Regional airlines’ share of flights has grown : Home: The Buffalo News

Key Quotes:

Given that Continental’s name was on the fuselage of Flight 3407, the families of the crash’s victims say they can’t understand why Continental seems to be escaping scrutiny for its relationship with Colgan.

Mike Loftus, a former Continental pilot whose daughter, Madeline, died aboard that flight, said his daughter bought a Continental ticket assuming she would have the level of service she had come to expect from that airline.

Told that major carriers had refused to testify at last week’s Senate hearing on airline safety, Loftus said: “I think they’re trying to distance themselves from the crash.”


“In a regulatory world, everybody has to meet the same standards,” Rice said, “but in the practical world, some airlines do more than others.”


“I worry that, because of economics or whatever, we’re trying to do things on the cheap,” Sen. Mike Johanns, R-Neb., said of the regional airlines.


Rice, of the pilots union, complained that such outsourcing has now reached an entirely new level, where regionals are subcontracting with lower-cost regionals to cut costs even further.


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In my opinion, the more bad press against outsourced regionals, the better for pilots. Standards in both pay and safety need to be increased without a doubt.