There were 2 D9C's from May '07 before the seatlocks were released. But other than a very small group, most everyone in the left seat of the 900 have been here 5+ years.

 

Wow, there is a lot of discussion about upgrading by new people. The upgrades are going to be going senior for a long time. Most people who have been here a year have the time and are ready to upgrade. The last couple awards have gone very senior in terms of their positions so I honestly will tell you there will be no quick upgrades or street captains in the foreseeable future. Even if we pick up a massive number of aircraft, the guys getting hired now probably will not be upgrading for a long time. Now if the flow pulls 100-200 guys to mainline, then things will move faster but who knows. Get hired, finish training and enjoy life because honestly the upgrade is probably going to take a long time and it is not that important to worry about.

 

Just to add some people have heard we hired street captains late last year. This was because the new FO's at the company could not upgrade due to time and experience. Experience is what they judged themselves because they had not been through a whole year of seasons and were advised to wait. The ones we hired off the street all mainly had 121 time. And as of the more recent awards they are not even senior enough to bid captain right now. Although they stay captain because they were awarded it at some point.

Back to where I was going. In spring 2007 and early 2008 we went from 500 pilots to 1000 pilots. All those hired in spring, summer and fall 2007 are now ready to upgrade or close to it so someone coming new to Mesaba could expect to wait a while to upgrade. We sit at 1100 pilots today and are still hiring.

Now that is the big question why are we hiring? We started hiring at a time when these people hit the line most airlines are pulling down there schedules. And not just a few, September we added 54 cleaned out the pool in the first class and this month looks to add between 30 and 45 with continued hiring for a while. So if this keeps up maybe upgrade will not take that long. They are hiring for some reason but as of yet no one knows why. Last time we hired like this we doubled are fleet but when we were hiring we knew the reason why in 2007 we were getting 36 CRJ-900's and 17 CRJ-200's.

 

Well there is a guy on the comair thread swearing he e-mailed our president about why pinnacle is operating the 900's for a few months instead of comair and he said that we didnt want to take on the temporary expense and pinnacle could absorb it because they had deliveries coming early next year. He then went on to say that those a/c are going to Mesaba after the merger is complete.

So believe him if you want to.

 

More planes or not.....we are hiring and that is a good thing.

That new memo out about flight times is interesting. I really don't think it has anything to do with upgrading people as there are plenty with the times. I'm guessing they cannot get enough LCAs and are trying to figure out who they can call to try to push the position on a few more people. I really think if they made the benefits better, they would not have any problems. $10/hour is not enough for all the stuff those guys have to put up with. I have talked to a bunch of people and it is way more work than the extra money is worth.


Also, I wonder how many people messed up the change it dates for the new manuals. Most people do not check them on days off and a lot of people were under the impression of the manuals going active Oct. 1. I havent been flying in OCT so I have no clue.

 

New manuals??? Guess it's a good thing my vacation runs for another week cause I have NO clue what you are talking about....

 

Duplicate.........

 

I thought like you do, but was told it has something to do with insurance premiums. More fuel to the fire about more aircraft coming on board? Time will tell.

 

As for LCA's I turned in my resume a couple weeks ago and have heard nothing back... Guess I don't have what they are wanting. Maybe if they would actually use me to fly on ready reserve I'd have enough time in type ..... Oh well guess I'll just keep sitting at home....

 

They should have some LCAs on ready reserve. They can show the new guys what its gonna be like after their green line.