gloopy

I didn't think Pinnacle could "force" us to pay them more just by declaring BK. If we hold the line with them as well as agressively enforce their performance end of the CPA/ASA the best they could hope for would maybe a temporary injunction delaying how soon we could dump them. But if they come to us for any relief whatsoever we should tell them to pound sand and use it as an opportunity to cull even more 50 seaters at the very least.

While I'm sure we want the full compliment of 255 large outsourced RJ's in our "armada" Pinnacle has zero leverage over us even with those airframes as there are tons of other carriers tripping all over themselves to instantly add whatever they can't do at the prices they low balled in their bid for the work in the first place. For any planes they have that we may be directly leasing or owning, those could be transfered almost instantly.

In either case it seems like a great opportunity to reduce 50 seaters and depending on the timing reducing 51-76 seaters that we allow to be outsourced.

gloopy

Windcheck says what?

Anyway that sounds like a pretty good fleet mission plan over all. Our baby busses are old and getting older fast. Some of the new 73's were ordered to replace them as well as some 75's. I suspect we will continue to see some overlap in missions that blur some of the size/capacity lines but in the macro I'll go with that.

It will be interesting watching the remainder of our fleet replacement orders play out. Most seem to be of the opinion that a split order is a slam dunk. While possible, especially if prices are right, I wouldn't discount a borderline radical shift towards Boeing for the rest of the baby busses and MD's going forward.

Whatever SWA flies is never, ever, going to have a massive fleet grounding AD so there is no exposure there, Boeing appears more willing to wheel and deal and we are committed to a large number of new 73's as our baby bus fleet ages rapidly and we need to at least start seriously thinking about an MD88 replacement.

The baby bus is an OK transcon airplane. Not the best, but it can hold its own. I think the 73-800 is slightly better and of course the −700 is like a baws at least in mission, marketing notwithstanding. Of course from the pax perspective, the baby bus is better although I haven't seen the "sky interior" or whatever its called, I'm sure the bus still beats it.

Then there's the issue of IFE. We like it in the 73s and 75s but aren't investing anything equipping the minibusses with it. That leads me to believe that unless we order more, the 320/19 is destined to morph into sort of an MD-88/90, 91, whatever it takes kind of role while the 73's do more of the longer stuff.

Of course one end of any coast to coast flight is the west coast and there is no money there and AS dominates and we can't do it ourselves or we trash the yields so we will just give it all to them but they feed our widebodies so its all good amirite?

mmaviator

Reminds me of the pilot write ups and mx response from some airline(some Australian Airline).

Pilot- Heard squeaky noise in by avionics
MX- Installed cat

gloopy

Yeah whenever fuel's tight on a long flight I like to crack out some boards for the cruise portion to take the edge off.

Wait, what?

Is that like negative flaps on a Maul for cruise or something? I guess its better than "OK when I select some flaps you pull that breaker real quick, k?"

And are we definately investing on sharklets for the 320's? If so that would mean we might be thinking of keeping/refreshing that fleet and taking a harder look at the NEO's than I thought.

80ktsClamp

Gloopy, remember that the 739 order was primarily because it was handed to us so cheap by Boeing, not because we are 100% Boeing. Everyone in flight ops thought the order was going airbus until they came in with that deal.

I'm holding out hope that we snag the NEO because it is such a far superior product, but I wouldn't hold my breath on any major domestic aircraft retrofits until this cap ex freeze gets lifted. We aren't even installing winglets on the 757s anymore.

The Cavalier

I thought we were installing winglets on all 75's except the old NWA a/c that cannot be modified and therefore planned for the first retirements?

80ktsClamp

It's still planned as far as I know but seems to have ceased actively occurring.

shiznit

According to the Boeing website:

737-800 Range: 3115 NM Cargo: 1555 Sq. Ft.
737-900ER Range: 3265 NM Cargo: 1824 Sq. Ft.

But still......MD-88 don't care.

Bucking Bar

Sorry about my phone ediing hack job, but ... what is no one else will pick up Pinnacle's flying for their agreed price? Delta has been trying to help them avoid this by increasing reimbursement rates as Pinnacle's costs rose.

My question is more pilot focused ... what happens to the guys we "promised" flow through agreements to if their airline ceases to exist? That is one reason I like seniority numbers better than flow through agreements. You can't trust management to keep (or even be able to keep) a promise in this industry.

forgot to bid

I appreciate what Boeing says, but I don't buy off on what manufacturers say on range.

I guess I see the 738 as having better runway performance so if it can get its load off the ground and fly it far then it has a better punch. But in the back of my mind I was thinking more of getting a 739 off the runway in LGA and going far but I forget LGA has range limitations though.

My bet is the 800 is still the better plane for full long range flying. It's like the CAL pilot told us that on the 739 it requires full length 22R out of EWR to get to SLC while the heavies take the intersection to go to Europe and Asia.

And no, the MD-88 don't care.

Problem is they're not doing enough north-south runs. Can I get an amen?

I just checked flightaware and Jetblue has theirs running right now from JFK-LAX so I think it has the range, never flown it obviously.

I think there will be a 73 base, with 100-150ish more 737s coming I don't see why not nor why they'd have to cut flying from one base and move to another like they did with the A320. Maybe a growth airplane unless we really do start parking the 757s.

Where do you guys go out of DTW? Is it just back and forth between LAX or the entire west coast?