Originally Posted by CGfalconHerc

"Chickens coming home to roost".. "Anti-ALPA talk"..."poisoning the well with the next generation of mainline pilots"

You're kidding, right?

How about biting the hand that fed them for 15 yrs. How about.."the vast majority of these RJ pilots were hired with as little as 250 hrs and only 50 hrs of ME. They volunteered to fly brand new DC9 size jets at a substantially reduced pay rate in order to gain thousands of hours of ME turbine time and enjoy explosive growth." As the mainline carriers furloughed thousands of pilots after 9/11, these RJ pilots joined ALPA and negotiated contracts where RJ captains could earn as much 80-90k. For over a decade, these replacement pilots wore mainline uniforms and flew large jets in mainline livery so their mainline passengers wouldn't realize that they weren't being flown by mainline pilots. As the mainline carriers went thru BK, mergers, and mainline pilots stagnated..ALPA negotiated larger 76 seat CRJ-900 and new E175's with large first class cabins to be flown by RJ pilots as their 50 seat jets became uneconomical. DALPA was sued, and as a result the "meet and confer" scope provision along with flow-up and preferential interviews were forced upon mainline contracts to eliminate any conflict of interest with their regional members. Throughout this time, the "next generation of mainline pilots" we're logging thousands of hours of TPIC..making them ideal candidates for SWA, FDX, UPS, JBLU, NKS. Only now..after legacy retirements, post-merger profits and the 1500 hr ATP rule do RJ pilots see a shortage and realize that they don't have to undercut each other. They'll just flow-up or take all that time to the legacy of their choice. Only the ones with skeletons in their closet or lack of a 4yr degree will be left at a regional..which will most likely become absorbed by their respective mainline partner..and they'll move up to mainline anyway.

The RAH vote was encouraging because it demonstrated that they wouldn't undercut their fellow RJ pilots at Eagle. Just too bad our ALPA RJ brothers didn't refuse any ALPA negotiated contracts that gave them bigger, better, longer range, international flying at the expense of ALPA mainline pilots.


Once again..I have to offer another perspective.

I think ALPA has been very, very good for "the next generation of mainline pilots".