I agree with you 100%, and I think most everyone does. There’s probably more to the story on that comment, if I had to guess.

I flew long haul for 13 years, and it was awesome. And exhausting. My body clock was in constant flux, and my first 2-3 days home were spent readjusting back home. I can just imagine how fun that would be with my young kids excited to see me after 5-10 days on the road, and I need to sleep for 6 hours during playtime.

I’ve seen 2 overnights less than 14 hours in 4+ years. And my duty days are in the 8-9 range. And I average 2.75 legs/day. The 4-5 legs/day comments about SWA flying is really focusing on specific routes, not the entirety of the network.

I chose domestic flying, because of the health benefits & the lifestyle overall. Not knocking anyone else’s dreams, planes, schedules, companies, etc... but domestic flying has been everything I was hoping for, especially in regard to how easy it works with my personal life.

For those out there reading these comments in these forums, please take every one of them (including mine) with a grain of salt. There’s been some real head scratchers in here lately.

There’s also the ability to sit Reserve on one of the Widebody fleets and seldom work. I know a couple that do it at a Legacy, and they’re always having to track their landings. Obviously being able to avoid putting your uniform on is the healthiest lifestyle you can have....as long as you lead a healthy lifestyle at home

Like what?

I’ve seen several overnights less than 14 hours in the last month. And you don’t need 4 to 5 legs per day to give you a long duty day. I’ve had more than one 2-leg day in the past month scheduled for over 10 hours of duty that ended over 11 hours of duty with block times scheduled to exceed what would have been illegal pre-117. And I’m not junior.

I also flew long-haul international before coming here. Totally different situation, though. So, it’s hard to compare that kind of long haul international to the same at DL/UA/AA/FDX. I’m guessing you didn’t leave one of those airlines to come here?

According to MIT, our peers at those airlines (narrow body and wide body) report lower block overall. SWA pilots average almost 1/3 more block hours per month than, for example, Delta pilots. We even average almost 40% more block than Spirit pilots.

Anecdotally, I’ve heard that at least some of the international trips at places like DL/UA/AA allow them to stay on roughly the same body clock when they jet over to Europe and back. That’s all anecdotal, as I haven’t seen any stats on that.

On the other hand, no one forces people at UA/DL/AA to fly wide body international. Even on a narrow body only track, according to UA’s contract comparison from 2017, pilots at UA and DL come out $400k-plus ahead in company contributions to retirement after 30 years.

I also am unaware of any health studies performed on the kind of flying WN does over the course of a career. I’ve checked. Pretty sure that study hasn’t been done.

However, being in the cockpit exposes us to several health threats. It makes sense that the more exposure one has, the higher the risk. But not everything that makes sense actually turns out to be the case in science. Maybe it’s actually healthier to spend more time in the cockpit? Maybe there’s a eustress sort of effect with more exposure?

Your opinion is yours. It comes across like you have an agenda with your comments, that’s all I’m saying.

After talking with some others about moving around within the industry, a few interesting points came up.

How’s FDX going to look in a few years? I hope they’re as strong as ever, but analysts have said they’ve lost a lot of value due to Amazon’s delivery service in the past 2 years.

How do the balance sheets look for AA/UA/DL when their federal tax exclusions since 2011 come to an end in the near future?

I hadn’t considered these points previously, not saying people shouldn’t still look at every option. Definitely go with the best opportunity for you & your family, but these points were definitely interesting to me.

Do people at WN really think we'll only be flying 737 or narrow bodies in 30yrs? Kinda honest question.
I cant see that happening but I'm not the one making the decisions.

Of course, everyone has an agenda if, by “agenda”, you mean something analogous to “point of view”. My point of view is apparently different than yours. I likely prioritize things differently than you do.

There are positive things about SWA. The most important of those things is probably the solid financial position of SWA and the fact that our management team is unparalleled so far in its ability to consistently produce profits. Even in the face of the MAX crisis, our exec’s are producing profits for the corporation. Our financial strength and record of profitability are facts.

What’s also a fact is that, according to the data, SWA pilots block more hours than pilots at most major airlines. It’s also a fact that, according to the data, after a 30 year career we end up with significantly less company contributions to our retirement than our peers (who fly less) at UA and DL. They achieve that while assuming less risk in terms of professional and health liability than us.

My point of view is SWA pilots have established a culture of settling for less for decades and justified it with reasoning like former SWAPA honcho Jeff Hefner used when he was quoted in The NY Times in 2006 in an article about the changing airline industry:

We also have historically pointed to our “culture”, Herb as our figurehead, our productivity, our “flexibility”, and our quick growth resulting in reduced upgrade times as reasons to accept lower rates, lesser retirement, and sub-standard benefits. Arguably, all of those reasons are no longer present.

My point of view is we can do better.

I don’t. Watterson basically said this in the OAK lounge last year. The MAX situation has had to have some sort of impact on this plan, either on SWA’s end, Boeing’s end, or even AirBus.

A year ago, I was pretty sure we were working on getting the 797 in the 2025-2028 timeframe. I don’t know if that’s the case or not anymore. I don’t know if the 797 is even being built anymore. Boeing has a lot of moving pieces right now.

We probably do have different priorities.
And different points of view.

I’ll buy you a beer sometime and we can discuss things.