This next question is for pilots at eagle. If i go with the atr and the emb 135s get sold off and there is turmoil in the next few years. when peole are forced out is it done by seniority of the whole company with the emb pilots going through retraining in the atr. how would it go down?

 

Seniority rules all regardless of what plane you are assigned.

As far as replacement of aircraft, my earlier point is that without growth the upgrade will stay in the 6-8 year range. Who cares how efficient an aircraft is when you're topped out at $38/hr for 7 years?

 

I was talking about the health of the company. yes 7 yrs at 38/hr is a little rough. again I'm an optimist. we will also have to see what happens with the arbitrator in March, right? that could change a lo of things in either direction.

 

No thats being overworked. I'm sorry any time management forces you to work on a day off is abuse. All this while they sit analyzing why their last tee shot went into the rough.

 

Getting new aircraft is a huge expenditure. Why would AMR make such a large investment at Eagle, which has a senior-heavy seniority list (making labor costs much higher than competitors), when it can contract out the flying to the likes of Republic or Mesa for a fraction of the cost, and still dictate the terms of the flying and reap the benefits?

If AMR thinks the 135's should be replaced, it has more incentive to get rid of them, shrink Eagle, and replace the Eagle flying with Connection flying.

I was at Eagle for about 6 yrs. Recently I finally took advantage of the opportunity to escape. I like Eagle. It is a great place with great people. And extremely professional compared to the outfit I'm at now. But the upgrade time is a joke and I don't think the future is really that rosy, despite what management may want you to believe. It's anyones guess what will happen, but I think it only makes business sense from AMR's perspective to shrink Eagle.

I agree with everything that Labbats and flyboyzz1 have posted on this thread. That's good info. As for the upgrades coming down to 4-5 yrs., not likely. Only remotely possible if the arbitrator rules extremely favorably regarding the Letter 3 grievances. Without new aircraft deliveries, the only upgrades will be for attrition (and here only attrition from the left seat, which may slow with 65) and flowbacks leaving (I think only about 150 left on property, maybe less now).

And don't forget, if you guys were working at Eagle this summer, there were HUGE vacancy bids for upgrade. But then at the end of the summer ALL of the Saab upgrades were canceled. Why? Management actually admitted that it was because they didn't have the staffing to replace people leaving the right seat. So to really help the upgrade problem, Eagle really needs to solve staffing issues, which won't happen with the long upgrade, etc. etc. One big circle.

At any rate, Eagle is a great place to get some experience. Use it for what it is. Just don't count on something that may never come.

 

what if.. and I mean what if.... eagle was bought by the likes of virgin america or Republic. Which from what I hear, isnt outside the frame of possibilities. Would a buy out like this help eagle by providing a place for the senior pilots to go as well as introducing new capital to pgrade the fleet? would somthing lke this help or hurt eagle?

 

A buyout by another airline is most likely the last thing that would happen. There's simply too much overhead (37-50 seat jets), too many pilots, too much seniority, too many existing problems, etc...

 

Although, in the history of regional airlines, it isn't out of the question for one airline (esp. one going through contract negotiations, like RAH) to buyout another, so they can whipsaw the two pilot groups against each other.

However, RAH mgmt seems to have a pretty strong desire to do everything possible to have a 70+ pax fleet in the future. They're doing a smart and good job towards achieving that goal too, and it's a darned successful strategy. That 170 is a sweet machine (although we could argue about whether regional pilots should be flying it!!!).

I can't see RAH buying another fleet of old 145s...they have enough on the CHQ certificate. I'm not entirely sure, but wouldn't AA's scope prevent AA from subcontracting out flying to a 170 operator? I seem to remember that's why you never see a CRJ900 or E170 flying an American Connection flag.

 

AA's scope clause will prevent any regional from feeding the mainline with more than a 50 seat airplane. The one exception being the ATR, under the Executive Airlines certificate, with 64-66 seats.

So any regional that would fly under the connection banner would be barred from operating anything with more than 50 seats.

 

Don't they have the 700s in ORD, though??? Are they 50 seat config with 1st class or what?

There would really be no point for RAH to buyout Eagle. The only reason I would've thought RAH would ever buyout Eagle would be to park a bunch of the 135/145s, and run the more-efficient 170s on the longer-range routes out of ORD & DFW. That won't happen, though, because of AAs aforementioned scope...which I actually agree with. The 170/175 and 900 should be mainline planes...they're practically the size of a DC9. And probably more spacious.