Originally Posted by albief15

chew on this....


you need to pay me more…..because i work longer hours and fly much more productive and rigorous schedules than those pax pilots…

you need to pay me more….because i work in a much less safe environment than those other pilots and am less insulated from the risks of fatigue and circadian issues… cargo pilots are working harder than pax pilots at night as we share the same airspace. As we fly over and around each other in the night skies, you can rest comfortably knowing all those ups pilots and other supplemental operators that are “used to working at night” will be stumbling working on that “second level of safety” that “is not cost effective to fix”. We will have to work even harder to keep our working space safe, and we will. But it will cost you.

you need to provide me better health care, vacation, and benefits…because i will not be as rested, nor will i have the protections afforded our pax brethren, and the toll on my health will be higher at my second level of safety. I am forced to work harder to make sure i am safe, rested and ready, and i will be. That will require a certain amount of time off and the guarantee i can take care of the my health needs—both mental and physical—because it is harder working at this second tier of safety.

you need to provide my family superior insurance and benefits…because i fly cargo that is not always screened (too costly) for security threats, and since we fly lithium batteries and other hazardous cargo routinely that has been proven to be deadly at times to aircraft, we understand that many times in our industry the bottom line trumps safety. it does not, however, trump the requirement to take care of our families. therefore we require industry leading insurance so we can fly knowing our families will be okay in the event of our demise burning up over the north pacific or halfway across the atlantic ocean.

so—yeah—i agree we are “different” is cargo. We work harder. We make more profit. We have a much more dangerous work environment. Therefore, our compensation going forward has absolutely, positively nothing to do with what else happens on the passenger side of the industry. Their pay, benefits, and concessionary contracts have zero to do with us. After all, we are “different”.

And that difference, my friends, makes all of us worth a lot more money…. So, keep your new work rules. But the industry better reach for their wallet, because they just demonstrated to us that this is all about the dollars, not safety. And we speak that language too…