Good luck to you. My advice though is to make sure you're okay with the worst possible scenario if you came to Atlas. I'm lucky in that my airplane doesn't always have full 17-day patterns and none of my trips start in base, so i don't have to commute on off days. (although, again, in the 121 world i was giving up off days to commute every week vs. a couple a month) I know one 747 captain who bid down to 767 captain because he lived in Florida and got pushed into ANC 747 CA and was giving up lots of time to the commute. With all the growth right now, i think any such situation would be short-lived. the MSP-TOL-CVG-TOL-MSP run on the 767 in CVG would get old, but for me the positives far outweigh the negatives. it's not all rainbows and unicorns here, it's an airline and i see lots of room for improvement in some areas, but all in all, i'm thrilled to be here.

Captain V great post.....of course you have to miss downtown Covington with Frasier......good times....

1st....I am not at Atlas....but another ACMI

however.... about 90% of what he stated above are my sentiments exactly.

Would agree that the MSP-TOL-CVG-TOL-MSP for a couple of weeks gets real old. I think we are going to see a lot more growth on the 76 side. We have 8 aircraft and the 2 ERF's coming online with 12 LCA's. They are adding 8 more LCA's and its hard to believe that we need that many more Check Airmen for only 2 additional aircraft.

If I could summarize into one word why Atlas was the choice for me, ADVENTURE would be it. I loved the airplane that I flew for the regional I flew for, the route I flew was up and down the west coast, about as easy as flying gets but that didn't allow me the opportunity to eat Tom Kha Gai with a side of fresh mango juice in Bangkok, fresh sushi in Narita, biltong in J-burg, drink pica pica in Peru, eat Kangaroo in Australia.... (yes, I like to eat and drink as you can see). With Atlas, I will get a chance to do that and more while not having that scheduled rush-rush thing going on. (Disclaimer, Atlas is diversified in what it does and scheduled services are one of the many things they do therefore the rush-rush does exist at Atlas). What I most value in work-life can best be achieved at Atlas.

Hmmm, I was under the impression that the commute was on days off regardless. So you are saying that if the trip does not start in base, you commute during your 17 on? Apologies if this was previously discussed.

If your first operating leg starts at your base on day 1 of your pattern, you're commuting on your day off. If your first op leg starts away from base, your schedule must show a deadhead from your base to get there. But you'll just go from home to the starting location, never touching base--commute on a work day while the CRT clock is ticking. That's nice.

The above may or may not hold true depending on where you live. I live in the hinterlands of Northwestern Montana and quite often I travel on a day off just to have enough rest before starting a pairing no matter where it begins. I'm not complaining. It's well worth it to work here. I'm just pointing out that if what day someone begins work is more important than the flying they do and the adventure of this business then I can already see dark clouds on the horizon for them.

That's what I'm talking about!

yup.