This is what I have been wondering all along. The current "threat" to Spirit/Frontier/Allegiant/JetBlue is not just that there is attrition. The threat is how much capacity do you have to train folks and how is that capacity affected by attrition. At the regionals it is killing them right now because they have lost so many LCAs so the OE training capacity is down at a time that it is desperately needed. Now at the regionals that problem is somewhat masked (at some regionals) by the difficulty getting pilots in the door to fill their new hire needs. But at the LCCs the question becomes how well prepared were you for the extra attrition? Do you have the capacity necessary to keep up with 10 pilots in a month? what about 50 pilots in a month, what about 50 pilots a month for 6 or more months? Are you losing instructors from your training center at the same time? how does that effect your capacity? Are you losing LCAs.......

So I guess my question is, how many classes per month is Spirit running right now? How many in each class?? then take those numbers and compare them against attrition? With the coming and outgoing numbers in hand along with the answers to how much capacity you are losing within your training department, you can figure out whether you are in real trouble with staffing. Feb isn't the issue, it is Jun-Aug! Can the LCCs sustain the losses they are going to see with AA, DL, and UA all hiring 200+ pilots a month and Fedex, UPS, and WN hiring as well. My math shows the total hiring by those 6 at over 800/month for the forseeable future and those 800 are coming from regionals and LCCs primarily (Military just doesn't have the numbers they used to) The regionals are definitely suffering and I honestly think the operations for this summer for regionals are going to be a trainwreck. What the LCCs' summers will look like is entirely dependant on their ability to train at maximum volume.

Once a LCC gets behind the curve on this, they have zero chance of catching up by summer! So, if your airline isn't training at max capacity already your fate for 2022 is already written....

I don't know what Spirit's training capacity is and don't know how many per month they are hiring. (anybody who has insight on that, I would love to hear it) Spirit should have the advantage of a slightly larger training capacity based on size and future growth plans, but whether they are exercising that I don't know. I figure that every LCC is losing approximately the same percentage of new guys to the above listed 6, but that percentage means a bigger number of actual pilots, so if Spirit isn't exercising their extra training capacity already, then tough times are ahead for the summer.

The only horse I have in the Spirit race is the same all pilots have, and that is that this pilot shortage is providing leverage for improvements in our careers that we need to re-capture after they were lost post 9-11. People will return to the career in droves, when the career rewards - cost to get in balance begins to return to favoring the career rewards side again. Us using that leverage now to return the career opportunities will help cure the pilot shortage problem for the future