Thanks for that update. :) It's always good to hear encouraging words. :)

they were not familiar with the RAH E190s. They said they'd look into it. But neither Embraer or Bombardier have produced a desirable 100 seater and they want Airbus and Boeing to step up to the plate with one.

More displacements possible prior to SOC on DAL-S.

We are over staffed system wide but narrow body still remains tight in their view. With ALVs, furloughs, etc, they said they're trying a steady as she goes.FWIW, scheduling claims not all cancelled flights to IROPS labeled as crew time out and thus not restaffed are their doing. OCC can make that call too, so there are times scheduling would like to restaff but can't.

They don't want a small subfleet if they can help it. They're looking at more MD90s for sure, some are near pennies on the dollar but the China ones are still off on price by a little bit. They'd like to have the 30-35 MD90s and at least a double digit number increase by 2010.

As to the MD88s off the DCA-LGA shuttle, the market has been crushed. Demand is way off and the Acela train is the main competitor. It got to the point they could make more money with those MD88s elsewhere and thus they were pulled. LGA-BOS will remain an 88 run.

I ask myself why would a DAL-N guy want to go? Here are the reasons that might be explored. To avoid training on another aircraft, tired, disgusted, or lazy.

I ask myself why would a DAL-N guy want to stay? He's top of the heap. The big Kahuna. With PBS he gets whatever trip he wants on the days he wants. His life is pretty dog gone good. He can drop whatever he doesn't want and somebody will pick it up. Half pay, full medical. Or, he could go out on disability. There are lots of ways to lose your medical when you are 60+ and still get a paycheck.

One thing management rarely factors in is the size of the ego. It's just like the senior F/A's, you can't make them miserable enough to quit because of their seniority. It's pretty good to be on top. Pilots just won't quit. They pretty much have to die to leave or be forced into retirement.

In my estimation, very few will take this offer. There just isn't enough in it.
I wouldn't take it and I can't come up with enough reasons for anyone else to take it.

Glad to have someone else post this. See it is all public info.

I know I would not take this. 140K is a joke. It is in line with what CAL and WN offered. Look at their numbers.......

How can they furlough? Don't we have a no furlough clause that is bulletproof, and not subject to force majeur (which has not yet been declared anyway?) I seriously do not know....

There is always a way.

They have a dedicated team of lawyers finding holes in our contract every which way from Sunday. We have a bunch of fat ALPA blowhards with mustaches who eat rib eye steaks and drink expensive wine on our dues who always cave in on scope and represent the regionals better than mainline.

If management want to furlough, we'll get furloughed.

The only way to start to win is drop ALPA and start an in-house union whos focus is DELTA mainline and DELTA mainline only. Not the regionals, its a major conflict of interest.

How do you know we will not get the same "bunch of fat ALPA blowhards with mustaches who eat rib eye steaks and drink expensive wine on our dues who always cave in on scope" ?

Crud, if we were going to leave, we should have done it before the merger and pulled an APA / TWA, oh wait, you are f-NWA, so maybe you owe ALPA a little something that you can measure in the outcome of this merger for you.

I agree there is a conflict of interest, but the conflict exists because we negotiated to outsource this flying. If we ever decided to act like a union and unify those in Delta service the conflict would disappear. Lets check the balance on the Major Contingency fund before leaving.

Hey guys, go sign your paperwork for the PERP. It is attached to the LOA. I know you want to! ;)

I agree with ACL's idea...

We should print up a bunch of them and put them in all the older guys' mailboxes.