With 20 a month attrition and a gradual drawdown, probably not. In fact, the attrition will probably even go up as more people put out more apps and our captains get sympathy recommendations and interviews from Compass alums and ALPA brethren.

The big problem will be captains. We were already headed toward a captain shortage because of the six month hiring freeze from two years ago. As the senior captains move on, we were going to be short even before this. That meant - for guys like me with just a couple months short of upgrade hours - we would have been upgrading into an environment of short reserve times and prompt lineholding IN BASE.

But if my base is going away and I have to either move or commute to someplace like ORD or IAH anyway, there are at least three regionals that would give me $45-50k in signing bonuses (and in two out of three of those cases an additional type rating) to fly as a DEC for them. Alternatively, I could bid LAX, I suppose, which MIGHT (or might not) get me more TPIC sooner. Career wise, that may be a push. A lot of senior FOs May opt for the money and then Compass will be looking at hiring DECs (and paying DEC bonuses to do it) too.

The point is, this isn’t the regionals of a decade ago. Senior people have pretty decent options. Even senior FOs (which around here is anyone approaching 18 months) have pretty decent options, and junior people have relatively little invested in terms of seniority and are very hireable elsewhere.

Management better provide certainty quick, and let people start making long term decisions. Otherwise the workforce may quickly evaporate on them.