Originally Posted by
jsled
For the long term, maybe it's not a bad thing. But looking at the press releases from earlier this year, UAL ordered 40 and then another 25 700s to be delivered starting mid to late 2017 to "reduce it's 50 seat fleet of RJs by more than half by 2019". So, what are they going to do to cut the RJs now? Buy the CS100? E2? Buy more used 737s/A319s? Keep the RJs? It certainly raises questions.
The only hope is the veiled reference in the release about continuing to work in the used aircraft market. Hopefully they have a line on some other used jets. In the actual presentation you see a reference to the number of aircraft that are unencumbered going from 250 aircraft now to 450 aircraft by 2020. The graph still shows the total aircraft planned for the fleet growing, but they emphasize that the number of unencumbered aircraft grows by even more giving them greater flexibility if they should need to downsize.
With that, I would assume that they are looking for any used plane they could get a hold of that doesn't come with a long term commitment.
If they have a line on some of those, then this could be ok. If they are just hoping to come across some, then this is of much greater concern.