Originally Posted by
MatchPoint
I disagree with your forcast, today is a completely different day and age. Those at SkyWest who are 10 years in the right seat are there by choice and the next 5 years will look nothing like the last so basing your opinion upon the last 5 is seriously flawed. Mark my words, RJ upgrades come 2015 will be less than 3 years and EMB with be less than 1.5 years..... and falling.
But as far the 4.5 year guy at 9E/XJ, stay put! Mainline’s about to start hiring and you’ll be just fine.
Help me with the math on this one. Junior RJ captains have seniority number around 1700 out of 3200 on the list. So a newhire is roughly 1500 numbers away from RJ captain if we stay the same size. They'd need that much attrition in 36 months to hold the junior seat. We've been losing about 5 captains a month over the last year. (And thats why the upgrades have been at a near standtill all year long) 2/3rds of our attrition is on the FO side and a good part of those are the ones not making it out of training. I do agree that attrition will double or even triple in a year or two, but we'd need to have 40+ a month leaving as of today vs. the 15 or so that it's been to get a newhire 1500 numbers up the list. ( Junior EMB captain is around 2100 or 1100#s away for newhire)
Another thing to consider is that we have nearly 600 FOs that could have held captain based on their seniority but didn't bid for it in the past. With future hiring looking brighter, they may decide to give up the good FO schedule for the PIC time in order to move on. That will change the dynamics as well.
If we add airframes it helps. If we get rid of the EMBs like the company alludes to in the financial reports or park 200s as per the current Delta contract it'll hurt. Someone more familiar with it will have to chime in, but I remember hearing years ago that the 200s start getting parked at a rate of 10-15 per year starting in the not too distant future. As in we only operate 700/900s for Delta past 2017 or so.
As far as the 10 year remark, I'm including his time that he already has. I'm based out west and mostly fly with he more senior FOs (the junior ones based here have 4+ years), but it makes me nearly sick to fly with someone thats been here 5-8 years in the right seat (which sucks on its own) and have them tell me that they also spent a number of years flying for another regional as well. I think I'm making peanuts on 13 year captain pay, but to know that they have nearly a decade in the industry and might make $50K if they work a bunch -
