jcountry

Made my choice a good while back.

Even though I never saw any of this mess coming.

Move on. You won’t be any worse off anywhere else. One day of seniority at a good place trumps 35 years at a dying company.

It sucks, but the company is dying. LXJT is going eventually as well. Couldn’t be clearer at this point.

SKYW will bleed every cent from a subsidiary and liquidate. Classic pump and dump. It’s unreasonable to expect LXJT will be any different from (the once far more lucrative) ASA.

It really sucks, but facts are facts. I have no idea why anyone is staying now. Get out while the pilot market is good!!

Bartender

The “facts” may change soon.

DirkDiggler

Yeah that’s been said for many years now. Good news is coming, check’s in the mail, give it a year. People can only go by the information they have in front of them. Which is no information...

asa rat

Thanks for all the info, I mean innuendo.

jcountry

They won’t.

SKYW dumped everything associated with the place.

LXJT is sitting on a bunch of old ass small erjs. Nothing is coming, no good news anyhow. If good news were coming, it would have happened when all the assets and pilots were still in place.

I truly hate the way stuff has turned out. Heartbreaking for such a good group of people.

But starting over isn’t so bad, it’s a bit of a challenge in some ways, but going back on reserve after 20 something years would be too. I really don’t think seniority at xjt will mean a damned thing to anyone soon.

Opportunities are everywhere for pilots these days. Jump on one now. Get a marketable type at least. Move on to something better. It’s definitely time.

Once again, I truly hate the way stuff turned out, but Humpty is broken. The place is toast. Just my opinion, but damn. What other possibilities exist for the place?

Wynncore

I agree 100%. The CRJ AA contract is going to expire soon, the odds of it being extended/renewed are slim to none. There is a reason why XJT has not "found a home" for the excess -700s it has.

UAL extended the ERJ until 2022. By 2022 the overwhelming majority of seniority list will consist of top of scale CAs and FOs all with longevity of greater than 10 years. Additionally, the fleet will 100% consist of older, 50 seat ERJs...if the E175 was coming it would have already happened.

If you can make it until 2022, then stay, if you need to remain employed past 2022 you need to seek another job immediately. I hate what has happened to this carrier and it's employee groups, but the writing is on the wall: There is no good news coming. Leave as soon as you can.

jcountry

The longevity of those left is important.

The only ones left at ASA (and many on XJT side) have very high seniority compared to most regionals-and correspondingly high costs.

This is why those planes haven’t gotten placed. People like Kirby don’t give a tinker’s damn about experience or loyalty-especially at a regional. They want that metal in the air at the lowest price.

The cost of a 30 year capt vs a 3 year captain is significant-and creates perhaps the most important disadvantage for any regional.

Good regionals al aye run into this problem. If a place is (was) good enough that a bunch of folks chose to stay, their seniority list will become much more expensive that the crap operations.

Happens to ACA, Comair, and now ASA. It will happen to every regional eventually. It’s a life cycle.

DirkDiggler

^^This guy gets it. And just when I thought all pilots were idiots, a light shines through.

They don't care about your 20 years of service to the company and the hard work you've put in throughout your career. Just go ask any outsourced employee at any major corporation. You put all this time in and now you're too expensive. To be replaced by a 1 year captain at Skywest or Gojet. Buh bye.

This is just basic free market economics. The only saving grace may be the fact that they weren't prepared for the speed at which our implosion is occurring. And they are not setup for a feed replacement.

The longevity divide is widening. We have 10+ year CA's and basically new hires. Because of this it's safe to assume most of the new hires will eventually leave. This airline is not competitive (and viable) with such high longevity.

DirkDiggler

And let me just add. It isn't solely the pilots who have such high longevity. But also the FA's, mechanics and dispatchers as well. The perks of being an established company.

Blackhawk

I agree. But an even bigger factor than the actual pay scale is probably vacation. Think about all the high time pilots with 5 weeks of vacation each year compared to new hires with 1-2 weeks vacation. Even worse, most of our FOs now have over 10 years.