I suppose a good counter-argument to a SLI is that unlike many of the other companies that go under, pilots at Mesa have seen this coming for years. Those that had have moved on even at the expense of seniority or got their time and moved up. Those that are left, IMO are there solely to get ahead by using the quick upgrades. People who play that kind of gamble with their career should accept defeat if Mesa goes BK.

I think a decent compromise is to give preferential hiring to ex-mesa pilots after the companies gone but perhaps a straight SLI is a bit too generous.

I would suggest you all listen carefully to what Nevets is saying. He is not simply making this up. What he speaks of is the greatest achievement to come out of this year's ALPA BOD. The fee for departure carriers have been negotiating secretly ever since to do exactly what he proposes. ALPA feels it's the only way to end whipsaw at the regional level. They feel it will prevent an airline, say Delta, from simply eliminating a high cost regional, say ASA, and replacing them with a low cost one. It would force them to take the pilots if they take the planes.

It sounds great on paper. The only problem is negotiating it and incorporating it into the contracts. Management ain't gonna like it. That means major concessions to get it. Is it really worth it, Nevets? Or will it just be another paper tiger like mainline scope?

I don't think that's a good counter argument at all. How would you argue that pilots at Mesa saw the writing on the wall for years? :confused:

Is that any different than the pilots who left decent regionals to go to compass? They will be stapled above all other regionals when what ALPA's working on happens.

the rest of us saw the writing. people i've known that worked at mesa, and in some cases still do, saw the writing. it's big giant letters on a huge wall. not hard to see. especially by those people working at the company!

Your dignity and self-respect hinge on who you work for? Why would you give an employer, or anyone that sort of power over you?

Maybe the "spineless ones" fled and the strong ones stayed and fought to improve things.

Haha, I'm not one to jump into these arguments, but I'm gonna have to raise the BS flag really, really high on this one. You stayed at Mesa to get your PIC time, not to improve the industry.

And for the record SlapHappy, this is about the umpteenth thread you've started about "big news" at SkyWest. Since I've been here the only big things that have come along are: the rise and fall of the midwest flying and the LAX base. With both of those changes nobody knew about them until they were actually awarding spots in the respective new domiciles. You're drunk on company Koolaid again and I might have to find you a sponsor and a 12 step program this time.

Because you either take their abuse or get fired. It's not optional at mesa...I've been there, you can't BS me.

Get real. The spineless ones stayed and rolled over for OJ when they had him by the short hairs last year. If I had thought that enough folks would stand up and ACTUALLY improve things, I would have stayed too. I started to have my doubts, turns out I was right.

the big announcement is bs... but it seems to be true that we have some additional flying via pro rate and increased block hours. enough to warrant no more VLA.

UAL has also sure'd up our 120's through 2011 with talks about 2013 (from KB). We currently have 59 on property but we are only using 49 (includes spares). The 10 will still be sold at around $4-5M/per but it will have no effect on our operations. UAL has also advised SKW that they can expect high block hours on these airframes. So much that NO EMB pilots can get LOA's and due to the projected understaffing on the FO side (almost no reserves for peak) they are considering running a small transition class (10-15) from RJ to EMB for those FO's who would like to move over (some already have their bid in and many are sitting in ORD or MKE went they're from the west coast).

After all, an RJ FO working only 10-15 hours with 10 days off per month makes the same as a line holding EMB FO who averages 90+ hours of pay with 14-15 days off. The last EMB line holder has a hire date of June of 08 and the last RJ line holder has a hire date of Mid 07.