Has anyone considered that this might have something to do with the chair of the House Transportation Cmte (Oberstar), from Minnesota (NWA), asking the DOJ to halt the merger...news which was released Monday around 10AM? And then, within 24 hours, you have an announcement that Delta is pulling 9Es contract?

Maybe these things are completely unrelated, but the timing makes me wonder.

And for those of you who think this has something to do with contract negotiations, I would think mgmt would use this as a way to stall even longer...I can see the Seal memo now: "These are hard times and we all have to make sacrifices, our pilots are no exception...yada yada yada."

I know right....YOU CAN'T SIT THERE AND TELL ME THAT BIG BAD DELTA IS GONNA LET MESA WIN RIGHT.....Ok this is all game that corporate america has to play in order to make things look right in front of the judge....ok....The big picture...and yes is sounds like the conspiracy therory BUT....Delta trys to cancel Mesa....Deltas lawyers and CEOS know that Mesa just not going to walk away so they are ready know that Mesa is going to come back with a fight which they did....now does Delta have enough juice to SQUEEZE Mesa out every little penny in court...you know it...BUT they let them walk.....SO...PNCL along with Phil and his cronies come to Delta and say "oh please big Delta we wanna be on your team we are already spending MILLIONS on a plane and we want to use them" SO they cancel PNCL contract....There is already a date of which we are "supposed" so stop flying them...July 31st I believe...which if I remember...there was no date associated with the Freedom cancel....please correct me if I am wrong!....In mean time PNCL is in contract talks with the union RIGHT NOW and remember that the whole reason that PNCL lost their planes to Mesaba is because "the pilots didn't have a contract"....NOW PNCL can say "look NWA we have a pilot contract now!!!"......PUNKS.....and NW will say "will now start replacing your 50 seat jets with those 900's you are getting.....whoopty doooo!!!"....Corporate GAMES....I used to be one....not in the airlines...but in other businesses....you can see right through this one though

Ok I am done rampaging on my keyboard!!!! There are my 2 cents....take them if you want them!!!!

My only response to this news is hogwash.....Our crews that fly our CRJ900 do everything possible to keep our performance as good as can be...I personally believe DAL wanted us to fail from the get go but that is only my opinion...

Of course...if you read the press release "It said the operational schedule created by Delta is a key factor affecting on-time performance." Cmon...I know you guys are smart enough to fly planes so you are smart enough to read through the lines....YOU GUYS WERE SET UP TO FAIL....in order to justify what I said in my previous post....GAMES!!!

I hate to say....but I have said before....we are all pawns in this chess game of corporate america!!!!

I don't have Pinnacle's on time performance but I can say that I use them to commute to and from DTW almost every week and I can honestly say that their on time performance on the flights I have been on is terrible. I would say that less than 20% arrive within 15 minutes and less than 1% arrive at or prior to scheduled arrival. Then once you are at the gate it takes another 5-15 minutes just to get parked!

Rducky are you an idiot? Companies don't sign a contract for 16 planes "wanting them to fail." They wouldn't waste their time signing something unless they thought it would somehow contribute to their bottom line.

And btw nice logo...how 'bout an ALPA one instead bro? Or are you a "company pilot?"

Are all of you blind? Delta is beginning to dump all it's regionals. Comair and Mesaba will win out this time. Two words, "wholly owned".

Exactly sometimes people crack me up....I love the threads that say Mesa WINS!....they are a long way from winning, and I would also say that Delta has a fairly good team of lawyers, and if they are pulling this on PNCL then they must think the Mesa thing will hold. just my opinion.

Blame Mesaba ops!!!

Are you kidding dude....Why is it profitable for an airline to "wholly own" as you say an airline when they can subcontract "for cheaper" (by the way those are my two words)....Mesaba and Compass WILL be sold Like pinnacle was and Comair will be sold too....Delta has already stated that...they are just waiting for the market to jump back up and sell it for top dollar....WAKE UP!!!

Yeah...wholly owned carriers are SO safe. Oh wait, I almost forgot about the historical beating taken by Mesaba and Comair by their abusive parents.

Ahh, come on now!!!!.............is that the real reason???

Uhh...crew sched and dispatch and mx?

Pinnacle Pilots:

I can sympathize with you. Your management is going to blame this on you, even though it is their failure. We at Comair played this same game just a year or two ago while we were in contract negotiations, however ours was under the threat of bankruptcy and an 1113 process to have our contract tossed. When we lost 30+ airplanes and even more through a sham RFP that stripped us of 16 CRJ 700s, it did not help our contract situation. We, the pilots, were blamed for that and the company spun it in a way that made the rest of the employee groups hate us.

Please know that this is not the pilots fault, as much as your management probably will tell you it is. It is their failure, however, unfortunately YOU will pay the ultimate price with your quality of life, or jobs, for THEIR failure. You have done all you can in flying from Point A to Point B as safely as possible. It is management's responsibility to staff the airline properly, have the aircraft in good working condition and provide crews with the tools they need to operate safely, and if at all possible, on time.

If, ultimately, you see ASA or Comair or Skywest or Shuttle America flying airplanes on routes that you used to fly, do not blame the pilots flying those airplanes. Vent all of your frustration towards your management and toward Delta management. Those pilots have just as much control over that flying as you did.

Someone once told me that "The best friend that an airline pilot has is another airline pilot." I happen to agree with that statement. Management, however, knows this and often tries to exploit that notion and divide pilot groups amongst each other by "whipsawing" one group against another. If we allow this to happen, then they have ultimately won.

Good luck to all of you at Pinnacle and all of us in the industry.

however, that's Mesaba's and NWA's fault, not Pinnacle's. That's what happens when your Pappa Bear (NWA) forces you to use your competitor's ground crew :confused:

Amen Brother!!!

Hey im not pointing fingers at anyone......but, I did observe a pinnacle flight this morning that was scheduled to leave at 8:19, just begin to board at 8:15....the crew showed up something like 8:10, needless to say they didnt get out on time.

*Edit* I do not wish for Pinnacle to lose any flying BTW.

Delta stated when coming out of BK that they wanted to reduced the regional carriers that fly for them from 9 to 3 or 4 carriers.

Also, just because someone can do it cheaper doesn't mean they are more profitable. Look at Mesa...... THEY SUCK! You pay for what you get. Delta paid for cheap labor and they got cheap service. Some of the other carriers may have higher cost but better all around perfomance and profits.

Hey PNCL stock is dropping....wanna make a quick buck....I never say buy airline....BUT BUY PNCL NOW!!!!! and maybe sell a month from now......FAST MONEY.....PPPECHOOOWWW!!!!

Cause DAL schedules a -900 for a 30 minute turn with a crew swap from terminal 1 to terminal 4 :)

They did not get spanked. There was a simple injunction issued until the case goes to court. Freedoms performance and operation out of JFK could only be described as abhorrent. They deserved to lose the contract and I suspect Delta will prevail in court. Last Christmas they could not even staff the flights let alone get out ontime. There were many cancelations for no pilots available. The injunction did not rule on the merits of the case.

I have a question...when does a contract dwindle down....I mean first....PNCL flying is reduce by 290 hours....that was last week....and now....oh....let just cancel the contract.....weird.....smoke and mirrors friends!!!!

I would like to think I am not an idiot, but obviously you seem to think I am so whatever. Don't we all want our companies to be successful and when I say successful I mean not at the expense of our flight crews but with our flight crews as a valued partner. Yes I am with our flight crews they deserve a contract one that values their importance to the company.

Answer me this why is Delta so quick to terminate the contract....

As for my logo get over it....

RDUCKY...YOUR THE ONE....You make uncle phil have so much fun!!!!

Just playing dude....as long as you are on the strike line with that PNCL logo....I'll buy you a beer!!!

Delta subtracted all flights that were thinned due to weather when making the calculations for Mesa. You only need look at old threads here to get a idea why the contract was canceled. I can't tell you how many freedom flights I saw late or canceled for lack of crew. The operation in JFK was a disaster. At one point a Mesa pilot told me that pilots were quiting so fast they were into large cancelations everywhere and were working the remaining pilots to death..

I am not pointing the finger at the pilots just making an observation.... If DAL is going to use "on time" stats to terminate its contract then there may be some merit to their claim.

Um..that was here in DTW..first flight of the day, on a 200.......

Maybe "idiot" was slightly harsh. Sorry for that.

I want our company to be successful like anyone else. I just think that pilots should be more loyal to their fellow pilots than the company. I.e. if you're a senior captain making decent money, you would obviously have a vested interest in the company staying afloat, because you have it good...but you should still be willing to put your cushy job on the line and strike for the poor 1st/2nd year FOs here if and when called upon to do so, because you were there once, and in this industry you never know when you might be there again.

I have a question NWA320Pilot....when you merge are you gonna change you name to...hmmmm.....I dont know.....Delta320Pilot.....creative!!!!;)

JK....anyways....I would like to see the actual stats before staking the claim that all regional carriers are pretty much "comparitable" to other regional carriers as far as on time performance goes...which will not be justification for cancelling a contract if you felt that you are going to get the same performance from another carrier....The bottom line is....well the bottom line....who is going to provide the service for cheaper...thats all....its not more complicated than that. And if you can cancel one to get another for cheaper....you would....You tell me the last time your carrier actually really cared about on time performance...yeah they get a little slap on the wrist from the DOT...but the doesn't even dent the the bottom line...really if you think about it

This is the type of response I might expect from a grade schooler...... Grow up a little. All I was doing is stating my observations. I do understand that its not the pilots fault. I have many Pinnacle pilot friends and I know that they all relay their frustrations with company problems.

Maybe we will see.... :D

Ok company man....Im sorry....now read the above post...LOL

I thought Comair lost the RFP because Delta thought the costs (pilot pay rates) were not competitive, not because they had poor OT performance...I am missing how these situations are comparable. It would seem to me that the Comair issue was the whipsaw thing, and the Pinnacle issue is a completely different one, that being the ability to cancel the contract due to poor OT.

This is EXACTLY why they're going to shift back to wholly owned carriers. No contracts to worry about, no flying to guarantee, can easily swap and move airplanes making the airline more financially and operationally sound. It makes sense to have wholly owned carriers. Streamlined service, streamlined communication processes and an overall streamlined carrier. Consolidation of resources is becoming a HUGE part of our little aviation world.

Lay off the coffee, so far this thread is fairly flame bait free and professional, can we keep the personal attacks to a minimum?

You're welcome to sit on my jumpseat anytime and observe. I think you will find we have no gradeschoolers working for us. Middle schoolers and high schoolers, well i'll agree to that :) Im not even sure if Past V1 works at pinnacle....

They are comparable because Pinnacle, like us, are at risk of losing flying, aircraft, pilots, etc... just like us a Comair was a couple of years ago. The circumstances behind the reasoning has nothing to do with it.

Either crew costs or poor performance, it is still painful. We were under contract negotiations, as is Pinnacle. We had authorized a strike, as has Pinnacle. We had lost airframes and flying to other carriers, and it seems Pinnacle will also.

That was my point.

Well...actually newbie, when NWA bought us they no longer padded MAIR's pockets with an extra 7%. In business speak thats 7% cheaper then anyone else:p.

Not sure what version of MS Flight Simulator you "F/O" for but most
of your comments are pretty juvenile.

You are in an anonymous forum with a bunch of "I'm an airline pilot who got my private license 2 years ago" know it alls so I'm guessing you knew that was a rhetorical question....unfortunately.:rolleyes::)

We got all our money back and then some (401k deposit and snap back) . I still make more then a 9E pilot ever did or ever will. Ouch the beating...

Oh, I thought Pinnacle was buying Mesaba???? When you do fire all of them.:cool: