I mean…… I’ll be honest, I wouldn’t mind going to Mongolia, lol.

 

Rather go there than anywhere in the Metroplex

 

You're remarkably triggered by us adding a few destinations. Personally I don't really care about other airlines' network choices, but you do you...

 

It's my professional recommendation that you focus on/deal with what is going on with your company and pilot union daily business.... Let us United Pilots deal with whats going on with our airline/pilot union daily business....

 

After spending a few days in Mongolia flying for the US Navy, all I can suggest is visit in June-Aug when the days are longer and the temp is higher.

It's interesting place because the city is like a giant Navy base the Soviets built in the 80's to try and "civilize" the Mongolians, complete with above ground steam piping to provide heat to many buildings from a central plant. Seemed as though most of the Mongolians ignore the city during the summer at least as they go out into the steppe and live in yurts along with their sheep/goats/oxen. Very nomadic lifestyle as the grass grows very slowly in the high steppe climate and is easily overgrazed.

They do have one tourist monument outside the city to visit, a giant metal statue of Kahn on a horse overlooking the city and steppe. You can go inside and climb up to the front of the horse and look out. I was there the year it opened circa 2008/9. It was pretty cool, sorta their statue of liberty. Otherwise it's very undevelped the minute you get more than a few miles from the city, think driving in Wyoming without freeways or state highways. It is spectacular from a nature and unspoiled by development point of view though.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equest...f_Genghis_Khan

 

Wasn't expecting a Mongolian travel itinerary when I woke up this morning, but that's awesome, thanks!

 

Really didn't shock me when you said you were a RJDC guy back when. Def helpful start as to why the keyboard diahrrhea towards everyone else is just part of your day. Have fun at The Yardhouse.

 

I've been to that statue! Once upon a time took a C-17 into UBN for Khan Quest...

 

The Atlantic stuff is a no-brainer. European travel is so overwhelmed you’ve got cities like Madrid & Amsterdam- as well as the major haunts in Italy- actually trying to limit & reduce their flow of visitors. Massive opportunity for smaller markets to become big ones. “If you build it they will come.”

UBN is the only one that raises an eyebrow to me, but these decisions aren’t made in the blind. Just because we, the pilots haven’t done the homework, doesn’t mean it hasn’t been done. There are some large Mongolian diasporas in East Asia, so there probably is enough untapped market there to justify trying out a couple of guppies a week- we’ve successfully run “add-on” legs out of Tokyo in the past. If not, it would be far from a legacy toppling catastrophe.

 

Yeah idk why, maybe he didn’t have his coffee yet this morning. I wouldn’t get too worked up over it — he’s lashed out at me a few times and we work at the same shop haha!

I will say the hype/marketing campaign via social media influencers prior to this announcement is bizarre considering all these new destinations will be flown with mostly NB’s and a few of your older birds that aren’t really WB’s. This year both AA and DL have announced new international routes (mostly to Europe) that will be flown by actual WB’s (AA 777/787, DL 330/350) for 2025 and beyond. It was treated as business as usual.

Obviously this is an attempt to build an untapped potential market. You have all these 787’s on order. I doubt the growth plan is to only retire older WB’s and upgauge existing international routes. You’re going to have to find new routes that can fill seats on the brand new 78’s showing up on property in bulk.

Also, pilots are cheap, Greenland will eventually go junior after y’all find out a single Banana is like $20 US currency. The Northern lights will be epic to see though.