How feasible would it be for someone to live in London (assuming they had the legal right to do so) and fly for Atlas?

Was it once a base? Any chance of it coming back?

Thanks

 

I'm sure Atlas guys will chime in, but I seem to remember that the Stanstead base (using outsourced labor) was a whipsaw tool that the company lost when they signed the agreement with ALPA. What was that, about 1998?

 

Atlas uses a variant of home basing....its a bit more complicated that what we use at K4....but if you are creative I am sure its possible.... we have crew members living all over the world.....Australia, Thailand, Phillipines, Hong Kong, South Africa, several in Europe... not saying it would be easy..... but its probably doable realizing you are going to lose some days off to travel more often.

 

STN was a base till 2009. The short history lesson, AWW set up a front company there to fly BA contracts. BALPA put their foot down and required British pilots fly BA freight. AWW now leases planes to GSS to fly BA freight but no Atlas crew are involved and there is a less than zero chance STN would open up again as an Atlas base.

We do have pilots living in Europe and Asia. If you can hold trips that start with a DH to Europe it could work. But if your trip starts in the CONUS it will up to you to set foot here as the gateway travel only applies in the CONUS.

 

Dropped a Capt off today in Stanstead who lives there.

 

Thanks for the replies. My long term goals include returning to the UK, it sure would be nice to do so working for a company with the flexibility that I could live here or there.

I'm still a couple of years away from being remotely competitive, are they likely to ever consider Part 91/91k/135 guys? I desperately don't want to go to a regional, but would love to end up at Atlas. What is competitive right now? I'm at ~2500 total, 500 turbine.

Thanks again

 

If you are at all interested in Atlas...do yourself a favor, and read this thread,

http://www.airlinepilotforums.com/hi...ir-hiring.html

Warning...it is 300+ pages long, and 3,000 messages, in this thread...but, disregard this thread at your own peril.

To answer your question...yes, I did fly with several new hire FO's (when I was an FO last year on the 744) that came from an all-corporate, all-135, and all-91, background...

 

TW has most of it in his post, but ALPA did not get rid of the whipsaw crews. There were a "golden" few who took the deal and claim jumped for left seats and the foreign hires who took seats from Atlas guys. The base came under ALPA when the US guys who went there became "Purchase based (HQ in NY), foreign assigned" to get around the legal issues.

Economically the base was never viable. The majority of the flying originated on the continent, so crews were flown directly to their aircraft without touching STN. There were a bunch of other shenanigans by management not worth the space to elaborate right now.

The previous management (98') came up with the idea of STN because they figured that opening a base there as a way to bust the union. It would allow them to transfer all the flying over there and if U.S. crews wanted to go there to keep their jobs, they could, but without a union since they would be considered "extraterritorial" and outside the reach of the RLA. They (the ones who came up with the idea) are long gone.

The agreement that was finally reached provided the company to open foreign bases, provided they first offered the jobs to U.S. based union crews. If an insufficient number took the bid, they could then hire contract pilots, but they would have to be put on the seniority list JUNIOR to the Atlas pilots, meaning if there was a furlough, the new guys would go first, regardless.

The base and foreign hires didn't go away until after ALPA was decerted and the pilots went to the Teamsters Airline Division. The Airline Division Director and Jim Hoffa were the ones who convinced the company that they needed to close the base and bring the crews home.

 

Nice history lesson, ATC, for the uninitiated...Thanks.

But it should sound familiar to those that follow Union-busting tactics over the last couple of decades...

 

You would think so...