I understand but to my knowledge no other group has had the problems NW/Republic had with fences and it seems that conditions/restrictions are a part of most mergers. Could it have had something to do with the 20 year or so duration? I'm not sure any new type would come on property in the next 5 years but if say the company replaced 787s with 777s as well as DC-9s with 737s, it seems like that would be addressed in the initial SLI agreement to me.

I see fences as avoiding a lot more expense, problems, and uncertainty than they create. For example they could be the solution to you taking advantage of your greater near term retirements. Whatever they come up with I hope they can implement a smart ruling that learns from past mistakes and protects status quo to the extent possible.

It seems that you DAL/NWA guys will have the enviable problem of arguing over who gets to fly the shiny new jets, and who will have the higher net gain in seniority once the inevitable hiring takes place. Try not to ***** too loud, not every airline is as well positioned, especially these last few days.

Actually the problem with the NWO/Republic merger was Roberts put "stuff" into the award that no one asked for. Also, he couldn't write so everything was open to interpertation......which, of course, he would resolve with another poorly written award.

As Nu said, rinse and repeat. Both red and green got to write lots of checks to old man Roberts. I understand the guys we have are real good and we should have it right the first time.

Oh, and yes, there will be conditions and restrictions.........how long will be up to the board.

Good discussion,
Ferd

Depending on those conditions and restrictions, I can see DAL jets and NWA jets move in to each others bases. I cannot see DAL willingly Deadhead people for three to five years until there can be an open bid.

Time will tell.

Depends on how you build patterns. For example, on the -400 side it would be real easy to build it into the patterns DTW-->NRT-->ATL--NRT-->DTW. What is done now to cover MSP, HNL etc.

I'm sure a "pickup and drop clause" is being discussed. What I mean is, if they move (for example) the -400 or 777, you could go to where they move it to or use your seniority to move where you can hold........inside the conditions and restrictions of course.

But, your right, time will tell. Is it November yet?

We (Delta) does that now on the 767ER, so I imagine we could see that on the 747-400.

There are trips like JFK-AMS-CVG-AMS-JFK, ATL-MAN-JFK-MAN-ATL, that kind of thing. The CVG flying is because even though there is a 757/767 base in CVG, it's domestic only. There aren't enough flights to make it an international base I guess. The reason ATL 7ER pilots fly a trip through JFK is that JFK is short of pilots.

I think this is how we'll fly out of each other's bases for a while - JFK pilots doing 767ER flights out of DTW, or A330 doing flights out of JFK, B744 pilots doing flights out of ATL.

Problem is the shift of the 7ER to SEA. We do not have enough domestic frequency to do that, unless every leg to SEA is done by an ER crew. That is from JFK and ATL.

Yup, same problem on our side if they move the 330 to JFK. Especially if it's the SEA base they want to pick up and drop.

Devils in the details eh?

From what I am getting there will be some DHing around, we will see what type of restrictions there are on the SLI. Those are the details that are really important on how our bases will be realigned.

With the side letter Delta sided with regards to Midwest, whats to keep Midwest pilots from being used to fly E-190's on Delta and Northwest domestic routes and replacing all the DC-9's and MD-88's.