Originally Posted by Skykid

Hey thanks you guys! As I posted earlier, I am expecting a class date soon. Well I just got the call, but missed it. Nice lady asked which airplane I wanted in her message. So now I have a couple of more questions before I call her back. Actually I returned her call, but it went to voice mail.

I live near Portland, but have family in Houston. From what I have read in the preceding 398 pages, it looks like Houston is junior and Portland is senior on the jet. My question is, how long has the most junior pilot in Portland been with the company. I don't care if I am stuck on reserve for a couple of years. I am wondering if I take Houston, assuming I can hold that fairly quickly, how long will it take to get Portland on the jet? How long after class is it before a new hire can hold Houston? Are the bid lines constructed so that someone could have a crash pad in Houston and commute to Portland a couple of times a month for a couple of days?

I know I could take the Bro and get Portland right away. But I really would prefer the jet. I guess I have SJS. It appears the info about class dates being near the end of the month is correct. The message said the class date would be Feb 24th.

Originally Posted by 10SNE1

What about PHX or TUS? How junior are they? Are chances good of getting either of these bases out of training? I live in PHX, but wouldn't mind TUS either. Any insight would be appreciated. Thanks.

Originally Posted by Flightsoffusion

May sound like a ridiculous question, but don't mean to, Would a drive of, say two or two and a half hours to base still be considered "living in base"? What would be considered commuting to work? Just trying to clarify a criteria. Or would it be only when one must fly?

Thank you

Originally Posted by norskman2

"Commuting" is generally considered to mean flying into your base, because that when things like the commuting clause of the contract (if your regional has one), missed flights, etc., comes into play.

This might be more than you're asking, but driving 2, 2.5 hours, or even more could technically be considered "living in base", but would run into problems with reserve callout times, etc.

Originally Posted by Jet87

The most junior guy in PHX has been there here almost 2.5 years, the problem with PHX is it's not growing nor is it going to grow. A lot of guys want to get in too.

TUS is a little more junior, with the most Junior guy being here a little more then 1.5 years. its a very small base with only 15 crews. You never know with these small MX bases at OO, they can be very senior and junior it just depends.

Originally Posted by FlyinRabbit88

For Skywest there really isn't a commuter clause per se but an honesty agreement. If you genuinely try and give them a heads up, preferably 2 hrs to call out a reserve, you will prob never hear anything from your chief. Just CS will ask you to call them once you make it to your base or a base where your pairing flows into. If they assigned it to a reserve you can pick it back up. If they junior manned your trip you cannot but can sit reserve in base.
Like I said its more of an honesty policy and won't hear anything unless it becomes a consistant issue. Commuting is real life "choose you own adventure", sometimes everything lines up perfect with no issues, other times you are on plan E or F and still won't work...