I'm sure I will get railed for posting this but I honestly don't care. I am not attacking any individuals in here but I'm sure it will be taken that way regardless of my diplomatic attempt.
I have posted in the past about ATC treatment of SWA and more recently about their hiring selection process that got sidetracked into a speed vs FAR compliance argument. At one point somebody told me "you just don't get it" I'm here asking.....what don't I get?
To begin, I would like to say that had I not gotten hired at Alaska, I would have loved to work at SWA. I think your business plan is solid and your executives understand how to lead and not manage. In short, it's hands down the best and friendliest airline to work for in my opinion.
What I don't understand is why the majority of the SWA and even non-SWA bubbas in here defend the operational practices at SWA to the death?
Time for some random quotes from NUTS!
1. "Be quick or be dead"
2. "At Southwest, speed is about doing things in days that take other carriers months to do"
3. "Southwest has learned that speed is both necessary for survival and essential to keeping people inspired and invigorated"
4. "In the world where the shelf life of our products and services keeps getting shorter and shorter, we can't afford to be too cautious and play it safe"
5. "The penalty for being slow and slothful........was the death of the airline and job security"
Now I'm not an idiot and realize that most of these quotes are not talking about flying an airplane or even taxiing. Therefore you're probably not going to find it in your FOM. However, I don't see how you can deny that it is embedded in your operation and taken to the extreme by some of your pilots.
Flight 1248 (Midway): "The National Transportation Safety Board identified the psychological pressure to complete their assigned task as one of the factors contributing to the crew's decision to land at Midway despite unfavorable conditions".
Flight 1455 (Burbank): "The NTSB concluded that the probable cause for the accident was excessive flight speed and too high of a glidepath, and the flight crew's failure to abort the approach when conditions were not met for a stable landing".
3rd person story from Orlando paraphrased: ATC advises of Windshear advisory, 1 legacy carrier (AA I believe) acknowledges, is cleared for takeoff, gets windshear warnings on their radar and clears the runway. 2 other legacy carriers (UA & Continental) all heed the warning and wait out the cell. 2 SWA flights disregard the warnings and takeoff with immediate turnouts to avoid the cell (as witnessed by close personal friend). Nothing happens, no mishap everybody is happy but was it necassary?
Can somebody please explain to me why it is not acceptable to criticize your airline when it is obviously a part of the culture there to do things fast? When Alaska crashed flight 261 due to Shady at best maintenance practices I would call that criminal and absolutely unacceptable. It makes my skin crawl that executives & managers would put crew & passengers lives at stake to save a buck or two. So what is different in the way that SWA operates? On a very similar topic....what about SWA and the late inspections and flying with cracked skins?
If there is any sarcasm noted it is unintentional. I do not mean any disrespect to any SWA crew or spouses, I just want somebody to explain to me why it's not acceptable for an outsider to be critical and judgemental on some poor decisions being made? I also realize that not EVERY SWA pilot operates like this, my only point to this entirely too long of post is that it seems to be embedded in the culture there and seems like it's only a matter of time before something even more tragic happens.