Uh what? PSA has the same.

 

The reversal of fortune? I feel sorry for anybody who has to fly with those guys.

 

What do you mean?

 

He's talking about something totally different- flowback. Back in the early 2000s when AA furloughed pilots, an agreement was made to allow Eagle pilots to eventually flow to AA in exchange for letting AA furlough pilots and have them "flow back" to Eagle until they could get recalled. The guys that were flowbacks were obviously not happy to be flying at Eagle and were a lot of times not enjoyable to work with.

 

Did all these occurrences happen with a highly qualified FO sitting next to them? The barrier at K19 is on the FO side, as is P56 when you depart DCA up the river. There are 2 chairs in the chief pilots office on the other side of his desk for a reason.....

 

One for you and one for your union rep!!! Always bring a union rep.

 

Close, but not exactly.

In 1997 AA wanted RJ's at Eagle. AA pilots did not want to allow that, but the writing was on the wall in the industry. Skywest and Comair were already operating them, and had for years, and passengers preferred the RJ's over the turboprops. Finally, a four party agreement was reached between AA pilots, AA management, AE pilots, and AE management to allow a limited number of RJ's, defined as jets with 45 or more seats, to be flown by AE.

The AA pilots were worried that the RJ's at Eagle would cost them jobs eventually, so they negotiated to be able to follow the jets down to Eagle in the event of a furlough at AA. AE pilots said, hold on a minute! WE will allow you to flow down to Eagle RJ CA seats in the event of a furlough only IF we are given the chance to flow UP to AA.

All parties agreed, and the four party Flow back, Flow through side letter was signed.

A few Eagle pilots flowed up from early '99 through the Fall of 2001 before the bottom dropped out of the industry and AA pilots were indeed furloughed. Some of the furloughs ended up as AE RJ CA's, per the agreement. A few stuck around for years and most were great guys. Some were idiots. But that's normal, really. Any pilot group will have its misfits.

 

450,
Just a little clarification.
The final deal was a 2nd TA voted on in early 1997. The Section 6 negotiations had a goal up to the TA #1 that all jets go to AA with APA mainline pilots. Once the senior APA leadership folded on the RJ issue with TA#1, there was no getting them back.

The RJ issue developed fairly late in the game which was a big problem. Some very smart junior guys had figured out that instead of providing "Feed" to AA as specified in the 1987 contract permitting Eagle, the new RJ's could replace mainline flights like ABQ-DFW-PIT/CLE/CMH or DSM-ORD-ALB/SYR. The junior guys were dead on correct, it happened.

I think this point needs a little clarification. Before the CRJ, there were a few exceptions to the mainline Scope Clauses at various airlines. For example, the BA-146's at Air Wisconsin for UAL and ASA for Delta as well as for the older Fokker jets at Horizon (I don't know their exact exception).

SkyWest had not been operating RJ's "for years". They only had 4 in 1995 and near the 1st TA at AA, they only had 10. The only Regional operating RJ's in significant numbers was Comair with around 40. It is also important to note that Comair and SkyWest at the time were not wholly owned and operated under Code Share provisions. Not so at AA under AMR. Our corporation sought to replace are mainline flying with low paid workers in another corporate division. They did that too. I think we are in agreement that the horse was escaping the proverbial barn at that point, but a win was still possible unlike after our 1st TA.

The other dynamic was that AA/APA were the first to enter negotiations after the early 90's recession. I believe NWA was next on deck and also had a no RJ's for feeder carriers as well. When APA folded, NWA ALPA had no choice either.

Thanks

 

I'm kind of surprised that made it by the attorneys. I would think there could be a bunch of potential problems, if a pilot leaves, fails training at AA, then comes back and has an incident or mishap.

Frankly, if you can't pass training at AA, after years at a regional, you may want to explore other career options besides flying.

 

I was around and on the Eagle side for all of that. Thank you for jogging my memory on the particulars.

Delta had a significant number of RJ's in service on their behalf, as you said: 40 at Comair and 10 at Skywest, which was still a relatively small, Delta-only feeder at the time. Yes, there were the scope exceptions at Northwest Airlink and Air Wisconsin (for United) for the Bae146', but they were really more niche airplanes than potential game changers, unlike the smaller, more economical CRJ-100's and 200's, along with the upcoming Embraer 145's. DAL Management saw that early on, and AAL, UAL, and NWA wanted to join the party, so to speak. Eventually, the parties agreed to allow a limited number of RJ's flown by Eagle, with restrictions. However, what REALLY let the cat out of the bag was the loophole that defined the RJ as 45 seats or more. Embraer came out with a 44 passenger RJ specifically designed to undermine the provision that limited the number of RJ's to be operated by Eagle. Sudddenly, there was no effective limit to the number of 44 seat RJ's that could be operated on behalf of AAL by Eagle or any other potential regional partner, and with that AAL ordered hundreds of Embraer 140's. That was the game changer right there: the under-45 seat RJ. The cat was now completely out of the bag, never to to be caught, running wild.

It seems it was inevitable after Canadair created that 50 seat jet and Comair (and later Skywest) ordered it and ran with it, with Delta's blessing. Once Delta had 50 of those RJ's up and running against their competitor's turboprops, it was only a matter of time before their competitors decided they wanted their own regional partners to fly jets too.

I DO remember APA using F. Lee Bailey as a spokesman, who went on to claim that Eagle pilots were unqualified to fly jets and that safety would be compromised if other than AAL pilots flew them. It was a ridiculous comment, and as I recall, APA leadership backed away from that statement quickly

Regardless, that was all a LONG time ago - 20 years this year, as a matter of fact - and we've moved on. It's history.