Originally Posted by
hummingbear
The 777 may be trending junior right now due to uncertainty w/ the P&W aircraft, the depressed Asian market & a resulting artificially high G-line. IOW, people who would normally be bidding onto the fleet as line holders are holding off presently to avoid reserve. (And especially, in many cases, to avoid COMMUTING to reserve.) Once all aircraft are back online & put into service, I’d expect a lot more of those hesitant bidders to start funneling in. It should be abundantly clear to everyone here that WB FO as a junior pilot is not the place to enjoy rapid seniority progression, but perhaps even more so presently. Conversely, if you’re new and want to fly the airplane (with full understanding of all the caveats), now would be a good time to slide into the seat.
As to the unfilled seats, I’ll give it a few more days before the snapshots start feeling very representative of the potential award, but my understanding of 8-C is that the company MAY offer unfilled bids to new hires, but is not under any obligation to do so. There will be plenty of EWR/SFO NB FO slots to fill new hire classes for the coming months, so I think all new hires can expect that as a strong possibility. (Though that’s to say nothing of what you may be able to do on the first vacancy that comes out once you’re already on property…)
Great post and reflective of how I’m feeling after a day or so of pondering the 777. I’m showing 60% after day 2 and I just don’t think I’m ready to give up seniority on the 756 for a whole lot of unknowns with that fleet for the next 6-12 months.
I would be very curious to know what crew resources plan will be if the 777 closes with 20-40 unfilled slots. Will it be offered to new hire classes or try again on the next vacancy for pilots like me that are still not sure if now is the time to give it a whirl. Either way I’m loving all the possibilities for everyone on this bid. I can’t believe how the landscape has changed here over 12 months.