Originally Posted by
CincoDeMayo
Pilots don’t complain about it because most of us understand we would do the same thing, most of us here still value QOL over other items
But just to show what you’re saying isn’t 100% correct
Right now DFW CA has 4 trips total in DOT for April. It was cleaned out in DOT by people who were displaced, picking up in DFW. Meanwhile IAH has about 60 trips in DOT for April, from all the drops in order to rebuild in DFW.
So how do you think premium flying looks for DFW when there are only 4 trips to be covered and reserve pilots standing by to cover these trips? Lots of premium for IAH, no doubt, too many trips to cover with reserve without having to go to premium
But stop with the “plenty of trips to go around, plenty of premium to go around”. There are 4 trips, in a base of 140
CAs, for the entire month that hasn’t started.
And seniority in the company isn’t base seniority. To say “senior guys still make out in IOT” isn’t the entire truth. You can be senior enough to not have been displaced and held ORD, DFW or DTW, but that sure as hell doesn’t make you senior to “make out in IOT”. You’re still junior in base. You’re just senior enough to not lose your base.
Plenty of trips and premium to go around in the company with the exception of DFW and maybe ORD? That’s certainly not the case for Florida based pilots and probably Vegas (not sure what the CA side looks like over there).
Here’s another picture to paint to illustrate how awesome having that flexibility is. Pilot A is based in ABC, but was awarded Base XYZ cuz that’s where Pilot A is lives out of. Pilot A drops trips in ABC and picks up where the pilot lives.
If the grid is red and you can’t drop, another option is to pick up trips that are front end and back end commutable and live overnights in the base the pilot lives, out of.
Of course, I’m not speaking in absolutes as both perspectives comes with pro and cons. I believe picking up out of base benefits the pilot group more as a whole than if we couldn’t pick up out of base.