This is a thread about reality- no question about it. Many of you are facing hardships like never before and my hat goes off to you that have endured such a huge setback. I am flying for a major airline, currently on military leave now in a health care field and probably will not be returning to flying for another three years (assuming I even have a job to go back to). When I left for the military I was about one or two classes away from upgrading in the 320. Three years later, my classmates are middle- seniority 320/ 737 fo's and they keep inching backwards on the seniority list. Pairings are getting worse, pay is still at 2004 levels and there is no light at the end of the tunnel. Being removed from the industry for a couple of years, I never realized the big companies like Comair and AWAC (my former employer a decade ago) are furloughing. God, it must be bad!
Where are things going? I know in my new field business if falling off a cliff in the civilian sector- to the tune of 30 to 40% since December. I was talking to an opthamologist friend of mine in the Navy and he said his friends in the outside world are seeing a 50% drop in Lasik eye surgeries! Bottom line is anything elective, even cosmetic or quality of life improvement procedure are cliff diving. So I can see why the expensive regional jets are being parked because they were at the fringe of the economic business model- great to harness high RASM customers in the go-go 90's and housing bubble days of late. Now, they may be the white elephants of an economic model that is completely different than it was even one year ago. But the RJ business model itself is the canary in the coal mine- which is going to be a huge problem for the majors going forward. I believe there will definitely be a trickle-up effect on the bigger equipment because it isn't like the majors can survive without regional feed. Gone are the days where an airline would hardly miss local feed coming in on a Beech 99 from Altoona, PA. Now, we are talking huge passenger enplanements coming off 50 and 75 seat jets so the business model at every major (save LUV and AAI) is in trouble. Some of the marginal hubs which were maintained by a mix of RJ and mainline aircraft are now flowing red. I think the big players will probably be doing major cutbacks soon. They have to. So even though you guys have seen a lot of furloughs on the regional level I believe you will be seeing much more at the majors in the future. Hopefully I am wrong, but like another poster said this poor economy is affecting everyone. I see it in my field and I see it every time I walk into Home Depot, Cosco or pick up a real estate magazine. The question is how much more pain is still in front of us? Best wishes to all.