Originally Posted by
R0GER BALL
Some great thoughts on this thread.
I too think the 1000 hour 121 for upgrade may sink a regional or two this summer. Junior manning won’t work. People will quit. Perhaps it sinks the whole business model. Maybe Delta even absorbs it’s regional group to protect the hub & spoke.
Today’s pay for regional pilots is extreme compared to just a few years ago. Triple from 2010. The regional business model was built on paying pilots $15/hour and wanting them to leave. Well? Guess what. In truth you don’t need to pay FOs more. Pay captains like mainline year two FOs. $130ish. Logical.
The first company to try and junior man upgrade is probably the most vulnerable to lasting change. Will it be OO?
The ‘absorbs it’s regional group’ isn’t going to happen. The OVERWHELMING majority of hires at Delta are off the street. The candidate pool of ex military and OTHER THAN DELTA CONNECTION regional pilots is VASTLY bigger than Delta Connection and DALPA (who would have to buy in) feels no special affinity for Delta CONNECTION pilots. They would rather have the company buy 220s and for them to take the flying back, it’s been their goal since bankruptcy forced concessions.
And anyway, the numbers don’t work out. Endeavor is what? 2000 pilots? Even if everything worked optimally and there was no attrition at all to other carriers (and that ain’t going to happen) the maximum theoretical throughout is only about 500 pilots a year, averaging maybe 500 hours of flying per year with an immediate upgrade. You are STILL limited by the 1000 hour to upgrade rule and you are still going to have to have CAs stick around long enough to allow their replacements to get 1000 hours.
Delta CAN’T survive driving all the other candidates to their competitors while they can survive upgrading the 717s with A220s and absorbing the feed internally.