Originally Posted by
senecacaptain
I hate to be doom and gloom but even with CARES extended into 2021, I am not sure what that will do. March 2021 is like 6 measely months.
At some point, passengers either come back, or they don't.
If the 2020 total for the year (Jan-March good, March-May crappy, May-Aug slightly better, Aug-Dec ???) is 50% of 2019, then that number is basically the pax count before 2003.
If 2020 is 75% of 2019 (which it won't be...) then we are at 2007.
How many pilots and airframes did the airlines have in 2007?
I am not a Phd economics from Harvard, but I don't see a bright future ahead anytime soon, barring a vaccine and resumption of confidence.
Oh, it will get worse before it gets better if you are a CFI looking for a regional. A number of scope agreements are tied to the previous year’s flying at the major, and those numbers are going to suck for next year. We will LOSE another few regionals because of that, and likely see additional furloughs at the surviving regionals as well just to stay within the downsized scope. That will be goid for Major furloughees who will be recalled that much quicker, but it means that until the Big Three rebound the regionals really can’t rebound, and probably with a year lag built in to that rebound.
Which means that once the surviving Regionals are able to recall BOTH waves of their own furloughed, there will still be a lot of ATP qualified guys with serious 121 experience at regionals who will be hired before the regionals go dipping into the ATP-eligible but no ATP or previous type rating pool again.
Unless the major pilots unions give relief from that block hour formula, that lag is inevitable, and I don’t see that happening while they still have pilots furloughed.
on the bright side, I expect domestic flying to be about 90% of 2019 levels by next summer, but international may well take longer.