Quote of the year, 2013

In recognition of your accomplishment, Beyonce is on her way over to make you some breakfast!

Just curious, with that kind of leak did they get out the mats and spill containment equipment?

At some airports I can't even throw a fuel sample on the ground without running afoul of the State EPD folks. The fines can be pretty serious and my avgas evaporates nearly instantly. Jet fuel kinda sticks around ....

You know what is sad FTB? We will do it again in the next contract. There will be more productivity/work rule give aways at the hands of an ALPA sales job (constructive engagement) for a marginal pay raise while the company pushes over the 3 billion a year net profit (profit sharing will miss half of that) and Delta holding company outsources even further. That 7-9000 pilot Delta seniority list some talk about may be no joke. If you are jr, get used to no movement for an even longer period of time and maybe no upgrade before retirement depending on how old you are.

You flew the 757, didn't you? :) That thing leaked almost more than this every time it shut down!

Damn FtB, your pen is quite sharp this evening.

Nu

Neither - it's edited for a reason. Delta only makes (loss) money on Delta, DCI and the AF JV while they basically make no money on code shares. AF is losing money and DCI capacity is moving to mainline disguised in the presentation as up-gauging mainline. Don't Google up-gauging BTW but you should probably Google CASM, I had to. Less people are flying but those who do are paying us more and the (less) planes (with more seats) are fuller making margins better with less capacity which is why I can't commute to work or go on vacation on my own airline.

Here's something cool about working for the World's Fastest Dwindling Airline.

For the same of easy math, let's say I'm 600 from the bottom and we have 12000 pilots. I'm 95% of the way down the list.

Now in 5-10 years, we will have retired 3000 people without hiring. I might not be quite 600 from the bottom because some of the guys below me will have gotten too frustrated and quit for UCAL, FDX, Emirates (once they open their US pilot base, etc). But hopefully only 100 or so will quit. So that puts me 500 from the bottom of a 9000 pilot force - which is...

94.4%!!

So your seniority really can improve without us growing or hiring! Be encouraged! If we get down to 6000 pilots in 20 years I'll be at 90% and holding a nice MD-88 FO line. Not a bad way to finish a Delta career...lots of landings to go around and I won't have to make those pesky trips to bounce in the sim!

So bring on the JV's... the VA order book...the AF A380's, and the upgauging at DCI. The faster we shrink, the faster I move up. Heh heh heh.

Within what you stated and the investor conference what are Delta's plans the next few years for the size of the mainline fleet? Note the word mainline.

All TIC aside, it does appear that someone has bought off on pay raises in lieu of advancement/growth. Nice if you are as far as you are going seat wise. Of course this ignores the fact the biggest pay raises you get are from seat advancement. The days of you'll be senior and Captain someday have been replaced for many with you'll just be a senior F/O. Sadly many are capitulating on this point as well and just going for the $$. Great that we will get the 717 and start hiring in 2014(?). Never mind that a not insignificant portion of the pilot list will lose much of their 4/8/3/3 with a downgrade to lower paying equipment as we down gauge on one end while up gauging on the other. Please curb my enthusiasm :(

Our guys in S. Forsyth can't hang. That's talent!