Originally Posted by
MarkVI
I don't fly for ENY, but I do fly for a WO. All regionals have their challenges. ENY isn't the only one to make mistakes -- remember when CommuteAir missed the runway in Presque Isle?
The fact of the matter is that regional pilots fly longer days with more legs, into less controlled environments, often times under greater stress for statistical performance, on airframes with significantly older technology than mainline. A great example is the lack of in-flight weather. Mainline can access onboard wi-fi to access global weather products. All WO's are stuck using radar that couldn't heat up a bean burrito. Expand on that to the fact that, of the wholly owned' s, AA's largest singlet type is the 145 which isn't even equipped with a wifi product for the pilots to tap into.
Then we can discuss the consistently negative behavior of CP's at WO's. All of them are in it for the resume, because they got lazy flying the line, or because they're just not good pilots. Some of my CP's have been wrong, on the record, regarding airframe limitations, FOM procedures, MEL's, and HR and Corporate policies. But they sure will be quick to point out a lanyard that's not compliant, or socks that aren't black, or pants that aren't from an "approved" vendor.
So of course those poor guys were going to land in ORD. The risk of having to deal with Air Ops at a regional isn't the same as the risk at a mainline. There's no care, concern, or genuine leadership at almost any of the FFD carriers these days. Add to that their limited weather product availability, the fact that they probably didn't have gas to make them comfortable diverting (if I remember, I think the field was VMC at the time and at my company you'd have to go to court to get some extra gas on a VMC day).
TL;DR: All regionals have some safety issues. Almost all of them start and end at nonexistent leadership, poor culture, and a race to be "the best in the system, but only so far as on-time performance, because nobody cares about having the best place for our pilots." In some ways, this is no different than issues mainline carriers face. ENY pilots are just fine, and I've had the pleasure of jump seating on them a time or two. We might play like Navy vs. Army, but CNN's just looking to dog an airline now that people are flying again. This isn't a big issue. It would be a bigger issue if they had actually put the plane on that runway.
This is going to be an unpopular post but I came here to read what the people working at Envoy had to say about this Media presentation and came across the above post. For background, I flew Beech 1900's in the late 80's and early 90's with just VOR's NDB's and no autopilot and I believe the above statement to be true, IN THE UNITED STATES. Why is this in caps and why is it important? Because up until very recently ACMI pilots were flying second generation jets like B747-200's, DC10's and B727's into third world airports that are far more challenging and with on board equipment that was much less advanced than any RJ flying today. For the most part they quietly did it day in and day out safely. If you think your managements are bad look up the people that owned Evergreen, Rosenbaum, the original Southern Air Transport etc.. Even today many of the RJ's flying in the US have more advance avionics than the 747-400 which is still very popular with UPS, K4, Atlas and others. Many foreign pilots are operating the same aircraft you are today in places like India, Afghanistan and Africa successfully every day with working conditions that sometimes make slave galleys look like Carnival cruises. Why do I point all of this out? Stop using this as an excuse. Yes, the mainlines have bad pilots who make bone head moves, Yes, you work harder for less money than mainline pilots and many freight pilots. It's not an excuse. Up your game. Monitor the NFP or PIC and speak up when necessary. Sometimes you might need to shout if their head is up their a** and their ears are blocked. Just because your jobs are hard and CNN is a commentary presenter and not a news source doesn't mean that some of their points are wrong. A little introspection might be in order. Many will roll their eyes and flame away at this post. I understand. Nobody likes their part of the industry, company, co-workers or themselves embarrassed in the media but it's out there now. Maybe we all can learn something from it.