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Commuting from OKC

Old 09-15-2017, 12:53 PM
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Default Commuting from OKC

Greetings all,

I'm getting ready to retire from the military and, for family reasons, I'll be settling down in Oklahoma. I will be pursuing an airline job and I'm curious which company/domicile/aircraft would be best suited for a guy commuting from OKC.

I'm familiar with most of the domicile locations, so I'm looking for info on commutable lines, schedule flexibility, deadheads, minimal time on reserves, etc.

Thoughts?

Thanks for the info!
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Old 09-15-2017, 02:47 PM
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Originally Posted by ViperGuy69 View Post
Greetings all,

I'm getting ready to retire from the military and, for family reasons, I'll be settling down in Oklahoma. I will be pursuing an airline job and I'm curious which company/domicile/aircraft would be best suited for a guy commuting from OKC.

I'm familiar with most of the domicile locations, so I'm looking for info on commutable lines, schedule flexibility, deadheads, minimal time on reserves, etc.

Thoughts?

Thanks for the info!
Someone with a Dallas base would be best. Be aware that OKC is where the FAA has lots of activity. Be prepared to be bumped by the FAA for the jumpseat.
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Old 09-15-2017, 03:23 PM
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I live in okc and work for a major airline. Shoot me a PM if you want details beyond what I am posting.
The key to an easy commute is frequency, flight length, and the number of commuters in your city pair.
Okc is honestly a great commuter city. There is good frequency to DAL, DFW, HOU, IAH, DEN, ORD, and ATL and nonstops to just about every other city that has an airline base except NYC.
Having a commutable line is going to largely depend on your airline, but at SWA, anyway, there are a lot of commutable trips in Houston.
If you go with a Dallas based airline, you can always drive down. It's about 3-4 hours depending on where you live in okc.
As far as the Feds on the jumpseat, I haven't really noticed that at all. I have never been kicked off the jumpseat by a fed in okc, but maybe I have just been lucky.
Best of luck.
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Old 09-15-2017, 03:31 PM
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Congrats on your retirement and thanks for your service. I lived in Edmond and commuted to either ORD or DEN between 2004 and 2013. I'm probably not telling you anything new but just know up front that commuting will seriously complicate your life. Some guys are better commuters than others. I was a senior 757,767 F/O so I could bid commutable trips...I couldn't imagine commuting and being junior in my fleet/seat. Things have changed some since I left but when I was commuting it was all RJs on United Express...usually full and weight restricted. Now there are some mainline flights to some of UALs hubs. I occasionally used Southwest to Midway and found my way to ORD and of course their direct flight to DEN helped sometimes. I now live in base and my life is much less complicated. There is a much larger trip pool to bid from since I don't have to worry about hotels, I never check the weather and of course don't have to worry about schedules and loads. Welcome to the industry and happy commuting.
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Old 09-15-2017, 09:14 PM
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Lots to think about. For example, trips at SWA are generally not commutable on both ends, but I personally know two guys here that commute to DAL from OKC and TUL. Also, Uber from DFW to DAL runs about $25 on average as a backup. If you have an AM trip, it's likely you would commute in the day before. A PM trip often has commuters going home the day after their trip ends.

A 1-leg commute is already hard--a two leg commute can really suck. Most newhires at SWA (historically) do time in BWI or OAK for a bit.

If you can handle a commute to a junior base, it's doable.
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Old 09-16-2017, 06:18 AM
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I commuted from OKC to IAH for about 6 months. OKC is probably one of the easiest airports to get in and out of from crew lot to Kcm to the gate. IAH was so short I could never finish my movie either. Once the frequency was so great I sat short call from the coffee shop couch there. Don't recommend trying that, but the stars aligned for me that day and I pulled it off. Never saw a fed once, don't know how the commute to Dfw would be. Only once did I have to use swa to hobby but I had an interesting uber ride from a Nigerian with 4 wives. Enjoyed that trip. Lol

I would consider OKC IAH as about an easy a commute as there is, except if you want to get into IAH around late afternoon in August. Thunderstorms.
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Old 09-16-2017, 06:38 AM
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While commuting is no fun, you can do some things to minimize the pain. I've commuted for 6 years and life is grand! That said, I've learned to roll with the punches. I don't run in the terminal (anymore) and I don't fly Mach .99 to make a commute (anymore). For your planning purposes I'll try to list the big ones in order of importance for me:

1. Most important is commutable trips (that eliminates Southwest). Being able to get there and back on work days is HUGE. Don't underestimate how long it takes, especially with time zone changes. I'll use ATL as an example. That flight is 1.5 hours wheels up to wheels down. But it's blocked at 2 hours and with the time change makes it 3 hours to get to base. So at the earliest, you arrive at 9 am. Now you need a backup flight, next one leaves an hour later so now we're at 10 am. Careful though, because if you work for Delta you need at least 2 hours between flights as a buffer (which gives scheduling time to book you positive space on the backup flight and rebook the bumped pax, huge perk!) so now we're at 11 am arrival. Realistically your earliest show time is about 11:30 am on a good day. On Saturdays more like 1:30 pm.

2. As you can tell, frequency is nearly as important. Look at this website: You are being redirected...

For setup I use the desktop version, "All", "Nonstop", "No", "No", "No", and for date select a Sunday for any given week. (The chart looks best this way to me)

Frequency changes frequently. Saturdays are always reduced schedule.

3. Ability to fly on your own company. Some hidden benefits other than priority are the ability to BOOK a jumpseat. This is almost like having a paid seat. I know at Delta and FedEx you can do this, but United you can only list for it ahead of time and a senior pilot can walk up 10 mintes prior to pushand take it away. Delta and FedEx it's yours and only a Fed can bump you off. Not sure about UPS, American and Southwest.

My guess would be ATL (frequency is decent, commutable trips, and ability to book jumpseat) and DFW (commutable trips, good frequency, ability to drive and same time zone).

Hope this helps. Good luck and welcome!

Last edited by LumberJack; 04-10-2020 at 09:51 AM.
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Old 09-16-2017, 06:44 AM
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Filler

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Old 09-16-2017, 06:53 AM
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Great info guys, thanks for the help! Hopefully I'll have a choice but ultimately I'll make it work with whoever offers me a job!
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Old 09-16-2017, 06:56 AM
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Originally Posted by ViperGuy69 View Post
Great info guys, thanks for the help! Hopefully I'll have a choice but ultimately I'll make it work with whoever offers me a job!
Oh you Viper guys are so modest
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