Q
 

All right, after seeing some of the inputs during the course of this thread I've taken a fresh hack at what throughput the TK might be able to achieve. For example, I'll assume only 4 sim periods per day due to extra cleaning. I'll assume the average qual course requires 9 FFS events rather than 7 (meaning most guys will need a full qual course of 10 rides instead of a 7 ride RQ-3). I'll go with 60% qual and 40% CQ, although I think CQ events may drop considerably for the next nine months (seeing as about 1000 out of 3000 current NB CAs will not need CQ after 22 May). One thing I have not tried to guess at is how many FFSs may or may not be required to cover FTD events.

Here's what I come up with:
737 - 2.4 crews per day, so about 72 per month and 288 crews trained by 1 Oct.
Bus - 1.6 crews per day, about 48 per month and 192 by 1 Oct.

These revised numbers are still on the high side compared to what Ugleeual hung out there earlier in this thread (PI insight of 55/mo 737, 37/mo Bus). But I expect the true monthly number will fall somewhere between the 55-72 range (737) and 37-48 (Bus). Seatbelt sign on...

How does this work if we are down 50-60-70% in October? If demand isn’t remotely close to their planned 30% reduction number, what difference does it make if crews don’t get trained if they aren’t needed? They could still announce a big furlough, train people likely to survive, and then just cancel furloughs this fall if they come up short. If they don’t fall short they can announce another displacement/furlough and start the whole thing over. They are going to need to cut payroll significantly this fall, and my money says that they will find a way to make it work. Sure hope that I’m wrong, but this displacement is just the beginning of what is to come unless things recover dramatically.

im not sure what you seniority is but go look at what % you would sit as a NB FO. If they cut 4000 on OCT 1 there will be literally 18 FOs left on the bus in SFO and 12 in EWR. CAs can’t fly in the left seat they will have to train or force all the flying into DEN and IAH since there will be FOs there.

I can try to figure out the numbers later(unless someone else wants to do it) but my bet is that SFO/LAX/ORD/EWR/DCA combined have less than 100 FOs senior to 4000 on the bus. The 737 is better but not by much considering how much larger that fleet is.

I really don’t expect them to cut 4,000 (made up big number) on October 1, but I think it will be a significant number, and that they could get there pretty quick if they wanted to. The lower the demand, the bigger cut they can make. More senior bases like IAH and DEN can be significantly reduced and displace people to other bases. At the end of the day, where there is a will, there is a way. The contract slows them down, but they are going to do what they want to do.

they could drop 2500 tomorrow and not even flinch. The flying will be covered the training center will be fine and have instructors. They will be more than able to fly the winter schedule and will be right in line with the head count of DL & AA.

i don’t think 4000 will happen either but everyone thinks it’s easy to just drop thousands so I’m showing why it is hard. 3900 furloughs takes out every single post merger hire since NOV 2012 that’s why I picked it.

i will be shocked if we furlough more than 2500 unless we’re still below 50% by January.

I won't be shocked by any furlough number; small or big. One or many rounds of furloughs.

As far as TK training, the 320/737 training is probably going to be almost exclusively 2 FOs for a while.

That’s why this displacement is happening now. The company just prioritizes pilots who can retrain quickly into bus and guppy FO positions in bases they need them, especially people who just left the seats or Captains going back to right seats. They could have them trained in 2-3 months and fill the base. The company won’t care about reverse seniority order, etc. They are going to right-size the pilot group as fast as possible to get as many bodies off the property as they can starting October 1st. Once they do that, they will fine tune it. Wouldn’t be shocked to see a big initial furlough number, and then have them push out furloughs over Nov-Jan as they train replacements.

How is replacing furloughed TK guys any different than replacing furloughed line pilots?

I think the main thing is it takes quite a bit longer.

Two differences off the top of my head (there are probably more):

1) Pilots can't be bumped into instructor jobs

2) The training footprint for instructors is significantly longer to become fully qualified