Just in case anyone wanted "official news" about AA and AE...here is the latest and the greatest:

Capt. Jim Winkley briefed the Negotiating Committee on Wednesday’s announcement by Gerard Arpey that AMR capacity will be reduced by approximately 11 to 12 percent. With his permission, I am sharing his comments with you, in order to help answer the many questions that will come from this news.

Due to the increase in fuel costs and the softening economy, American Airlines will be parking 40 jets, most likely MD80’s and perhaps A300’s. AA will be considering each and every route on an individual basis in order to maximize profitability. Capacity reduction decisions will then be made on that analysis.

Similarly, American Eagle and American Connection will be parking between 35 to 40 regional jets, and an unknown amount of turboprops. Again, each route will be considered on an individual basis in order to determine where capacity will be reduced.

The capacity reduction is scheduled to begin in September of this year, but it is expected that the results of the analysis may not be known for several weeks. More detail will be shared when these decisions have been made. American Eagle, of course, will not know exactly where our reductions will be made until AA decides where their reductions will be made.

Due to these events, new hire classes are cancelled indefinitely. It is hoped that the pilots currently in training will bring our staffing to a manageable level, to balance the summer flying schedule against the planned reductions in September. While every effort will be made to mitigate the effect on the Eagle pilot group, displacements and furloughs will almost be a certainty.

While it is too early to make decisions about the turboprops, management is considering how to balance the efficiency of the Saabs and the ATRs against the inefficiencies of maintaining a smaller fleet. The Saabs, for example, are approaching their twentieth year in service, which triggers additional FAA required maintenance.

Captain Winkley reiterated how important these announcements are to Eagle pilots. However, it will be several weeks before any further decisions are made.

Capt. Rich Krutenat
MEC Communications Chairman

What do you guys mainly fly outta SJU? ATR's?

ATRs are based in MIA and SJU

I wonder where things will stand if oil drops to $100 or even $90? Very disappointing news.

Satan will be building snowmen before oil drops back to $100...

I see ROC-DFW SYR-DFW going bye bye again!

Any chance to bring the some ATR's to DFW to replace the SF3's? I know the SF3's are getting old but they have to be making a better seat mile margin than the e145's on some routes..right?

What other routes does everone think will go bye bye?

I doubt that Eagle will bring back the ATR to DFW for two reasons. One, the primary reason, is that the ATR is currently only on the Executive certificate (SJU and MIA). Secondly, they were removed from ORD, and later DFW, in large part due to the Roselawn accident.

From what I understand the ATR's are life limited to 25,000 hours. Can any of the ATR guy's confirm this?

The ATR was still flying ORD and DFW 5 years after Roselawn. Redesigns were made very shortly after than accident and the ATR in its current form is more than capable of flying any route. Look at the numbers of ATRs being flown in areas where ice is a fact of life...so it really has little to do with that. The ATRs are just well suited for where they are - high mounted engines keep sand ingestion down - they are powerful and have very good short field capabilities. So could you see them back in DFW or ORD? Certainly. Just probably a newer model.

As for the Executive certificate - I'm sure Eagle is free to operate ATRs to their hearts content - they just have to get some!

The big difference between AA and AE is that those S80s are getting replaced with 737s. AE will just plain shrink.