Potentially no California crew bases
 

Alaska Airlines Update:

Alaska Airlines is threatening to close its California crew bases after Supreme Court rules that Flight Attendants have a right to meal and rest breaks.

Source: https://rb.gy/orxbtv

So only the cabin crew get a meal break and not the front end? Last I heard the meal break was called the long sit or if one was really desperate the quick turn. Guess Scarf down a sandwich while programming the box is the new normal.

I hate to say it but this stuff is long overdue. Airlines want to treat crews like robots. Yes, you can push captain authority and delay things to eat but you can't play that card everyday.

Every major airline has a presence in California, and only one is threatening thousands of its employees with upending their lives.

Even if it's only posturing, it's sh*tty. It's par for the course. And I'm absolutely sick of it.

Maybe it’s part of the plan to reduce carbon emissions.

This law is ridiculous to begin with. So any flight out of California is supposed to land after 5 hours or whatever it is to give everyone a break? How would you do any flights heading over the Pacific, the law as it supposedly reads mean they have to be free to get off the plane.

https://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/FAQ_MealPeriods.html

FTA, here is the part of the law that Alaska Airlines doesn't want people to read:

This is not an issue of logistics. This is not an issue of CA crews no longer being able to fly long legs. This is not an issue of having to staff flights with additional crewmembers, or having to land mid-transcon to let the crew off, etc, etc. This is an issue of Alaska Airlines not wanting to incur the cost of having to pay a handful of people on a handful of flights on a handful of days one extra hour of pay.

It's truly in character for Alaska Airlines to not only be indignantly opposed to having to pay the cost of doing business, but to also obfuscate the truth and completely misrepresent the situation.

Read the Q&A, that is addressed in it. The intent is the 1 hr pay is supposed to be for exceptions to a missed break. Not for regularly (purposefully) scheduling of missing breaks. So that isn’t a solution for airlines.

But Alaska Care Lines

So what, you prefer the proposed solution?

So when it’s your break time as a pilot, a 3rd pilot comes into your seat, while you go back to a blocked off seat in 1st class to eat your re-heated leftovers you brought from home in the cooler next to all the Passengers?

Uh, no thanks…

Or…. It’s paid…. If you are required to stay on/not allowed to leave the premises, as a part of doing your job. There’s a reason Alaska is the ONLY airline in the press with Cali based flight crews, having a come apart about this, and it’s because what was said above…. Money. They don’t wanna pay the extra hour.

I'm not sure that Q&A speaks to intent.

You’re incorrect about your understanding of the law. Providing the extra hour of pay is not a workaround to bypass the requirements of the law. It is meant for the few situations where it is out of anyones’s control to provide the break at the specified time(i.e. weather delay, medical emergency, etc).

If you actually took the time to read the law, you’d see that simply arbitrarily providing the extra pay in lieu of the break would not be in compliance with the law still.

In fairness, it's bs that airlines are subject to state or local whims with regards to actual air ops. Ground employees yes. Crew, no.

​​​​​​It's generally understood that congress alone has the right to regulate Interstate commerce. The FARs and the RLA are federal laws. If every state could iset its own rules for flight crews, we'd have a giant mess. This is the kind of situation that commerce clause of the US Constitution is supposed to prevent. Right? That's what they taught us in aviation law 101. But, not so fast, turns out that there's more to this issue...

A quick Google search of US Commerce Clause shows that throughout our history there has been disagreement on how to interpret the commerce clause. Various Supreme Courts have at times expanded Congress's mandate while other Supreme Courts have sided with states rights an pulled back the power federal congress. It appears that the pendulum is swinging in the direction of states rights once again with this conservative congress. The airline industry was built on one interpretation of the commerce clause, but now it looks like everything has changed.

As organized labor, we need to look at how this court decision can advance our goals. For generations we've negotiatied under the RLA and were subject to FAR duty time limitations. Now, there's a new player in negotiations: state governments.

I believe this is correct. Look at the railroad and trucking systems and regulations. Same should hold true for the airlines.

Just because a state Supreme Court upholds it, doesn’t mean it’s fine under Federal law.

ETA: Alaska Airlines Cares, just not about you.

I think the only reason it went back to the state court and the supreme court didn't want it was that it needed the state to clarify the law better and how it will directly apply in this case. Maybe when it is clear then the supreme court can hear the case.

It was not a state Supreme Court that upheld it. It was the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. That's Federal Court, and the last step before the US Supreme Court.

Not picking on anybody here, I'm not a lawyer either. But, if you read the 9th Circuit's decision it talks about who has control here, federal or state. They provide reasoning for what they found citing precedent. Read it, its interesting.

Obviously the expectation in the industry is for the FAA to be exempt from this and provide in their own regulations. The 9th Circuit felt differently. The SCOTUS felt it was a state problem and declined to hear the case.

To me, that means there is likely a legislative solution that Sacramento can pull together should enough pressure ($$$) be applied.

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You think this is a "conservative congress"?

Standby to be surprised what a "conservative congress" really looks like after November.

The constitution clearly defines the role of the Fed government. Besides common defense, regulating interstate commerce is one of the few things its supposed to do.

Congress actually likes to abdicate it's job as much as possible and instead rely on "executive orders" or supreme court codifying policies that apply to all states.

Mandating rest breaks for aircrew members sure seems like regulating interstate commerce to me, but I'm not a supreme court judge or an FAA administrator.

We already have some differences in the way employees of different bases are taxed and use sick leave for example, but those differences from state to state apply just to the taxation and benefits of employees and not the actual working condition.

Did the federal court uphold it or didn't they just send it back to the state court for clarification?

9th circuit upheld a majority of the lower courts decision and tossed out a few things including but not limited to plantiff attorney fees and some penalties to be paid to the plaintiff from Virgin (AK).

Alaska's legal team appealed that, and SCOTUS elected to not take the case. So it's actually settled law. I'm sure there will be filings and motions around the edges, but from what I understand. It's done. If the Supreme Court does not take a case that's made it all the way up to them... it's over.

It's worth knowing too that when they appealed the case to SCOTUS, numerous states filed motions (I know there is a more accurate term for this but again, not a lawyer) to go along with the appeal to try to argue for or against SCOTUS taking the case. Also, the US Solicitor General filed brief/motion/whatever in kind.

There is a lot behind this.

Aside from that, I would not be surprised if a legislative solution cannot be found. The Robert's court seemed to like throwing things back to the states these days.

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I don't prefer this solution but I think it's absurd that narrowbody crews can be expected to work 6-8 hours straight without a break. Do truck drivers or train engineers do that? Perhaps this case will force the FAA to address the issue.

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Yes, truck drivers indeed work for 6-8 hours straight. Was that supposed to be a joke?

Then what would be your proposed solution, divert somewhere and land? I’ve blocked more than 6hrs with winds to Hawaii, what are you going to do then. It’ll be a cold day in hell before I go back and take a break in the main cabin and have to sit next to Bob, Mr. now it all in aviation, while he barrages me with questions while I try and eat my crew meal…

What exactly are you doing in cruise, that you can’t eat or think about anything else, that you could on your “break”, especially on a ETOPS flight with ACARS…?

Look you got into this profession, which is to fly an aircraft from point A to point B. We are a pathetic bunch if we now need augmented crews and rest bunks in narrow body aircraft.

FA's can take plenty of breaks.

Pilots are on "break" for the vast majority of cruise on 2+ hour flight. They just need to be available in case of emergencies which are quite rare. You can ask the other guy to take the radios while you eat (or study the panel, if necessary).

If airline managements have to augment pilot crews on transcons, you get one guess who's slice of the pie it's coming out of... hint: it's not management's slice.

*Psst... your Alaska pilot defeatism is showing.*

Tell me you've never worked a job outside of sitting in an air conditioned flight deck without telling me you've never worked outside an air conditioned flight deck.

Haha...

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Please stay out of my Flight Deck! Why exactly are you a Pilot? Go back to your first Career. Geez, I can’t believe we have to deal with ……… like you.

Get real. Just because It's bad for the company doesn't mean it's good for pilots.

Sir this is a cockpit not a flight deck

I'm just tired of legacy guys thinking everything is an automatic loss for the pilots. Y'all treat it like a foregone conclusion and you make it self-fulfilling.
There is nothing about this ruling that is the pilots' fault, nor should we be expected to pay a price for it. If we do, then we enabled management to do so.

I’m sure there’s a happy median. Do I want to do quick turns and rush all day while I wait to eat my meal in the air? Not particularly. I also understand operationally it doesn’t make sense to require breaks or delay flights because we need 30 mins to scarf down our food. I think it’s widely accepted we leave that for once we’re leveled in cruise. Is that a negative thing that we’ve accepted into our normal work culture? Yeah it probably is. Am I smart enough to figure out a solution to fix it while not completely derailing flights and smooth (relative term) operations? Not at all.

The flight deck is where the catapults and arresting gear are!

No. It’s a ruling that shouldn’t apply to airline crews that are flying airplanes. By definition a work place you can’t vacate once airborne.

I don’t see anything positive coming out of this for us.

No I think it's a ridiculous unintended consequence that's bad for everybody and the law should be changed by Sac, or overruled by congress.

Reality: The highest cost for airlines is pilots or fuel, depending on the price of oil. If you increase their biggest or second biggest cost by 50% to allow IRO's for lunch breaks, something is going to have to give. If nothing else that would limit future opportunities for contractual gains.

Actually as the law is currently written, you'd need to land the plane and get everybody off for 30 mins on any transcon+ leg. Not even sure how you do that over water. Pontoons? Maybe have a cruise liner pre-positioned so after you land on floats people can get off? The USAF is actually working on that believe it or not.

We don't have any say in which bases they maintain, or at what level. The legacies can't close their Pacific-gateway CA bases, but I wouldn't absolutely put it past AS to actually do that. I suspect there's a real potential for base staff reductions, if for some reason this law doesn't get fixed.

If the law is a ridiculous as you say, then why is ALASKA the only airline making threats about it?

Here's where your years of conditioning shows. You expect it to impact the employees. You even support it.

Your political biases mixed with Alaska indoctrination have actually made you anti-lunch break. It's impressive.

Rather than work to find a legitimate way to comply with the law, you're on your soapbox telling everyone that the most reasonable course of action in your mind is base closure. Not additional crews. Not schedule adjustments. Base closures.

Your tacit acceptance of abuse is the only thing that's notable here.

Alaska indoctrination? I think he works for united

A United pilot would understand that there are costs to running an airline. A United pilot would understand that those costs shouldn't come out of the pilot's share.

An Alaska pilot would toe the company line and expect any sort of expenses to be a deterrence to "growth" or cost pilots money in their "next" contract. Even though Alaska is back to industry-leading profit margins.

Rickair is undoubtedly an Alaska Air pilot.

Alaska error group has always played their work groups against one another. They find it particularly amusing that they can play one workgroup against itself: pilots. having been at QX in 2016 I can tell you they cranked the fear factor to 11 and basically told us "Eat the costs or else" when they wanted us to take pay cuts to get more aircraft. It's a classic stockholm syndrome diagnosis.

Uh…Rick is Delta.


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