Originally Posted by dckozak
Razor,
You can expect to fly mostly nights until you get some seniority, than expect the delemma of seat change vs seniority in current position. The INTL flying is both day and night, but since you will be on the other side of the world is it better to flying during the day, when back home is night or visa verca?? Either way fatigue will be a big part of any flying you do here (or any freight AL). Good luck and stay close to your Fedex buddies, they are your only real chance of getting "In" at Fedex.
I concur 100% with what Dennis has to say.
The night flying is not all that bad, if you figure out the ways to beat the circadian rhythm trap. A lot of caffeine helps <g> . .
When you are junior (in any seat) you are going to get the dregs (Peoria night Hub Turns to MEM). The up side is that I see advancement at places like FedEx to be more rapid than elsewhere. There is a list somewhere I recall seeing, that shows the retirement numbers for every year over about a 20 year span. There are a LOT of them, coupled with more routes and the business continuing to grow, you could expect to advance pretty rapidly to more senior flying in your seat.
Let me expand on “the dilemma” Dennis mentioned . . . of “do I stay . . or do I go”. You finally get senior enough in your seat to hold some REALLY nice trips (day-or otherwise) and they have a System Bid -for new airplanes, a domicile or just to “fill in” for replacements to retirement, etc.
Quandary, quandary, quandary! The MEM-living guys tend to “go for it” . . the seat/airplane upgrade (big pay raise) at the earliest possible moment their seniority allows them to hold the next bid. The “commuters” tend to stay in their seat a LOT longer than the guys junior to them would like.
Dennis and I know that from a personal perspective. I stayed senior in my seats, passing many upgrades and a LOT of wide body pay. . just to fly the kind of trips I liked a lot and because it provided the lifestyle I liked. This allowed people below me to fly a seat that I would have otherwise been occupying. There is a lot of that going on. If you want to live in Subic Bay, you could likely be very junior, flying the wide body.
It used to be that there were between 70-75% of us who commuted (Dennis can update that #) and that really tends to skew seniority quiet a bit, because of what I said above.
BTW . . congratulations! Dennis . .didn’t know you had upgraded. The last time I heard you had just given my old crew a check ride. . and gave them an “up” <g>