How many, if any, of those FE's are the ropes or whatever y'all call them? If there are any left, do they have bidding rights to a window seat?

Thanx for the info, thought MSP was 744, not 747-200, my bad!

Revenue folks want to fly a set amount of 200's right until the end, and the crew resources folks want a slow draw down, which is easier for them. details are being worked out as we ponder.

How many of those are on long term sick leave?

Look for a annoucement of a early retirement program in the next 3 months to offset the 747-200's. There are however a lot of issues to be worked out. It appears the program will appeal for the most part only to Delta N pilots. Since the funding requirements ongoing for the Delta N retirement are going to be quite large the concept of additional retirement money going that direction is going to be a difficult pill to swallow for many Delta S pilots. Working through those details may derail the program but for the moment Delta is working on a early retirement program to be effective in the fall.

I don't think any of these are LTS. These numbers came from the active bid list for August.

For the may bid month there was a total of 18 guys on LTS throughout the -200 fleet.

That is about what I have been hearing. I figured it would be after summer flying.

It may but it is what it is, and we all agreed to the JPWA.

The deadzoners are about maxed out by all of this already. I understand. While none of this has cost them anything yet, watching others get handed gifts while they got hit in bankruptcy and hit again by the market is more than some of them can take.

It's politically touchy to remind them they enjoyed rapid career progression when those above them bailed out. There is a silver lining for the deadzoners (and all of us) in the early outs.

I did a quick cross reference and of those 18, 15 still are holding a 747 position as of August. (10 Capt, 3 FO, 2 SO)

DL