If one were to get hired at Eagle and choose ORD, how hard would the commute be from MSP? Plenty of AA, UAL, and NWA flights a day, but how are the trips, what is the length of reserve in ORD, and are there any crashpads available?

Thanks!

I used to fly that route on the guppy years ago and the commuters at the time painted a very bleak picture of the actual commute. Even though there are many flights - they were always full and delayed for t-storms in the summer and snow in the winter.

Didn't sound like fun. You may want to talk to as many people as you can about commuting on that route. Also, do a search (in the google box above) but there was crackdown on crashpads around midway and O'Hare within the last year and many were closed down.

One of the harder commutes out there. It's doable, but you'll be one of many. Go to a carrier based in MSP. Even though they may be a little worse than Eagle, the upsides of living in base trump all.

I commute that route and can attest to its difficulty. I never rely on American flights because they are always oversold. Many American mainline pilots commute as well. United has about 3x the amount of commuters, and you can never count on riding up front as there will always be a mainline pilot commuting. Northwest is a slight refuge from both, but its where many regional and junior United pilots go to try and tie up the offline jumpseat.

Forget Eagle. Go to Mesaba.

For what it's worth, I had two mainline United guys in the crashpad in ORD, they said it was a hard commute and they are mainline.

Mesaba's hiring like mad. MSP base.

I'm a F/A with UAL, Soon to be applying with many regionals, however, I can guarantee you that with all of our F/A & Pilot MSP Commuters, that you would probably get the jumpseat maybe max 7-10% of the time, and only get an open seat in the back on the last flight of the night from MSP to ORD......going ORD-MSP, very hard on the last flight of the night to get a seat on, but we have flights almost every hour, so you might get on mid-day timeframe...........best of luck........

Wow... not the best outlook, but thanks for the insight. I never would have thought it was so difficult.

Funny thing is, I don't even live in MSP. It's just on my short list of cities me and my sig. other are considering moving to after graduate school. MSP, SEA, DEN, in that order. SEA -> no choice (not going to Horizon), DEN (way senior for Skywest, and RAH), MSP a few choices, and a few domiciles within a 2-hr flight. IDK, we see what happens.

I am looking into Mesaba and Pinnacle, but I wanted to see what else was out there.

Thanks again!

Why not live in Chicago?

Too much money to live downtown. We're both young (25) and we want to experience the nightlife of a downtown before we settle into the the burbs' with kids of our own.

Downtown Chicago is nice... but it sucks in the winter, and it's really $$. Haha, I know Minneapolis isn't any better in the winter, but it's not that windy!