PDT News and Rumors
 

Dont think there is a thread for any PDT news and rumors, so I figured it would be nice to have one to see what people hear/know of what might be going on within the company, or the future.

Was going to just start a thread asking this question, but figured this might be a better idea.

Any news on the 200s that PDT was supposively looking at?? Or did they try to low-ball Horizon and the deal went sour? Havent heard any news on this at all lately.. I suppose new airplanes and PDT is an oxymoron.

PDT is a joke! The only worthwhile news or half-way interesting headline might sound something like:

"Training Manager Jay Keen finally reveals he is gay." or
"CP John Buchanan demoted to company janitor, where his skills find their match!" or
"Entire training dept. fall victim to firing squad."

Wake me when it gets interesting!

I watched the latest video on TheHub with Dug Parker addressing flight crews and that question was asked by a PDT check airman. Doug said at this time there are no plans for any new aircraft.

I heard the low ball offer we gave to the leasing company getting horizons 200's was laughed out of the office. Never should have dumped them to begin with. Other then that Philly ATC is so impressed with the delay ridden CLT metering program that they are thinking of implementing it.

I didnt think the deal was actually going to go through. Figures this is a time for PDT and US Airways to take advantage of the fuel efficient Dash-8s and do something with the company but of course they can apparently care less. . . Biscoffs anyone?

<P>Then again I suppose during these times no news is a good thing.</P>

.Wow JK is still there that guy is the most arrogant person in aviation, rude, disprespectul and think his sh@t don't smell wonder why they keep him around , then again some other instructor came in the first day and told us we don't belong here.,

For the pilots in the pool waiting patiently to hear when their class date will be, I was told today that "We have not "ranked" anyone at this point in time. When a class is scheduled, I will be given guidance from our VP of Flight Operations (Michael J. Scrobola). In regards to when they will start, it is still uncertain. Also, when they start hiring, they will be looking for minimum 1000+ hour pilots.

Just some more info for the pilots, like myself, who are trying to get as much information as they can.

interesting...still wonder if they are going to hire??

Yeah he should really be gone. There are professionals - and then theres JK. He likes to spread his "joy" whenever possible. Talk about contagious attitude! :rolleyes:

I remember Johhny during an interview I had with them in the distance past.

The man came off to me as a person with a serious Napolenic complex. He reminds me of the Bald guy Benny Hill used to slap on his head all the time.

From the e-mails I have been receiving from Bob, it is dependent upon attrition, upgrades, and new planes. As of a few weeks ago, they plan on six upgrades; but I would think they would start classes in the current pool, and get through those before they look at hiring again. Especially since their classes are expected to be decreased to 6-8 pilots, instead of the 12-16 they used to have (I am unsure if those are the exact figures, but I know it was more than 6-8). I don't know if this is possible/feasible, but my fear is that they will be looking for those recently furloughed pilots with 1000s of hours of turbine time, and hire some of them for the upcoming classes, while getting rid of us low-time pilots waiting in the pool. Anyone know if a situation like this has ever occured, or seems likely?? I know Bob has been emphasizing that he wants all of us in the pool to work for them, but I am hoping that US Airways doesn't force them to hire more experienced pilots.

The fact of the matter is, you are already hired, and even if PDT decided to hire 1000+ hour pilots, they wouldn't be more senior to you. So don't get discouraged and feeling that your job is in jeoprady...it's not....

They would only hire 1000+ hour pilots if they were in need of more captains, since the current FO's don't have enough hours....very similar to what pinnacle was going for a while when their FO's didn't have enough hours to upgrade.

Otherwise, there is already another hiring pool of applicants that have interviews when hiring does begin again. It will be very interesting to see what happens in the upcoming months. Hopefully all good news :rolleyes:

Very true, I been hanging out since my June 16th class got cancelled in Mid-April for so long, I forgot that I am technically hired!! Let's hope for good news!! Hopefully we get more routes.

Doing the same thing, flying as a CFI and building hrs like mad. Trying to get up to about 1500+ before I go to class so I can get an upgrade earlier. Hope PSA dosent fold their pool like Air Whiskey.

Sherwood80, we are already hired so dont worry about having more expereinced pilots coming in. The fact is if PDT is one of the only regional hiring, so they will not be short on applicants (so they are being more picky now). I emailed one of CAs at PDT he seemed very positive and said everyone in the pool should be in class by end of 08...hope he is rt

I also hope he is right. You know just as well as I do, things can (and will) change week to week; I just hope it is a positive change. You gotta love this lovely "black gold"

PDT has its share of numbskulls - every airline does. That said, PDT is no joke - we have a great contract by comparison to other regionals, and we do a damn fine job of serving the small-time role that we do.

Don't know if any of you guys have seen/heard about this. Happened last week at GSO, heres the vid.

Video

Also, on a side note. Talked to BT today. He said as we all know hiring has frozen pretty much solid, maybe will interview and hire a couple more towards the end of the year... then he whipped out a 7'' tall stack of "good" resumes. Then said theres a bigger stack of the "bad" ones. The "good" ones that they will be drawing from when I asked the average hours that the guys have he said around 1,200-1,500TT.

hmm....if he said they might hire a couple more towards the end of this year, did he imply anything about additional classes than the one he told us they were planning to have, with 6-8 pilots in September??

I'm not sure about that. He just showed me a huge stack of resumes they will be picking from, so I do assume they will be going through those resumes and picking a couple from the bunch to hire.. Unless I mis-understood him.. Maybe he meant by hire to just get the rest of the guys in the pool into a class. :confused:

For those of you waiting classes, find something else to do for a while cause movement in the company has slowed down drastically. I have been on the line since January and the past three months held a build-up line(half reserve/half hard trips) January and February I broke guarantee. This month, the only trips I did where the ones assigned on my build-up. I went for 27 days without flying, my roommate who is straight reserve went for 42 days without flying.

On a side note rant- my trip trades still get declined due to "coverage" even though I haven't flown a reserve trip in a while.

Nice video post Stoki, i'd be interested to hear what happened on 335 with all the wierd ECU juju goin on in the 300's lately.

i am confused...there are 30 ppl in the pool and BT is talking about hiring??? how does that work?

I agree with three green...that doesn't sound too credible. Especially considering from what I've heard.

Maybe by hiring what he actually meant was just starting a class from people already in the pool.. probably just some miscommunication.

Dont know what went down on 335, I don't even think they know yet.

All I've heard (from the captain) was that the engine started surging at 50', so they shut it down and came back... dont know why it was surging though....

It was a beta lockout failure. They shouldn't have shut it down if they read the checklist. Oh well, it worked out.

higgi8f6, where are you based?

EWN. Nice place, good crews, nice hotels, nice trips. Just tired of sitting on my butt and not knowing what is going on. If I had a family or something EWN would be perfect, home alot and it is a nice place to raise a family. But getting more than minimum days off would be nice. There is only so much you can do for fun in New Bern on your reserve days. Debating over MDT, SBY, or ROA. Not sure which one yet though. Figure I would move away for a couple months then come back when I could hold a little seniority in base. Its a QOL decision.

MDT is a great place but its gonna be a shock going from EWN PDT crews to the ALG crews in MDT. We operate the airplane a little differently from you guys. I was hired as a Piedmont pilot but raised as an Allegheny pilot. I know the company likes to say everyone here is a bunch of old cranky guys but its simply not true. There are only a few bad apples just like every other base.

Heard good things about ROA and a mix about SBY. As long as you're used to operating the true PDT way SBY will be great for you.

The only difference I notice between alg/pdt is that the alg guys (myself included) prefer to land with condition levers 1050 when possible instead of max. How is MDT a shock?

I think one of the biggest and most annoying differences for me is that odt guys don't use the interphone. That gets annoying fast considering I still use my trusty DCs. I've also known pdt crews to turn the batteries off even when they see us coming out to the airplane. I've known a few people to have to abort starts because of stuff like that. There aren't many huge differences between pdt and alg, but there is a lot of small stuff like that.

As far as shock is concerned, I still see a lot of anti-ALG sentiment outside of MDT. I've heard everything from sighs to an "oh youre one of them" when true pdt crews find out I'm from MDT. I think it would definitely be a shock for an F/O transferring from the anti-alg sentiment found down south to the anti-pdt feelings I know many MDT crews have. Just a big culture difference.

i get so excited when someone writes in this thread...but then i read it and its just you guys talking about different crews and bases :(. We want news!!!

You "get so excited when someone writes in this thread"?!? Are you serious? I think you need to find yourself a new pastime, pal.

no, just hoping someone says "PDT is 50 crews short!!!" a guy can dream

Why would ANYONE use the interphone? Unless you're an oldtimer who's nearly deaf, there's absolutely NO reason to use it. You've obviously passed your medical, so you should have no problem using a single-ear headset. The problem is that the newbie's in MDT get conditioned to the way the old guys make them do things, so they eventually become convinced that that's 'the way' to do it. Time to ditch the DC's, guys! You're not flying a light twin anymore, and therefore there's no reason to wear those ridiculous looking headsets in the cockpit. Spend a few bucks and look like an airline pilot. In my cockpit, you'll have that DC on one ear only, or you're gonna have a L O N G day.

Ah...I see where you're at. Waitin' to get a class, huh? Sorry for the previous comment. I know it sucks waiting, so hopefully you'll hear some good news soon. Best of luck!

no prob coop, i pretty much only read the PDT thread and thats it. nothing else really applies to me here