CAL Fall Reductions
 

Any CAL pilots heard anything on plans for the fall schedule? Reductions is RJ flying, Mainline flying, or both? I know they were planning on doing some more hiring before this economic meltdown. Just curious if anyone has any insider info.

They got rid of some frequency and even cut some destinations out of KEWR to "relieve congestion". BGR (xjt) is one in particular that comes to mind. CAL always cuts back flying in the fall. I would not be surprised to see an announcement of said reductions (mountain out of a mole hill) just to add to the doom and gloom for the suckers. As far as hiring goes I should let you know we have a few hundred out on an 18 month leave, and 147 furloughed. Recalls would need to happen before that. Hiring? You will hear it coming.

I think most of the reductions were XJT cities. BGR, AVL, CAE and a few others. It seems that XJT is getting the most reductions and Colgan and Commuteair in EWR will loose typical fall reductions. It sounds like there may be more furloughs at XJT with this round of reductions

Colgan is in the same boat as XJET. We lost MHT and YUL and I think a few others this month. That doesnt count BDL, RIC, IAD, BWI, GSO and a few others I cant recall over the last few months.

Id say the connection/express carriers are losing the routes at an equal pace. Of course there is some swapping going around with Commute getting some of the Colgan routes that we lost and vice versa.

Losing a few city pairs does not equate to more furloughs. From every union rep I have talk to in the past few weeks: "More furloughs does not seem likely at this time unless CAL drastically cuts our flying on top of what we are already planning on." More COLAs and early outs to be offered but furloughs are not on the the table at this point, it does not make sense to furlough for 3-6 months.