Eagle does approx. 1400 flights a day for feed to American Airlines. What regional can pick up this flying in our current environment ? Wake up people!!

 

Not trying to get involved in the fray but the number of flights doesn't matter. What matters is the amount of seats. Frequency is going away for fewer flights with more seats. 8 flights a day in a 145 can easily be replaced by 5 175/900's. So that means fewer pilots overall needed. Hell, you throw in 1 MD-80/A320 flight and you can decrease the number of flights by 2.

Once the 50 seaters and smaller are gone there will be fewer pilots needed to move the same amount of passengers. So really they would only need to be able to replace 1400 flights with 921 (using 50 seats as an average). With Skywest/Expressjet and Air Wisconsin having a great deal of 50 seaters that are going to be exchanged for fewer 175/900's there will be plenty of pilots available to fly those flights. Not to mention the overlap that you will see go away as hubs are shrinked or shutdown.

 

Will the regional replace the number of pilots leaving with new hires? I hear RAH hasn't been able to grow their SL much over 100 number while hiring hundreds and that's in 2013, the hiring in 2014 is projected to increase by 200% to 300%. There is a reason why 300 or so 50 seaters will be parked over the next 2 years. The regionals might be able to hire about 25% of the pilots leaving out the door.

 

We simply disagree on how fast they could shut down Eagle. I'm not going to try to convince you how fast it could be because neither of us know exactly but they have Eagle by the balls... and it is simply my opinion that Eagle is not as safe as some like you seem to believe.

 

Just do the math on an airline like Expressjet which currently flies ~251 EMB's (9 of which are 135's) and 106 CRJ-200's (including 11 for American). United/Delta must park most almost all of those that they fly along with almost all of Skywest's CRJ-200 fleet (158 including 12 for American) because of the contract they signed with their pilot groups. Those planes will not be replaced at 1:1 rate so they will have a glut of pilots with nothing to fly. They are the ones who could easily take on Eagle's flying.

It is true RAH can barely staff its airline as their seniority list has only grown 90 pilots from March to December despite hiring 293 pilots in that time (364 pilots were hired for all of 2013). More than likely if the options for the additional 47 175's are exercised, CHQ will be shut down to staff it. But they aren't the real threat as RAH already has a majority of 70 seaters. Anyplace with a large amount of 145's/200's will be losing a great deal of flying and will have plenty of pilots to staff new flying. Or like in the case of Skywest, they own their 200's and could easily repaint them like they already have. I have not heard of Skywest having a class with no shows yet. Heck even Mesa hasn't been having trouble staffing as of late since the announcement of the 175's.

I do agree that its going to get harder and harder to staff at the regional level as real hiring at the majors increases. However, I do not think it would be a problem for Eagle's flying to easily be replaced quickly as they were already planning on reducing it for 2014. Look how fast ACA or Colgan were replaced.

Also, Air Wisconsin needs something for after 2015 and could take on a new type like the 175 or more CRJ's like the 900 rather quickly. I bet it could even be at exchange rate of 2:1 or 3:1 and still get them to terminate their 200 contract early. Or because they are privately held, their owner could shut it down overnight and cash out. Than those pilots will need someplace to go until they can get picked up by mainline.

So to sum up, Eagle's current flying could easily be replaced in less than a year's time. My prediction is that if Eagle pilot's sign the concessionary deal, they will go down to ~60 ERJ's and than be sold off to RAH. There is more than likely a reason that an Eagle exec was just placed on RAH's board.

 

I didn't know that United has to park most of their 50 seaters, you might want to go review SCOPE again, then come back and lecture me how SKW inc must park most of the 50 seaters.

I still think you are missing my point, in our contract there are 2,700 pilots furlough protected, it will be interesting how this company can shut down Eagle in a short period of time and violate SCOPE while they are profitable to include Eagle. Management is not saying Eagle isn't profitable, they are making arguments that come 2015 when Delta does their adjustments they will be at a disadvantage. There is more here than just one group taking a few airplanes. I fully see AirWisky jumping in the picture soon specially as the slots in DCA and LGA are sold and also PDT as they park airframes, But there is much more than just swapping airplanes around. I have seen management violate contract provision on a daily basis so I don't know how well a furlough protection would pan out but it's something that is there and has to be accounted for.

 

As an FYI,
The 145's will not leave Eagle until at least 2022. They will be drawn down to a much smaller number, but they will remain for the smaller markets.

 

United's new scope is once the maximum number of (71-76) seat regional aircraft is reached (223) the maximum limit of 50 seat regional jets will have been capped down to 125. This is what would provide the Hard-Cap of 450 Regional Aircraft. Before they hit the limit of 223 70-seaters:

For the first 10 aircraft above 153 (71-76) seat aircraft,United must reduce by 27 (50) seat aircraft.
For the next 10 (71-76) aircraft above 163, United must reduce by an additional 28 (50) seat aircraft.
For the next 10 (71-76) aircraft above 173, United must reduce by an additional 29 (50) seat aircraft.
For the next 10 (71-76) aircraft above 183, United must reduce by an additional 30 (50) seat aircraft.
For the next 20 (71-76) aircraft above 193, United must reduce by an additional 62 (50) seat aircraft.
For the next 10 (71-76) aircraft above 213, United must reduce by an additional 46 (50) seat aircraft.

I'm not arguing about your furlough protection, I'm talking solely about whether the flying could be replaced. My initial post was to regards to somone's post regarding 1400 flights a day not being able to be replaced. Besides when has any airline management actually followed a legally binding contract.

 

Is this based on a company provision in the concessionary TA they are offering? What prevents the 50 seaters from being flown by Skywest/Expressjet, Air Wisconsin, Commutair, Piedmont or PSA?

 

Great, you went and got the numbers. But now lets look at how they would get to park the 50 seaters. For United to park the 50 seaters they would have to put into service another 80 or so 76 seaters and this includes the Q400 tanning in the sun. And then they would have to add more 76 seaters, your math is that SKW inc is going to have surplus of pilots but one has to realize that hiring at the majors will triple in 2014 and the amount of new hires for the regionals will be likely be cut by 25% or so. Yes EXJ could get a whole lot of AA flying if they parked most of United and Delta's 50 seaters but we know attrition will likely keep up with airframes leaving our the door at EXJ. PDT and AWAC are the places that could park their airframes or substitute the current flying AE does with AWAC 50 seaters. But we need to account that someone also would have to staff the 40 76 seaters Delta has left that will go into service later next year and also whatever 76 seaters United decides to add into the mix.

Mesa and RAH are hiring, currently they are hiring but the numbers coming in the door are similar to those going out the door. PSA is in the same situation, will they get to grow their SN list, i bet they will but will it be enough to grow the airline 100% like they are planing onto, doubling the airline's size? It means these two airlines are planing to hire 1000 pilots next year. RAH said already they will sacrifice their 50 seaters to staff the Ejets. They are talking about getting another 30 or so next year. So if they shut down CHQ they still have to hire to maintain numbers for attrition. Just these 3 airlines are looking at hiring well over 1000 new hires. Serious question, do you think there will be enough pilots out there to staff all this growth flying?

American 300+
Delta 500+
United 500+
JetBlue 250+
Spirit ???
Virgin, they got new routes so I bet they will hire as well

Cargo, 135, fractional????

Regional retirements????

The gest of the PSA contract and the Eagle offer is to lock in the pilots at rates for the next 10 years under the AAG umbrella and entice new hires with flow while the other airlines jockey for new hires with $$$. Mesa and RAH are looking at contracts improvements? Why is that?