Originally Posted by
flybynuts
Sad for sure. No growth planned for the next four years so we can "be better positioned and handle the merger" nonsense is weak. I am hoping that the Wall Street and industry pressures force us to have to grow because our headshed has to prove that they aren't as weak as perceived by many.
Even if they tried to grow at this point, they're so far behind on building a training pipeline, it will take at least until the end of 2014 before pilot staffing levels are healthy enough to grow. I did notice that, in the latest United Investor Update (24 Oct), they anticipate 4Q2013 mainline capacity to grow by 2.3-3.3%. For Q4, they anticipate regional capacity to grow 3.9-49%.
Good luck with that regional growth working out; I just read that even the great SkyWest wasn't able to fill their latest newhire class; it was short by 9 people. I am hoping that we see a trend reversal from the last decade - regional contraction with their flying being replaced by mainline flying. ... if there's a pilot shortage on the regional level, they could cancel two RJ flights, replace them with one mainline flight and not lose any ASMs on the city pair.