There's always hope for LOAs. But those hopes are pretty dim.

 

They should have greater and greater opportunity as the hiring continues to ramp up almost everywhere. We were hiring and losing before CVD19. Hiring and keeping some for half of 2020. Now back to losing more and more, but wait this contract will attract more than before if they are stagnant only to leave a year or 2 later. Same old record, same old song, same old skip. Enjoy it or don't enjoy it, Good Luck to All.

 

As long as we're better than regionals, the seats will get filled and the planes will still fly. A three or five year captain paired with someone coming to us with about a year in some RJ will be able to get the job done well enough, long enough to make the company run. Moreover the labor costs and benefits for having junior crews, most of whom aren't even fully vested in our benefits runs in the company's favor. This is why the efforts to drive people away from here have bothered me for years; it doesn't work. Those efforts also treated the pilots we were supposed to represent as commodities rather than customers.

Hindsight is 20/20 they say. Usually that's associated with calling someone a Monday-Morning Quarterback. The thing is hindsight also sees years of being told "Don't challenge our methods! We know what we're doing!". So now, as leaders attempt to shirk responsibility they're grasping for narratives. We're seeing "The pilots didn't sacrifice enough or stand with us!", but that ignores our leaders giving themselves raises or even joining management in the middle of investigations and negotiations. We're seeing "The company refused to negotiate". That ignores the delays we created after arbitration became unavoidable. Also our best strategist who claimed so much money couldn't come up with something to deal with "No."?

I'm sure I sound angry, but I'm really not. I'm saying credibility has long been a problem at 2750. Now's the time to admit leadership screwed it up and take stock of the real errors made. Should more have been delegated? Were too many decisions made by a single man without any check whatsoever? Were we too focused on internal power plays? Failure is common among great leadership teams, but those great leaders analyze and learn from those failures. That requires an honest admission of failure. That requires honesty. Dodging responsibility is for children. Children don't lead men and women.

Publicly admit fault now. Conduct an internal analysis. Publish findings. Be the men you pretend to be.

 

Are you sure it was union leadership driving people away or was it simply the free market of labor? I would've been top 15 on Atlas's list but I left making the assertion that by the time Atlas had a new contract that I'd be a CA at FedEx. I was off by about 6 months. So the decision was the correct one as by my calculations and my quality of life is much better living in base for Purple. I bet more than 1000 of us made that bet and will ultimately win. So was it a strategy by the union to drive us away or was it just in our best interest to leave? One friend from Atlas now here at FedEx is in CA upgrade class for the MD-11! I'm now gone from home maybe half of what I was. The union did educate us on what we were worth and looking at other contracts we made simple decisions about our careers.

 

There won’t be any LOAs. The company got 90+% of what they wanted. They have no incentive to agree to anything else.

Hiring will continue. People will continue to leave. There will never be a good level of experience in the operation in the bottom half of the seniority list because the turnover will be too high. Management will be fine with it.

We lost a 767 and 3 pilots. We almost caused the largest aviation disaster in history when our 747 full of pax almost collided with another 747 full of pax on approach. We almost lost a 747 in HKG..and possibly another in NRT. We had a 747 run off the side of a runway due to poor piloting technique. We bent a 767 full of pax on OE. These were fairly experienced crews…though obviously with some issues in some. We had a 777 with a 4 man crew(with maybe 8 years experience in company/aircraft when you add all 4 together) stall, or damn near stall(I never heard officially if they actually stalled or not) an airplane without anything wrong with it on departure at around 5k feet..

As experience levels continue to drop, both in new hires and upgrades, there will be more problems. We WILL lose another aircraft…it’s just a matter of when and where. Upgrade candidates are failing at alarming rates. New hires are failing at higher rates than ever before in my time here.

Atlas is going to be a wild ride for those that stay.

 

All the 74 examples you mentioned had a 20 year Captain on the helm.
FYI the majority of 3 and 4 digit PIC’s are a pain in the @ss to work with as you have to tippy-toe around all their pet peeves.

 

As our lead negotiator revealed today…”At the Miami Airport Marriott Conference room filled with about 300 instructors back around 2018 (I may be off by a year or so), John Dietrich answered a question asked about if he was concerned with attrition and the lack of a competitive contract. He said he was not. He said his plans were to make sure Atlas Air always remained a place that pilots go work at who were unable to ever get a job working anywhere else that was better. The room fell silent in shock.”

JD made a very similar statement this year in testimony before the arbitrator. Mission accomplished for our CEO.

Atlas got a pass on the first crash. If attrition doesn't shut the airline down, when the next crash happens the FAA may have to shut the doors. They certainly will if God forbid we lose an aircraft with 400 military onboard or we put one into a metropolitan area. Atlas has dodged so many crashes over the years they’re on borrowed time, and the staffing situation that’s going to develop is going to speed up the clock.

 

You also tell people not to work at Kalitta?
The Aviation Herald
Or any other random airline?
The Aviation Herald

 

I'm sure this has already been posted, but here are the new pay scales for those interested: https://www.airlinepilotcareers.com/atlas-southern.

 

To clarify, 757 Capt in base at MEM or Capt upgrade in 6 months, hub turn out and backs mostly with a few overnights correct? Definitely a seller or “Winning” as you mentioned and that’s good stuff for anyone wanting the stability of a great gig with those parameters. There are many who would enjoy your Purple gig and I wish them going forward the best. Just selling it for you specifically and you definitely had too much time remaining on your lifespan as best we know to stay here. Makes total sense. Please correct me if any assumptions are wrong.

*Good move on getting on with Purple before the Brown pool called. Well done Good Sir a great fit for you! I am being truthful, well done “P”.