DSflyer05

does this mean they will start hiring sooner than expected?

767pilot

Isn't it interesting that while cabotage protects the career of the passenger pilot, it gets in the way of the freight pilots career. Would open cabotage rules really be bad for us? I think probably not.

⌐ AV8OR WANNABE

I'm confused, what do you mean by that? Also, I'll admit my ignorance here - where did the term cabotage come from?

767pilot

Not sure where the word came from, I think that it is latin for "eating cabbage".

What I mean is that the cabotage rules protect the passenger pilot from having an airline such as British Airways or Lufthansa come in and cherry pick local traffic route such as New York or Chicago to Los Angeles or Miami for example. It also stops Ryan Air, Malev, Air Yugoslovia, or any other low cost carrier from coming over and setting up shop with tehir low wage rate structures.

Passengers are also protected from the high quality of service that many of the international carriers provide and forced to endure trips on the US carriers slave ship, but that is another story <G>

It isn't very likely that one of those carriers would pose such a threat to the package industry where the infrastructure costs are so high, nor does a package care about the quality of its' service during the flight.

In the meantime, we are shut out from flying dozens of routes that we know of in Europe, many future routes through China, and who knows what else in the rest of the world.

Does that help any?

⌐ AV8OR WANNABE

Now I see what you meant but unless I got it all backwards I think it's the other way around. The first round of "Open Sky" agreement opened up the competition to the pax carriers mainly and not so much to cargo carriers. When it comes to cargo carriers it’s the ability to deliver packages in a specific market, access to sorting hubs, delivery trucks, cars, etc… (aka billions of dollars in investments) that matters and not simply bringing passengers from one country to another.

The second round of Open Sky which is being negotiated right now might not happen for many years as the US does not want to change the ownership rules. Right now a foreign airline can only buy up to 25% of a US airline’s voting rights. The Europeans want to be able to buy up to 49% of the voting shares in a US airline, something US airlines can already do with an EU airline.

The way I understand the round 1 Open Sky agreement is that a US airline, let's say American, can buy up to 49% of British Airways’ voting shares. However, British Airways can only buy up to 25% American voting shares. Clear as mud?

EU regulators caved in on this and some other things when they agreed to phase 1 Open Sky agreement but have said numerous times that IF the US won't change the ownership rules in the next few years, they will change the reciprocal agreement and will only allow a US airline to buy up to 25% and not 49% of an EU airline.

Of course, right now with the money crunch, but most of all because of the weak dollar we won't be seeing US airlines buying up any European airlines anyways.

Also, an American airline can fly from any city in the US to any city within the EU then continue to any other city within the EU (as long as it’s another EU country – an easy feat as the distances are pretty small in Europe anyways). For example, New York – Paris – Brussels – Amsterdam – New York would be ok whereas New York – Paris – Marseilles - New York would not be. On the other hand, an EU airline can fly from any city in the EU to any city in the US and then can continue to a third country but cannot fly to another city inside the US. So Paris - New York – Mexico - Paris would be ok whereas Paris - New York – Atlanta - Paris would not be ok. I hope I’m correct on this but that’s how my buddy at Ryan Air in Europe explained it to me.

My point is that the phase 1 is far more harmful to the pax pilots than to the cargo pilots. Had we been in a situation where all US airlines were flush with money, oil was cheap and the dollar was strong, the phase 1 would have benefited the US airlines (and all US crews) more than the European airlines.
However, we signed this agreement in the worst time for the US, when the economy is contracting, airlines are bleeding and the dollar is falling.

It’s a bonanza for European airlines and Lufthansa’s purchase of a 19% share in JetBlue is only the beginning. European airlines will buy up shares in other US airlines because right now the US market is basically a flea market to them.

Having said that, the open market doesn’t do much for the cargo industry as a whole because it’s not the lift but the ability to deliver the goods that matters. Case in point, DHL is a powerhouse in Europe and all over the world. However, even the strong euro can not help them in the US as their sorting and delivery business simply cannot keep up with Fedex and UPS.

I personally believe that very shortly DHL will sign an agreement with Fedex to let them deliver a large portion of DHL shipments which of course would be a great deal for all Fedex pilots. I do not fear the Open Sky agreement as much as I fear a further erosion of the US dollar and continuously high oil prices…

Here's a good Forbes article...

http://www.forbes.com/business/2007/...327oxford.html

767pilot

I don't think that is the case, we got the same out of it that they did, the right to originate flights in a country and then fly on to another. Still not cabotage. In our case, UPS made sure that the system was reworked so that any gain we got would turn into a cabotage flight for a net result of zero

As for ownership, I am not sure who wants what in that one. I'm pretty sure that UAL would be happy to sell 100% of their stock to Lufthansa and perhaps LH would be happy to buy it. There is a lot to say about sovereignty too. Suppose Air France had owned Delta. Would they have been flying many craf troop charters to the Iraq war?

I think that your Ryan Air friend is correct in his analysis too. They could probably do that flight as long as they didn't put paying passengers on in New York for ATL though. It's all above my pay grade!

⌐ AV8OR WANNABE

From the article above:
"Under the agreement, U.S. and EU airlines will be able to operate to and from any airport. While U.S. carriers will be able to fly within Europe and to other destinations beyond, EU airlines usually will have to begin and end flights at a single destination. Ownership of U.S. airlines will remain restricted."

I think we (US airlines) got a much better deal than the Europeans did.

767pilot

by "we" I meant that I don't think that the freight pilots did any better or worse than the passenger pilots, which I thought was your original premise.

⌐ AV8OR WANNABE

I see, well I thought the original agreement focused on pax flying primarily but I cannot find any supporting information to that so maybe you are right. However, I still believe that open sky is not as "bad" for cargo pilots as it is for pax pilots because of the huge investment that sorting & delivery would cost the European airlines.

767pilot

and that was my original point. I don't think we have as much to fear from it as the passenger pilots do. While they might be hurt, it would help us.