Originally Posted by
Excargodog
Au contraire. There is less flying going on right now then there has been for decades. If you aren’t going to take scope back now, WHEN EVER WOULD YOU? Certainly not when the mainline DOESN’T have the capacity to do it.
Besides, some contracts limit scope to a certain percentage of the major narrow body or total flight hours. That scope will decrease automatically. And while I agree that companies can declare bankruptcy pretty much at will (Republic was still profitable the last time they did it to shed their 50 seater contracts) that’s not a good reason to NOT go after reduced scope now. That situation ALWAYS prevails, if management wants to do it. Nor am I against compelling legacies to bring all the flying in house with a B-scale for what are now regional jets for those legacies that actually require small jets feeding their hubs to be profitable.
But again I ask you, if not now, when?
The rolling 12 months is about to hit and hit hard right when recovery is happening and the majors “need” the regional feed. Are they thinking about this? Are the planning for it? What will that impact be like - or will they get to take a pass on regional fleet reductions?