There’s some good news for a change.

Should land at IAD at about 1230 on Tuesday. The next two are built and awaiting test flights and the following one is undergoing final assembly. Vegas has the odds at 3.5 deliveries before the end of the year. Might actually get that 4th one this year. Boeing is telling the company 12 next year (instead of the original plan of 20+)

I agree that the next major route announcement will be SFO-BKK

There are no pilots on the seniority list who are involuntary captains. (By this I mean, forced into the left seat during BI - there are tons of people who bid NB CA for money, ego, FOMO, etc. that desparately want to go back to WB FO.)

There are no captains on the seniority list who have been trained under 9-K. With how senior all captain vacancies went last month, I doubt we'll ever see one.

There were people who had no choice during the drop. I have personally flown with one. He was 25 years old, about 2,400 total time, zero TPIC and his only jet time was about 400 hours at Spirit from what I remember. After one year and 500 hours at United he will be going to upgrade training unless someone else bids his slot. With slowed hiring, hopefully that happens since he's not ready. I'm personally hoping that hiring does not get back to the pace that it was. Controlled growth is good, but the unchecked growth that we were experiencing was a problem waiting to happen.

Im pretty sure that all of the CA slots that were not “protected” by the NH have been bid by more senior people.

This is correct. As it turns out, zero people will be going to charm school involuntarily.

He had a chance to make his slot available for someone senior. He choose to not give it up….

Sometimes the best way to learn is to just to get into the seat and do the damn thing… Gotta start from somewhere. It’s easier being a Captain here vs at a regional with the tools, resources, and support that we have.

I’ve yet to fly with an FO at AA that didn’t have some TPIC, but I keep reading about people getting hired at legacies with no PIC and frankly very little TSIC, how common is this at UAL?

It was not uncommon for a year or so at peak hiring at United and Delta provided the applicant came from an AA WO regional, Endeavor or a LCC/ULCC competitor. I know guys from PSA, Piedmont and SWA who got picked up without TPIC and under 1000 121 SIC. One had just over 500hrs in an RJ. I know a bunch more who got interviewed right around 1000 121 SIC by UAL and DAL and were in class after their first trip post Captain OE at their regional.

This was a while back and he had made his slot available. I'm sure that it has been picked up by now, but that is only because hiring has slowed significantly and captain is going more senior. If we were still hiring at ludicrous speed I'm sure that he would have been stuck with his award. We've hired plenty of high time pilots such as ULCC captains who will do just fine with quick upgrades, but we've also hired plenty of people that we would have never considered prior to the pandemic. Wanting to bid captain is one thing, but forced upgrades regardless of if it's at the regionals or legacies is a bad idea. I'm hoping that future growth happens at a level where captain vacancies only go to those who feel ready and bid it.