example, we down graded a bunch of Captains just recently.