BWI Base
 

I’m seeing quite a few flights in/out of BWI. I’m considering Spirit, live a few miles away and would probably end up in ACY or DTW due to commutabilty to DTW or drive to ACY. But can you pick up/trade flights originating here in an effort to reduce commuting or is this an “undocumented” micro domicile...that would make life easier. No interest in SWA not a big B737 fan otherwise that would be a natural fit.

you can list yourself as willing to work off days out of any airport we fly into. If something pops up they’ll call. If. That’s about the best you can hope for.

BWI? There was a rumor a few months ago that bwi was out next base to open. It hasn’t really gained any traction and I haven’t seen anyone try to spread it in a while.

Once you have the ability to drop trips you can pick up anywhere in any base. Clearly we are building BWI. I had the Station Manager tell me point blank it was going to be a crew base. Honest who knows?? You're better off going to SWA. You'll get BWI no problem!!

Picking an airline because of the aircraft type seems crazy. Always live in base if you can, ALWAYS! BWI is junior at SWA. You’ll make more at Southwest too. And what if spirit transitions it’s fleet to a 737. Now you’ll make less, commute, and fly the 737. Commuting to fly an Airbus for less money. Now that I think about it, this post must be flame bait.

I read a post last year. Guy had offers at delta, fed ex, and southwest. He was willing to move so base wasn’t an issue. All good choices for that matter anyway. He chose delta because he didn’t want to fly a 737 and he didn’t want to fly all night. Guess what? He said now he was flying a 737 at delta doing mostly red eyes.

Lol some people.

Except he’ll have the option to move into something different in short order.

What does any of it mean???


https://www.pressofatlanticcity.com/...342240a1f.html

https://wtop.com/business-finance/20...-destinations/

I can’t really answer your question, but I can say that BWI is one of the bigger SWA bases and pretty junior in the system as well. There are over 1200 pilots based in BWI, so the flexibility is outstanding. Try to get to the airline that makes your life the easiest

I agree. There’s no contest between us and swa (in general) and esp if you’re that close to bwi.



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Thanks for the input. I’m not trying to choose an airline based on an aircraft. At my age (45+) , retirement and quality of life are my top priorities. I flew for former NWA pre-9/11 and then worked for the FAA for 10 years because I was furloughed. I have to consider quality-of-life because I cannot move to a new base because of my children and life situation. Just gathering info so i can plan for an airline that I may have to commute for or not.

Your qol will be 1000X better at SWA in BWI

Agreed if he doesn't care about what he flies, I don't know why he would even consider coming here. QOL, pay, retirement, and they get profit sharing, there is no contest SWA wins hands down.

As far as retirement, SWA is 15 DC, plus profit sharing, has averaged (firmly, but no guarantee for the future) above 10%, so about 25% if you don’t contribute. NK is 12, going to 15% in 2022, so definitely less.

As far as QOL, it really depends what you need. If you don’t need to be as flexible after you get your schedule, SWA better. Lines are built to average 17 days off, with 80+ hours credit, 220 - 250 hr TAFB. NK 15, 74, 250 - 290. (before PBS, so not sure yet).
If you want to drop to zero, turn your whole schedule around after the award, or do red-eye turns to Central America NK is the place to be.

Even if all things were equal you don’t commute when you don’t have to. He lives in BWI. You always choose the airline with a base in the city you want to live unless it’s a regional

All good input. Thx. What about upgrade times? At 45+. I have to figure how much money I’d have the potential to earn over the 20yrs I have left. For example.. if upgrade is reasonably around 10-15yrs at SWA how would that stack up against any carrier with a 5-7yr upgrade? If you upgrade at 5-7 years at a higher pay rate then you have 13-15yrs at CA pay rather than 5-10 yrs.. does that make sense?

Upgrade times are a shot in the dark. I always calculated upgrade times based on no-growth, and then age 65 happened. For an upgrade at NK you are looking at a pilot group that is about 80% younger than you, so for upgrade look at doubling in size or about 5 years at 15% growth, but that is based on the order coming in and all the deliveries happening. For SWA there are more retirements but less growth, and my best guess would be 10 years. If nothing much changes contract wise you still would easily out-earn at SWA compared to NK IMO.

I disagree. WN has peaked and is fighting extreme headwinds on CASM. If NK continues to improve as an airline and as the pricing difference becomes more widely known I see NK growing to 300-500+. NK will grow more as a percentage than WN can anymore. Throw in an age 67 or 'as able' and you could really shoot yourself in the foot at WN if you're betting on retirements. Not to mention the 73 sucks.

An in base southwest FO can easily make as much as a commuting spirit captain and be home more. This is fact. So basically you’d be making your spirit captain pay from year two on at southwest and after you upgrade at Southwest it’s all gravy. 45 isn’t that old

Why does the 737 suck and what does that have to do with pay and retirement? Just curious...

It doesn't.

What does factor in is a mature airline growing 3-5% YOY versus a young airline growing 15-20% YOY. WN is also the leader of the pack on NB compensation and I think they'll have a harder time with higher percentage gains as the economy turns sour versus NK. We still have significant room to improve in the next go around and have more headroom on our CASM ex to negotiate than they do.

That said, being in base with a crappy carrier is far better than commuting to great carrier. Commuting sucks and I'd put living in base as an extremely important factor. If the OP wants to live in BWI than I'd go all out for WN as I can't see them ever closing BWI even if one is forced to be shoehorned into a 73 for their career.

Hard to say on upgrade time, but as of right now we don't have a new aircraft order so its really hard to tell what your upgrade time would potentially be, without a new order if you came here you would never upgrade.

Did you really pass up your recall to NWA --> Delta??

no recall... left to work at FAA. :mad: