It's bad enough that I can't go down an escalator, but now I can't even take a leak! Guess I'll have to start wearing those Depends my kids gave me for my last birthday, or carrying an empty milk jug:

Co-pilot hijacks Ethiopian plane, surrenders to Swiss police | Reuters

So Scambo, where we going?

If you're going to 'divert' while I'm in the Lav, please, take us to St. Maarten!

Just like I told those idiots at the TSA, "Leave my nail clippers alone! We don't need nail clippers to hijack an airplane."

"The plane's second-in-command, who was not carrying a weapon, took control of the plane when the pilot left the cockpit to use the toilet."

Yes Northwest was nuclear about competition!

NW added DEN-LAX in addition to carpet bombing LAX-MSP against Frontier.

This is the train of thought that I do not understand. Profit sharing was negotiated during LOA 51 when the company was gutting our contract during the dark days. We negotiated it just for the days we are going through now, meaning making money hand over fist. It's been paid for once now we paid for it again in C2012.

We have once again fixed a company problem. The pilot group gave up a much larger percentage of pay and retirement than any other group at Delta. We negotiated profit sharing then the company decided to GIVE it the other employee groups. We knew that was going to happen, that's a history lesson to fortune telling. Not a big deal to the company either since they weren't making money so there wasn't a check.

Now fast forward to today and the check is getting quite large and the company wants to take some of that money back. If they go and take it from the non-union employees (which they can do at any time), then they have to worry about them running out and unionizing. So they come to us and say if you give some of it back then you can have larger pay raises.

I voted no to C2012. I felt that over a decade of giving back to the company that we had done our share and expected a contract that recognized those sacrifices. The union kept saying that if we didn't give the profit sharing back the 4-8-3-3 would have been even smaller raises. I don't think that even Delta pilots with our history of passing everything 60/40 would have passed that.

On a positive note, I just watched Lee Moaks video about the pilot shortage. I actually feel he did a good job putting airline management on the spot about pay and benefits being the reason we are not attracting pilots in the US nowadays.

PrJay,

I may be the only active participant on this board who actually took the time to talk to J C Lawson about the error that he made. I told him he should be building bridges as we tried to do at ASA, not throwing political grenades.

Delta pilots are an intelligent group of people. I only write these things to help them see the matter objectively, so that they may properly consider their political support and hold their elected representatives accountable when questions involving their employment proective provisions are decided.

I read this earlier, and all I could think is, why didn't he just take the train to Geneva?

I get what you are saying and many may find your insight in the matter helpful. Trust me, the 1300+ furloughed are well aware of who is accountable for employment protection provisions as we watched what we had get negotiated away while we were still out.

Lawson tried to use a bunch of guys who had just taken a 100% pay and benefits cut (well not quite 100% as DALPA paid our COBRA which was a huge help), but tried to use us as leverage to get himself a windfall. He doesn't get a pass on that. Ever.

ORD LHR coming in OCT, 7ER
#airlineroute

Cheers
George

Don't let your friends hijack airplanes. Because St Maarten ain't all that, St Baarts is where you'll want to go, you'll go broke on $12 beer, it ain't worth it.

I've got a better idea for you. Have you had your coffee yet this morning Mr Florida lake fisherman man? No? Cool, you won't need it...

Just click on it...
Megyn Kelly to Janice Dean: If they're canceling the train, are we having another night in bed? - YouTube

:D

I'm sure someone can repost the letter (which desired a trade for larger jets in addition to holding hostages), but it wasn't the only thing that caused a "strain" in relations. Lawson and Bob Arnold (RIP) were the only two DCI labor leaders that refused to sign a Mutual Support agreement leading up to C2K with the Delta pilots. Even SkyWest's student council signed.

Bar's simplistic recollections of the PID pushed for by ASA/CMR and his dismissal of the risks for then current Delta pilots overlook among others the Roberts award, the internal results of DAL's own WAL and PAA integrations, the later Nicolau award and the consequences they induced. While "zippers" may have been planned in private, the public face presented to the Delta MEC was PID. Oh, and it doesn't even take into account the elephant in the room -that management would have had to agree to a merger...which they wouldn't/didn't.

Bar's frame of reference appears to be that scope was "ironclad" until 1996. Not true. Deregulation moved faster than labor contracts. We are where we are, and wishing for "unity" doesn't get us where Bar desires us to be. You've got to get your counterparty to agree, and that's where it becomes a math problem for management and pilot labor.

True. DALPA has proven highly adept at getting management's numbers to work.