Originally Posted by
rcfd13
You're over analyzing it. All that will matter in the long run is seniority. Your first year at a regional is going to suck no matter which way you analyze it and try to plan it.
Also consider this: I have a friend who was hired onto the CRJ the same month I was hired onto the Brasilia. Things slowed down a lot and they weren't running any transitions or upgrades. Everything was stagnant. My friend spent over 2 years on reserve on the CRJ in a junior base. I was a brasilia line holder for the majority of that time. Even on 2nd year pay I was actually making more money as a brasilia lineholder than he was on RJ reserve guarantee. I also had quite a bit more turbine time than him by the time he finally got a line.
Take the first class date you can. In five years you're not going to care anymore about the one year you spent as a brasilia FO, or the two years you spent on reserve. You're just going to care about how many more people are in front of you on the list before you can upgrade.
Passing up brasilia class dates waiting for an RJ class date because you're trying to predict the state of future seat locks just means you're letting more and more people upgrade ahead of you while you sit there trying to decide.
^^THIS^^ There is no way to guess when or how SKYW determines the need to hire for the EMB only or the CRJ only, or both. Seniority is EVERY. THING. Pretty short-sighted to pass up 100 spots on the list waiting and hoping that you get hired into the jet instead. Plus you might wait until Oct and still get the Bro, what are you going to do, turn it down? A month or two can determine whether or not you get a line or sit reserve for what feels like forever. I was hired at the front of a wave... 250 pilots after me in six months means I get to sit left seat in my home domicile while my friends are coming up on 7 years in the right seat.
Don't be afraid of a little turboprop... you might actually like it! You'll get paid the same hourly first year, the West Coast prop flying is still some of the most fun I've had here (Crescent City to Arcata at 6000' is soooo sweet. 250kts to the marker in LAX? Yeah, we can pull that off.) Movement on the jet is slllloooow now, and don't forget that the seat lock works both ways, as in you could get hired in the fall into the jet, and suffer watching the people hired in the year before you transition into your base and bump you down. And a huge number of those 7-year jet FO's who thought they were too good to fly the Bro when they were hired are now largely desperate to bid into it just to get a captain slot.
Also, any nonsense people try to tell you about majors not respecting TP time is just that: nonsense. The Bro guys who just left for UAL and got hired at DAL and SouthWest in the last hiring rounds will tell you that, too.