Originally Posted by ZapBrannigan

Flew with a Captain this week who, coincidentally, I had also flown with at another major pre-9/11 and we got to talking about this one unique and surprising characteristic of SW pilots. We both thought before coming to SW that the pilot group was largely cowboys and laid back good old boys. Neither of us was prepared for the significant military presence and influence.

But what surprised us most was how many of the prior military folks had a tough time letting go and assimilating into 121, instead preferring to join this ‘subculture’ and behave as if the airline were simply an extension of the unit from which they came. In rare cases even choosing to continue using their callsign.

There’s isn’t anything wrong with it, and they certainly should be proud of their service - but it IS somewhat peculiar how big this particular demographic is at the airline and how successful they have been at influencing everything from policy to nomenclature. It was not something that either of us had seen at any of the other airlines we’ve worked at.

Unfortunately it has bred a little bit of a civil war - devolving into name calling and, in the case of one particular domicile, stereotyping.

Personally I enjoy their stories and experiences as long as they’re able to talk about other things too... and they don’t roll their eyes too much when I try to regale them with my heroic tales of flying the 19 seat Jetstream between Altoona and Pittsburgh. [emoji6]

My one pet peeve from the prior military Captains is when they presume to try and school me on the airline industry, and in-particular, how ‘industry leading’ we are, when they really have no basis for comparison. It would be nice if they would listen with an open mind to pilots who spent the last two decades bouncing around to various airlines and had real world experience with other airline CBAs. There’s a lot to learn about airline history, especially when it begins to repeat itself... but sometimes that means you might have to listen to your FO, and not presume that the left seat makes you an expert.

But now I’m stereotyping Captains... [emoji6]


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