They get 4 weeks vacation, 6 figure pay, nice bonuses, weekends/holidays off, 8hr days... Say that's worth more than 15-18 days off, Jr. assignments/extensions, 15hr duty days with only 5-8hrs block, min coverage days, 2 weeks vacation that must start on mondays and 60G's a yr for a CA 35G's FO. (average) oh... and furloughs.

 

Going back to the original thread, I think that there might be a slight chance that they'll need more pilots, but the truth is that they'll have people flying more days a month.
Anyhow, I wouldn't hold my breath on these new regs. briging jobs back. I'm honestly looking forward for the economy to pick up again. Folks, this is still AMERICA ! when the recesion is over, a boom will follow. The only thing the USA needs to watch, is the energy prices (OIL$$$), that's the only thing that could hold back the next economy boom. International travel will pick up again big time, this means majors will increase capacity again and the cycle restarts. Now, I think we'll see something interesting, like accelerated growth met by massive ex-military 'nam era guys retirements. I get the feeling that we are only 4-5 years away from all this.

 

Me too. 12hr limits is gonna hurt more than help me.

 

Heard from a guy at Mesaba that someone in training told him Mesaba would have to hire when the new rule went through. Personally I think that might be taking it a bit far, especially with the loss of 13 more Saabs. I do think it will mean less furloughs then there would have been otherwise.
I also heard from a fed that there is a good chance that highspeeds will no longer be able to be integrated with regular lines.
For the airlines who are close to proper staffing currently, I think they might see some hiring.

 

The whole days off thing is not regulatory, its what is negotiated by the union or set by management (non-union airlines).

If you don't like 10 days off then that's something to bring up to the people who make it happen. Some regionals have better schedules than others. 10-12 days off is still better than the 8 the rest of the world gets, granted not always on the same days!

If this rule passes, the only way we'll have the days off taken away is if we give it away!

 

Exactly! (filler)

 

I spent 15 years in non-aviation fortune 500 middle and senior management. My average work week was 55 to 60 hours, 10 to 11 hour days. Up at 5:30am and in the car at 6:30 to commute 45 minutes to work so as to be in the office by 7:15 to answer (mostly ignore) 75 to 150 emails and vmails a day. By 8:30a my door was revolving with people and meetings (I had a staff of 75 in the last position) until 6:00p or so. I would work at my desk until 7:30 or 8:00p trying to clear up the critical stuff, drive 35 minutes home, and get in around 9:00. Have dinner with the wife, review a little material for tomorrow, and hit the sack at 11:00p to do it all over again. My fellow directors and I would go into the office on Saturday's from 9 - 3 to clean up as much of the week's desk work as possible. I would take Saturday evening and Sunday morning off. Sunday evening I would work at the home office preparing for Monday. I spent most of the time tired and in a fog.

I traveled an average of 8 nights a month away from home. I never saw a three-day weekend like Labor day completely off. I never had two weeks off in a row - at most one week every other year and I spent at least some of it on the phone or internet on company business. My request for a week of vacation was almost always meet with "do you have to go now?" or "you can take the week of Christmas off."

The best retirement plan I had was a 2.5% 401k company match. I saw a bonus only one year (even though I spent seven years working in the "high flying dot-com era"). I had stock options twice (once it was a lot of stock options), both times they expired worthless (80% of all stock options issued do expire worthless). I never saw an annual raise more than 1.25%. The only way to make more money was to get promoted. Period. The only way to just keep your job was to do at least the amount of work described above.

After 15 years I walked into my office to see the head of HR and my boss standing there. My position was eliminated in a company reorganization without regard to seniority or tenure or notice (it happen three times in 15 years). I was asked to be out the door in less than 30 minutes.

As a pilot, I'm home more, see my wife more, have a better retirement plan, far better insurance, a number of guys below me that would go before I do, union job protection, job security like I have never had before, and an activity I love to do. I can earn more sitting at home on reserve doing nothing than I made as a 8 year middle manager. I'm still adjusting to having more than three days off in a row.

We need to fight like h*** to keep it and improve it, because of the number of people lives we have daily in our hands, the level of professionalism required to safely do the job, and the consequences of even minor failure.

Management experience's the above in their daily lives and do not understand ours. They only interact on a daily basis with other management personal and management pilots who don't fly regularly. They think we should be made to work the hours they do. They don't understand fatigue. All they know is the fog of their lives and think we should be able to operate aircraft in the same tired fog.

Sorry for the rant.

 

Can someone please help me understand why we will get screwed by duty time going to 12 hours? I have some Captains telling me this but I am missing something. I dont understand how we will have fewer days off in a month.

Sounds like my prior job at UPS!

 

Minimum days off (10, 11, 12, whatever) is in your contract. Maximum days off is not.

So if your current airline has the days off for lines split like this (shortened for space):

10 days off - 50% of all lines
12 days off - 25%
13 days off - 20%
14+ days off - 5%

It may end up looking like this:

10 days off - 100%

As long as you are on reserve it wont mean anything to you though.

 

Didn't sound like a rant to me, it sounded like pretty good insight. Thanks for sharing!