I talked to the chief pilot, here is a summary!
Q. "how true are these rumors?"
A. "it is definetly something we are looking at...." At this point it is more about logistics.... this is a country that basically had a military/goverment run airline and they don't know anything about running an airline. The greater emphasis right now is on things like schedulers, admin, maintenance, etc.
Pilots, if any.... will come later. the 10-10-2010 date is still a goal but doesn't reflect our involvement date.
Who would go? "we would send people that we think would do well and positively represent the company"
Should I have taken that as a slight? I don't know, maybe I'm being sensitive.
In the spirit of not speculating or adding B.S. comments; here is what I learned when being recruited by foriegn carriers in asia (japan and china) in the past.
the pay was usually around $80k to 90k a year. They also paid a generous per diem basically 24 hours a day for the whole time you weren't on vacation. they provided housing and a transportation allowance (think taxi or train from housing to airport) and also provided two round trips back to the world.
The chief pilot I spoke to said that they didn't know how the pay would be worked out but suggested that the pay in Asia was considerably lower and I think (don't quote me on this) he mentioned like 30 to 40 grand.
CAUTION! YOU'RE ABOUT TO ENTER THE OPINION ZONE!
the idea that they are going to get EXPERIENCED pilots to go over there for 30 60 or 90 day rotation for anything other than existing pay represents a grave niavity on managements part.
As for all of you who commented on the difficulties and the problems of logistics; Not true, really. the logistics of this is suprisingly easy. Here's what I looked up.
According to the U.S. State dept web site and a link to Vietnam immigragtion, They only have one type of visa. i.e. no work visa vs. tour vs. student visa etc.
they are very affordable (less than 100 bucks) and you can get a 90 day multi entrance visa by simply filling out one form. Housing is cheap and transportation is nothing but a positive space ticket away.
At first, I was excited about this at first.... who doesn't love a LBFM? But I have to admit a bit of skeptisim now. We'll see.
Finally, in answer to the question posted by a furlough guy. I'm not taking a jab here but From the conversation I had with the CP and CEO, they are not sending from the bottom, but rather hand picked. The only way this is going to have a direct impact on the furloughed crowd is if this simply creates more work for the whole company and they get called back into their previously role.
Stick