Absolutely!

A number of years ago I flew a trip with a former PAA captain. He had a great quote: "Never underestimate the greed of a pilot".

If you think of that quote in terms of the guys who waited too long, trying to get that last paycheck before DCC, it'll make sense.

Wow! Someone offering up his opinion on an airline pilot forum...that's just plain crazy! Has that ever been done here before?

Do you really believe what you write? Our respective management got together and orchestrated this entire thing, put out conflicting messages to the MEC's of each council, in cohoots with the DOJ, to avoid excessive training costs? I think you overestimate the abilities/luck of Delta management.

J
Not donning tin foil hat or searching for black helicopters - yet

I never said they were in cahoots with the DOJ. I'm telling you what NWA pilots were told by management, and what RA was quoted as saying. No conspiracies here, just facts.

Do you honestly think that as closely as both MECs are working that one would have "secret classified info" and the other wouldn't? Both MECs knew the score. They had reps who signed non-disclosure agreements who knew the score. Management did know what they were doing but trying to time your exit to the last day was silly.

I still think there was a grace period that would have allowed these guys to retire with the NWA insurance after the DCC. I thought it was a 48 hour grace period if they had filled out the paperwork and submitted it. Then when the DCC came, they had 48 hours to call and "pull the trigger" on their retirement. I don't know if that is really the case, but that was the info I got. So, if any of the NWA guys were really even remotely thinking about it, they would have had that paperwork in. The quick timing from DOJ to DCC would not have mattered.

In any case, we're all one big happy family now and lets hope that guys decide to leave way before age 65.

Rocky,
The "Thousands will retire" was proven false and is now a fact. Just as 62.4 will prove false but the genius of it is that it cannot be proven or disproven until after the fact. I'm just glad the myth of thousands retiring was proven false before the three wise men decide or better yet before they force our two sides to reach a deal.

Scoop

"A merger of equals" is a quote from one of the arbitrators in a closing statement he made, and he said he was speaking for all three of them. this new seniority list will be finalized on December 8, so any furloughs will come off the bottom of that new list, not from the old Delta or old NWA. Delta uses a different crew ratio than NWA, so as of corporate closing at the end of October, they are short of pilots. What they do about this hasn't been decided. My guess is nothing until the economy and fuel sort things out.

Spoken with great certainty, even though it is pure speculation.