Originally Posted by rickair7777

I know there are specific operational performance requirements, and there might be financial items also.

The bigger issue with finances is the FAA...121 airlines must maintain adequate financial reserves or the Fed will pull their ticket. The reasons are obvious...a broke airline is not likley to do Mx correctly, and may take other operational shortcuts.

I suspect that mesa has aleady qualified for contrat termination on operational performance issues with UAL (and maybe Airways) based on the fact that other regionals had to cover their UAL flying last year. But it would be hard to fire any large regional right now...no one else can take on a sudden large amount of flying due to pilot shortages.