Originally Posted by
ZapBrannigan
Agreed. That's the trap ALPA fell into in the late 90s. "We're too good to fly RJs" or "My squadron bro shouldn't have to come here and fly RJs" led to a decade of parking narrowbodies and outsourcing.
I also disagree that a smaller gauge airplane will somehow lead to the downfall of the airline. On the contrary it can allow us to bring back frequency to markets we have allowed to languish because we needed the metal elsewhere. For example, a morning and evening 737 between Dallas and Tulsa with 2 or 3 smaller airplanes throughout the day between. You can't get business travelers without frequency.
Secondly, it can allow the company to enter into markets that can't support a 737, but could still feed customers into the network - something you'll need if you want to fill up the handful of eventual widebodies that some of you are salivating over.
But again, that's a business decision for the company to make. Our singular concern is that WHATEVER metal they decide to bring on property, it's flown by SWAPA pilots. Full stop.
As I said, some people are so emotionally charged about the word "scope" that they can't even see that none of us are advocating for giving up scope lol. We are simply saying that when another type arrives, if it ever does, it will probably need to fly at different rates than our standard 737 ones. The same thing will need to happen if we go bigger, but I bet the conversation will be much less charged since it will be the senior guys getting paid more.