I'm sure the Q would work well in Hawaii

The Q400 works well in any market that is short enough but still needs more seats than your average RJ and better fuel burn.

So yes it would work well in Hawaii.

Any word about any of this from your side of the fence?

Not a whisper just tossing another log on the fire :)

It would seem like it would work well, in which I agree. Island Air didn't have any luck with the Q400 out there. I think the capacity is too much for the islands (running a "regional route") A Q300 would possibly be better.

Loads are at least 95% on the 170, at least the routes I fly. I can't speak for the 190 or Airbus. When did you check the flights? Anything on short notice will be a high ticket price.
Although this thread has remained quite civil, the initial poster was definitely flaming away. You have no need to post such garbage.

The guy who did the deal.

Thanks for noticing.... whose the flamer now? Are you trying to relight the ashes?

That's exactly what Lynx did.

That is funny!!

Wow really? It'd be nice if you actually knew the facts.

What do you mean?

Thats helpful. To whom?

TD this has been explained to you before. Lynx was a startup but the pilot group was a stacked deck. The lowest time pilot had just shy of 2000 hrs, how much did you have in 2007 when you started? This was not the 1st job for any of our startup pilots, later yes, but the initial group no.

If your guys are to fly the Q green on green it'll take time and money to train everyone and then more time to get everyone up to speed. High mins captains, low time F/O's not to mention ASE, good luck.

I asked you before TD if you've heard anything on your side of the "fence"? Hint hint.

The same. My earlier post might have not been as clear as I intended, sorry for the confusion. My point was that Lynx was a new airline running new routes. At some point people had to go into Aspen for a first time. While I have no idea what bs the company will try and pull I have no doubt that flying in wouldn't be an issue with proper training.


I don't know what you're getting at by this. You'll have to spell that one out a little for me.

Not really, we had a lot of Ex-Mesa Dash 8 folks with lots of Aspen time so the program expanded off of theirs. The manuals were written and for those of us who hadn't been in there, we got plenty of sim and line training. Which I greatly appreciated after listening to everybody else going in there. It seemed like us and SkyWest were the only ones who knew what they were doing up there. Seen and heard a lot of scary stuff from the corporate folks. Not a place to mess around with.

Although I think we did have a while with mostly junior pilots flying the Aspen lines because no one wanted to do 6 legs, all Aspen, all day for no money. No premium pay, short flights, lots of work, long briefings for each approach. They tried the premium pay for a month, then we lost that, then they mixed the day trips with ABQ and gave those lines the most days off. That seemed to work somewhat.

Okay, I'll bite...what kind of "scary stuff" did you see & hear from "corporate folks" up in Aspen?

Is it a challenging airport? Yes...but it ain't rocket science.

I heard this one: "What do you mean single engine departure? Balked procedure??"

I don't know the performance characteristics of a Citation but I bet they're not good enough to not need a special single engine departure. But many people just blast off like it's any other airport.

Hopefully something more is in the mix regarding the Q. What was your average flight time on those legs? It'd be nice to see it stay in service. There are several routes being flown currently that could really benefit from them.

For the record, even SkyWest has a waiver to operate into Aspen, AWAC was the last operator that I know of that could actually fly out of there successfully after losing an engine. That might've been because they had 4 on the BACjet though :)

I have heard a lot of pilots chatter about things over at Atlantic ASE at a previous job... like "we are part 91 so we don't need all that climb gradient stuff" or "it's VFR, if we lose an engine we should be able to keep it level". I spoke with an ASE controller one day and he said the FAA was sitting in the tower the IFR day before copying down tail numbers as everyone took off. Then they were sending out letters to the listed PIC asking for proof of the modifications made to the airplanes so they were legal to make the LINDZ departure climb gradient. I bet violations followed shortly after. If it's VFR you don't need much but IFR watch out.

Lynx required 100 or 200 hours in the left seat and approval by the training department before you could attempt to become ASE qualified. During the checkout you had to do a Loc 15, circle 33 and a Roaring fork visual. Even doing 3 turns a day the conditions rarely allowed you do all 3 in the same day... with checkouts averaging 3 days. Recently they added a night landing as a requirement. Same procedures were required to be done in the sim within 3 months prior to checkout plus balked landings for both runways. Obviously with the limited lifespan of the Q's at RAH they aren't going to waste the money training any new people to do this... especially considering they aren't typed.

Lynx started flying in Dec and flew the first flight to ASE in April... so everyone had the hourly requirement before it happened.

Agreed on the training but local knowledge for that kind of flying is OJT only. All of our check airmen were prior Dash-8 and or had Aspen experience.

The 2nd part about the fence, how are Lynx pilots going to fly under a Republic certificate prior to the SLI?

True story, some do, some dont. We had performance software to help us calculate the requirements, applied at Eagle also.

Aspen turn is about 50 min. block. More questions than answers now.

No it's not but, it's strange how people treat it. Tend to see a lot of stuff with total disregard to winds aloft, the upsloping runway, and just not knowing the local landmarks.
The scariest seems to be when someone tries to fly a normal approach, not following the PAPI, and ends up nearly scraping tree tops, or when someone has to go around and the controller has to remind them to turn downwind. Plus same thing about the lack of balked or single engine procedures.
Contrary to what most believe, it seems, if you go missed after the missed approach point, the published missed does NOT provide terrain clearance. Moot with an ILS but with a LOC that has an MAP three to six miles from the runway it becomes kind of important. I think the charter outfits that fly in there a lot do a great job and don't mess around but for many it becomes pretty obvious that they have never been there before.

I sure hope so too, it's a good aircraft, very capable and fun to fly. The only downside it seems that an airline has to have a lot of spare parts for it. It's amazing how well we did do considering how long we went without a spare aircraft and parts.
As far as performance, I remember flying the CRJ and even with the 700 and 900 we had a lot of flights that had weight issues. Either a performance limit for takeoff or more commonly a landing weight limit. It just seemed rare that we had issues like that in the Q. Every once and a while in ASE while it was snowing maybe, but most of the time the FMS would take whatever we put into it. Very very capable aircraft.

The flight was usually blocked at 50 minutes but it was typically 25-30min wheels up to wheels down.

Exactly

We could too under most conditions, not sure if we had a waiver or not, don't think we did. Just a big difference in the performance requirements between part 91 and part 121.

Since ODP climb gradients are based on all-engines operating climb performance, that's 100% correct for part 91 operators...you don't have to be able to meet the ODP climb gradient with OEI. The FAA says the PIC does have to have a contingency plan, however, should circumstances arise that they cannot meet the gradient (like in the case of an engine failure). Visually maintaining one's own terrain/obstruction avoidance is one method, the other (useful when departing IFR) is a runway analysis & special departure procedure developed by APG.

I've heard that yarn before - FAA ASIs writing down tail numbers of aircraft departing at ASE in order to violate operators. Interestingly enough, nobody ever claims to have been violated or personally know anyone who was violated for departing ASE because they couldn't meet the 7.6% gradient OEI...

My AFM says at 18°C there's no possible way for me to depart ASE and maintain 7.6% to 14,000ft, but with an APG analysis says at 18°C I can depart at MGTOW. Needless to say, I wouldn't be real keen on being harassed by an ASI expecting me to prove I could meet the gradient when he cannot provide I couldn't...

I have no idea. I don't believe anything until it happens either. Until recently there was a 100% guarantee that all the Qs were going away. Knowing this management I wouldn't be surprised if they try something sneaky.

I know you don't NEED it part 91... but for me common sense sends a different message. If it's not legal 121 or 135 then my judgment says I shouldn't do it. I used to stop in Peublo or Grand Junction most trips out of ASE part 91 cause I thought it was a smarter plan. The boss never complained when I told him it was safer. You could even play the fuel is 8 bucks a gallon card if you had to but it never came to that.

I can tell that our contract states that the flying would be done by RAH pilots. As duck duck goose said, who know what our management team will dream up for this one.

Just hire former Lynx guys as management pilots? Already typed...already experienced...$60k a year?.....

If it was a performance issue with the 170 or 190 it's not the first time they made that kind of mistake.

About 7 or 8 years ago CHQ management assured Delta that the EMB135 could get in and out of EYW and fly to MCO without any issues. They found out only a day or two before that it might not. After last minute scrambling and talking to Embraer they found out that the 135 could indeed do it with 37 people and full bags but only with a few hundred lbs above min fuel with no alternate. If any more fuel was added they would bump passengers. So they got away with it. However, on several occasions due to MCO needing an alternate they needed to fuel stop from EYW to MCO in RSW! Not one of Chautauqua management's (now Republic), finest moments.

In light of this I wouldn't be surprised that someone in management screwed up badly. But what do I know?

That's an interesting story...

When I worked at AWAC we'd seasonally do EYW-MCO in the CRJ-200; I don't remember if we were pax-restricted on that particular segment (I do remember we didn't have more than a few extra pounds of fuel to play around with) but I seem to recall it not really being a problem to take 40ish people to Orlando.

I know Eagle used to do RDU-AUS in a E135 which I've always heard was "hot rod"...I presume the E145 I saw Freedom flying EYW-MCO during that time was better on that particular route?

In my opinion Lynx should be added to the Frontier certificate. It never made sense to me to have Lynx seperate from Frontier. Economies of scale (10 airplanes) should have precluded it in the first place. All of the duplicated functions (management, headquarters, dispatch, scheduling, maintenance, ect., ect. made it a losing proposition from the start (three times the startup cost than what was planned). Inside rumors report that Lynx IS the reason for the bankruptcy. Frontier could just as easily have added the Q400 to the Frontier certificate and made that aircraft the entry level position and negotiated a fair wage scale for that aircraft. The aircraft and it's markets made sense. A whole new airline for just 10 aircraft did not.

Fuel spiking over $100 a barrel and getting hit hard by the credit card processing have always been pointed at as the key issues.

I believe Comair did EYW-MCO as well and would limit seats, but you would have to ask someone at Comair about that.

The E145 would actually be more restricted. EYW would always want to try for a 145 around spring break and was always told no because they would get less than 37 pax on a 145.

Eagle has done RDU-AUS and still does very long segments like LGA-XNA. CHQ has done them as well such as MCO-IND, CMH etc. The range of the aircraft wasn't the issue. It's the take off performance that is the problem. The 145 family can't deal with the 4800 ft runway.

I honestly would have figured the Embraers were less runway-happy than Canadairs...plus they're more fuel efficient so I suppose I thought their range on such a short segment wouldn't be an issue.

Guess not...

Yah, but we flew that route with the Brasilia back in the good 'ole days.

Pointed to by Frontier management. That's easier that admitting that you totally mucked up the Lynx fiasco that cost you 90 million. Had the Q400 simply been put on the F9 certificate, the aircraft would have been generating revenue a full year sooner (at a minimum) with a fraction of the startup costs and a fraction of the operating costs.

The Lynx debacle left them cash poor. Had they had that cash they could have weathered the oil spike and would not have been vulnerable to the credit card processor.

That's a lot of speculation. I think the credit card issue hit them to the tune of $150 million.

Exactly, Lynx was not the reason for Chap 11.

The Lynx certificate did cost a lot of money... the number you mentioned is 3 times higher than anything I have heard before (depends who is telling the story I guess). There are lots of reasons why F9 was low on cash at the time. Like, recession, competition, 318's, RAH contract, deliveries, fuel price, post Potter syndrome, Lynx certificate delays, and course First Data. These reasons combined caused the chapter 11... not just one of them.

even if the creation of lynx contributed to bk the mgmt of Frontier made the decisions. no fault of the lynx subsidiary for the stupidity at Frontier.

It's all spilt milk at this point. S.M. got the ship headed in the right direction. I still think he would have been better off to cut his loses with Lynx and just add the aircraft and employees to the F9 certificate. The aircraft and it's markets make a lot of sense. Having a whole separate airline with all of the duplicated functions and only 10 airplanes did not make sense. Don't get me wrong. I always have considered the Lynx employees to be top notch, and their DOT record speaks for that, but I have always also considered them to be Frontier employees. If B.B. does decide to keep them in some form, they deserve to be on the Frontier certificate.