Good observation. I passed on being one due to the belief that a strike was upcoming, and I did not believe in starting training, but not "turning a wheel".
My impression from flying with many of them is that many are fine - and that many are opportunists. When they were interviewed and selected United was looking for individualists (trying to be nice here). Even though being swayed by "ALPA and Jamie got a hold of them" many have basic personality traits that made them desireable to a company looking to pretraining pilots for a strike.

 

Ah, CAL has many of THOSE types of people, too. Thankfully, they are fewer in number as they retire. Helped Lorenzo set back this career many years.

 

another important question about this area at UAUA -- do you guys have to train on your days off like we do at CAL... It BLOWS!

 

The 570 that refused to cross the picket line in 1985 have more spine in their fingernail than you have in your entire body.

 

You obviously have not had to sit next to many of them for 5+ hours. I disagree with your observation.

 

No kidding on that one! But I sure have learned a lot about flying from the all knowing, all seeing, all important sky gods otherwise known as the 570. But at least they are impressed with themselves.

 

The few 570's I have flown with were not the cream of the crop. Definitely a profile the company was looking for at the time: people unhireable anywhere else. They were play dough and ALPA beat the company to the punch with molding them. Amazing what free beer can do

A majority of the 570 had zero previous airline experience. Hired at a time when almost all the other major carriers were only hiring high time experienced pilots. The 570 were not the genuises they like to portray themselves as. In fact our MEC Vice Chair is the poster boy for the incompetence of the 570. Arrogant and impossible to reason or work with, he carries the 570 flag. Ask anyone that has dealt with him in and out of the cockpit and you'll get any number of stories. I wouldn't pick up his water bottle in the bunk room on the 400, if you believe the rumors

L

 

Okay Lambourne I sure agree with most people about the chest thumping of the 570 and that type of stuff but if you are going to question the hiring I will bite.

In a class I am familiar with out of 12 we had 3 ex-continental, and 1 that left fed-ex after a couple years, there were 3 out of the military 2 air force and one navy, the air force were 1 transport and 1 fighter type, the navy was an f-4 pilot that did not come back when the 570 were recalled, he had gone to Usair. There were 2 corporate types that were flying nice corporate jets, 2 commuter pilots from the west coast and 1 general aviation.

Again, I agree with the chest thumping and some go on and on, however lke most things that is not all of them. I also don't like the ones that crossed and I can give you the numbers that worked both sides of the fence. I also get tired of hearing from some that think they saved the world, I understand that gets old after 25 years.

There was also a comment on here about being trained and not turning a wheel? I think whoever posted that have your groups mixed up as the majority of 570 were trained and waiting to get called and most of them when the call came did not go because of the strike however the trained and not turning a wheel is a different group that does not get discussed to often.

By the way Lambourne when was it you were hired?

 

Hotwing,

We don't go to training on days off (12 days off min) except that lineholder International F/Os who are (or are close to going) non-current for landings go to landings class on a day off. One of the many wonderful nuggets in the sh!t sandwich known as Contact '03. Another chunk from C'03 is PBS, with pre-planned, known absences such as training and vacation paid at 2.8 hours credit per day. The PBS solver builds schedules around known absences resulting in no paid trip drops for conflicts unless training is assigned after the schedules are out, which is very rare. So when we go to DENTK every 9 months for the alternating PC (3 day event) and PT (2 day event), we get paid a whopping 8.4 hours and 5.6 hours, respectively. For most of us, that means working the same number of days in a month for less pay. And having vacation often means a low pay month. Just a few of the many things that must be fixed by the JCBA.

It's amusing that this thread drifted into a 570 bashfest. You might as well get used to it; you'll learn more about our various subgroups as the process moves along.

Edit: While we don't have to go to TK on days off, we are expected to accomplish the prereqs (exams, CBTs, videos) on our own time and without compensation.

Snake

 

As you will of ours:

Old CAL, (scabs and non-scabs)
Texas International, (scabs and non-scabs)
Super Scabs (late 83-early 84 hires)
Scabs (mid 84 to late 85 hires)
New York Air
People Express
Frontier
Muse
'87-'90 off the street hires, (I fall into this category)
Express flow through's, (were given seniority numbers at CAL when they were hired by the regional Express Jet)
Late 90's off the street hires, (includes some Eastern Pilots, scabs and non scabs)
and finally the B3's, (a mixture of off the street and ex-Express hires who are probably our most hard-core Unionists and make up the bottom third of our list)

Interesting that everyone over here only has to attend a 2 day sim check once a year while you have every 9 months. You can bet on the much cheaper once a year program probably surviving the merger if Jefferey has anything to do with it.