Hedley

Considering that everyone is having trouble staffing their contracted flying, what is the solution? Continue to spread things thin over multiple companies, or consolidate into fewer large regionals? If the current market conditions continue, the retirement of the 50 seat aircraft will probably be accelerated due to staffing issues, but that still leaves the issue of who operates what is left. Definitely crazy times. Regionals can’t hire and upgrade fast enough to keep up with attrition, while the legacy airlines hire pilots without college degrees or PIC time coupled with hundreds of unfilled captain awards on every vacancy bid. My crystal ball is broken, hence the questions.

Round Luggage

United owns 25 OO flown 175sc. Mesa only owns 18 yet had about 80 on property meaning United owns the bulk. The republic 175s I don’t know but i think I remember those planes delivered 2015-2017 as United owned but were originally going to be republic owned anyway whoever owns those it doesn’t matter, United owns enough.
Things don’t really change though 10 years ago C5 pilots were hoping to get republics q400 scraps as republic transitioned to a jet only fleet. C5 recycles. ♻️

piloto2

I keep hearing about C5 getting the 175s. I'm just curious what their chances of pulling this off are though. They failed miserably at bringing on new aircraft of the same exact type they were already flying when they got the 145s from XJT. And part of this was during the timeframe when they were just about the only 121 carrier hiring. The company has always been a bottom feeder operation. One only has to look at the number of contract violations the company willfully commits each and every day and their bottom tier pay scale to see why they will have a hard time growing. Many looking for regional employment do their homework and know these things. Sure, there's a small number who can make this dumpster fire work for their circumstances, but in today's hiring environment will that be enough? And given the apathetic nature of the pilot group there (~50% participation in the latest ALPA vote), things aren't likely to change much. Maybe shiny jet syndrome will help....

TransWorld

Was the previous attempted growth of 145s due to hiring problems of pilots? if the 175s were swapped out by parking currently flying 145s, on a one for one basis, would that improved matters, or at least allow them to tread water? Or is it just systemic? I am curious as to your thoughts.

Str8 Cash Homie

Yeah those are some great questions, who knows honestly. I don’t believe there’s going to be any consolation with mergers. They’ll probably fly as much dual class RJ’s as they can with the pilots they have and continue to shrink. The regionals who can’t afford to endure anymore attrition will shutdown. It’s really that simple at the moment.

Take a few minutes out of your day and go read the recent SkyWest earnings call. Every investor question was based around attrition, you’ll probably get a clear picture of the current solution for the regional pilot shortage. I’ll give you a hint, they don’t have with one. SkyWest operates the same way Delta operates, “we’ll wait for the data”. The Captain attrition “data” after these huge pay hikes has not settled down. They’re not going to like the data. The only question is what’s the next carrot they’re going to throw at regional pilots to keep them tied down.

United is in a weird spot though without any WO’s available to merge onto their mainline seniority list. I’ve heard American may already be preparing to go that direction. The TA that was recently offered to American’s pilot group has pay scales included for their RJ’s.

dmspilot

IAD may be "junior" for newhires but it is still a small base with a lot of senior people in it. You should be able to bid for IAH and get it relatively quickly and you will build relative seniority there quicker. That said, the company wants to grow IAD but due to inability to plan and think ahead they have been scaring away people who want IAD and it's become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Houston crews are now staffing a significant amount of Dulles flying.

Hedley

UAL has made it pretty clear that they don’t want anything smaller than the 319/737-700 on the property. If failure to staff the regionals changes that plan and UAL did decide to bring the 175’s to the mainline side, they really don’t need a WO to merge into the list. UALPA would never allow anything other than a staple anyway. UAL already owns 175’s. They can simply bring them to the UAL side and hire off of the street to staff them. That avoids all merger cost and seniority integration issues. Bringing them over to the UAL side would also allow them as many 175’s as they want as well as make the E2 variant possible. Doing so could also make adding the 190/195 E2 a more realistic possibility. I really don’t see that happening. I think their plan is that elimination of the 50 seat fleets will free up enough pilots in the regional system to staff the existing 175’s.

dashtwo

Anyone heard what class will be first AQP? Current offers are for Feb. class dates.


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JonValor

Cool, was there aqp approved?

dmspilot

AQP was only just approved for recurrent after years of work. Initial is being worked on next.