Originally Posted by
cencal83406
I'm no regional lifer, and I can't speak for the lifers, but with my limited knowledge of airlines, outsourcing, and unions, we (the regional pilots) have zero power in deciding how much flying and what airframes we are given. That is completely up to Delta and the upper level managers at xyz regionals.
The only people who have actual power to affect change of this "outsourcing" trend are you guys.
I'm not your enemy. I don't want more flying. I may not have this job for the right reasons, but I don't want to stay here forever especially at the expense of a chance of sitting in a real Delta seat.
Lifers aren't your enemy. They are merely protecting their seats from lower bidders.
Stopping outsourcing has to start at the source. All we can do at a regional is preventing outsourcing of our contract flying.
Pinnacle's contract (the one theyve been under since 2000 and that you're still flying under) was signed to secure more and larger airplanes. They were flying 33 pink saabs at the time.
Many guys at pinnacle and other carriers were chomping at the bit there to get 70 seaters when I was there... which always prompted a stern lecture from me. There was always some giddy crew room rumor going around that NW pilots had given up scope and there was a 700 in the hangar in MEM or something to that effect.
The main issue with scope relief the past 10 years was bankruptcy. Mgmt had a gun to everyone's heads and it was complete chaos. Of course it all started many years ago, but management successfully snuck a bomb into the center of the dam. We're now trying to use our fingertips to plug that problem.
It's a complex problem with many parties at fault and everyone pointing fingers trying to place blame isn't going to fix anything. We do have to do everything possible to fix this mess.