US Pilots Labor Discussion

[Black Swan]

My thanks to the fine men from AOL for that beautitful pamphlet that I just got in the mail, must a cost a lot. Keep those donations coming in.

Here comes another lost campaign. Aqua, do you really believe an east pilot is going to take the Nicolau, then try and unite with your group after he/she basically gives up any upward movement and pay, in order to battle the company? Seriously. Take an 84-85 hire, who is already in the breech for a widebody upgrade. Taking the Nic will put someone in the west 97 era hire ahead, and there goes the vacation, 767 pay, and on and on. Then you have a bunch of F/O s who are sliding into the widebodies and upgrades right now. Taking the Nic is assuring them of never hitting an upgrade, or widebody F/O that instantly puts them in a pay grade above any the west has. Why would they ever do that? It just makes NO SENSE. Also, the LOA 93 pay issue. If that thing goes three cherries, it is totally over.These two groups will never unite. Either way, the older East group is hitting that 63 mark as we speak. We will just wait for the retirements, medicals etc. They are coming home as we speak. Instead of trying to get some east guy to thank you as some of the dreamers on the board think should happen, take the time and ask some serious questions on how close they are to a widebody upgrade or captain upgrade. Maybe it will become clearer why you just wasted another stand of trees for nothing. Aside from the wasted paper, this is the second time the info one of your assistant chief pilots has given has hit the US Mail. Parker is going to have to answer why he is allowing this guy to keep using confidential company information. All East pilots are going to be donating very shortly for a lawsuit to get to the bottom of this thing.

 

[Ames]

It is YOUR side that is salivating to take the east's, to recover YOUR failed career, and you just use Nic to justify it.

Here's where you go so very wrong. Until you guys came along no at pilots at AWA ever considered their career as "failed". We worked for a growing company, upgrades were at around 7 years, morale was great and most of us actually loved our jobs. You easties assume that we were at AWA because we couldn't get hired anywhere else. You assume that AWA was nothing more than a commuter on steroids. Your assumptions could not be more incorrect.

You claim that without the "merger" AWA would have gone away. Yeah, I know, Parker said we might have entered bankruptcy without it but, isn't he the same guy that said openly in a crew news that he often says things that aren't true for effect?

I have illustrated your assumptions and now I'll illustrate your realities:

You worked for a failing airline that was in bankruptcy with liquidation imminent.

You had over 1500 pilots on furlough, including pilots with DOH of over 16 years.

You stayed with said failing company for however long.

You, sir, had the failed career.

It is you, sir, who is salivating to take from the west in order to recover from your miserable failure.

 

[Ames]

If what Parker has to say is any indication, the "eastholes" would be working at the bottom of some other carrier's seniority list, and the westholes would be sending in their resumes to that same carrier looking for a job once AWA shut its doors six months after US.

Don't forget, Parker is the one who openly stated in a crew news that he often says things that aren't true.... for effect.

Why don't you just go back to 2005 and read some pertinent financial statements and let the facts speak for themselves. Oh, I forgot, you eastholes are allergic to facts.

 

[banshee74]

All,

1013 pages, 10501 posts and what of substance has all this arguing accomplished?

 

[Ames]

A simple 'Thank you' as you hub in and out of CLT, PHL and DCA would be nice.

Thank you. I love flying into CLT. The PHL overnights are great, too. Can't say much about DCA. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Happy now?

Question is, why am I thanking you? It should be you thanking God that you still even have a job.

 

[exB717Flyer]

All the furloughed Midwest pilots were ratioed in amoung active pilots.

You are either lying or guessing but either way you're dead wrong. The Midwest pilots were 100% stapled behind everybody else on the Republic/Frontier/Lynx list. I have a copy of the Eischen award and list and I'm looking right at it so there's no doubt about me telling the truth.

 

[exB717Flyer]

lets see, acoeding Parker east is flying 4% or the west schedule and the west is flying 24% of the east, Im thinking the big picture looks diferent from my end than yours. Maybe you could un-wad your shorts sice with the east you'd have significantly less flying oportunities.

Why do Easties keep repeating this as if it means anything? Both sides are flying within the limits of the Transition Agreement. Within those limits it's irrelevant who's flying which routes.

 

[Pi brat]

Here's where you go so very wrong. Until you guys came along no at pilots at AWA ever considered their career as "failed". We worked for a growing company, upgrades were at around 7 years, morale was great and most of us actually loved our jobs. You easties assume that we were at AWA because we couldn't get hired anywhere else. You assume that AWA was nothing more than a commuter on steroids. Your assumptions could not be more incorrect.

You claim that without the "merger" AWA would have gone away. Yeah, I know, Parker said we might have entered bankruptcy without it but, isn't he the same guy that said openly in a crew news that he often says things that aren't true for effect?

I have illustrated your assumptions and now I'll illustrate your realities:

You worked for a failing airline that was in bankruptcy with liquidation imminent.

You had over 1500 pilots on furlough, including pilots with DOH of over 16 years.

You stayed with said failing company for however long.

You, sir, had the failed career.

It is you, sir, who is salivating to take from the west in order to recover from your miserable failure.

You are putting words in my mouth. I have never said a westie couldn't get hired anywhere else. I happen to know quite a few really good westies that could get hired anywhere.

Your career has not failed, but it is not what you expected in 2005. Those expectations have proven false, just as some of the assumptions of my classmates at PI in 1986 were. We had just gotten hired a really great airline. Upgrades to the F-28 were running about 2 years, a Boeing 3-4. A bunch of 737s on order and the 767 about to be. That all changed in 1987. AWA was a low cost, low yield airline and the guy running it has said, repeatedly, that you were toast absent a merger. Period. Unrealistic expectations.

My career also has not failed. I stayed at a troubled airline that finally got it's cost in line, leading to a merger that saved it and another airline and has, so far, enabled both to stick around.

I am flying the same seat, in the same base, that I held in 9/2001. How is that taking anything from you?

You last line is telling of your arrogance and, well, i'm feeling kindly today and will leave it at that. It is people like you, not the quality west guys I know, that make me wonder about AWA's hiring policies. You need to calm yourself.

 

[Pi brat]

Why do Easties keep repeating this as if it means anything? Both sides are flying within the limits of the Transition Agreement. Within those limits it's irrelevant who's flying which routes.

I agree.

 

[Pi brat]

It should be you thanking God that you still even have a job.

I do, although I sometimes wonder what his plan is. As should you be, but I have a feeling you think you don't need to. You're special and entitled.

 

[Black Swan]

Thank you. I love flying into CLT. The PHL overnights are great, too. Can't say much about DCA. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Happy now?

Question is, why am I thanking you? It should be you thanking God that you still even have a job.

As CEO Parker told a three-year AW pilot complaining about AW's post-merger “stagnation- in a videotaped meeting in PHX on 2/06/07,

First off, as to the...the stagnation of growth, for America West pilots since the merger - what I will tell you is, and this is a hard thing to communicate to people but I believe it with all my heart: If we didn’t do the merger with US Airways, you’d be in a lot worse position. Frankly, I think as a 3 [year] F/O, you wouldn’t have a job.

We would have gone through a bankruptcy filing. We would have downsized. We had an airline at America West that had 20% lower unit revenues than US Airways and now has the same unit costs. That airline could not survive. We would have tried to make it better. We' d go file bankruptcy and get ourselves a little stronger and now the economy's back and we'd be trying to come out like Delta is.

But I swear to you that [the] airline was going to file bankruptcy. When it filed bankruptcy, we would have downsized at least 15%, and, you know, while you feel bad about stagnation, you should feel better about that versus where you were headed. And that's where we were headed.

 

[Black Swan]

Don't forget, Parker is the one who openly stated in a crew news that he often says things that aren't true.... for effect.

Why don't you just go back to 2005 and read some pertinent financial statements and let the facts speak for themselves. Oh, I forgot, you eastholes are allergic to facts.

The merger has strengthened both carriers financially. According to the Company’s SEC Form 10-K filing for 2006, AW reduced its net loss from $397 million in 2005 to only $37 million in 2006 while US reported a net profit for 2006 of $345 million. The SEC Form 10-Q filing for the first quarter of 2007 states that the holding company for both carriers, US Airways Group, Inc., now has more than $2.5 billion in cash and short-term investments, a dramatic improvement for two companies that were admittedly struggling with liquidity issues in 2005.

At the May 9 session of the Joint Negotiating Committee, Scott Kirby, President of the Company, revealed to the assembled representatives of both pilot groups and ALPA National that he had headed a project code-named “Project Zanzibar” for AW in 2005 and that the legal papers for a Chapter 11 filing had been prepared and a plan developed for AW's bankruptcy in the event that the merger failed to come to fruition. Project Zanzibar was AW's only Plan B. It is now beyond dispute that the junior AW pilot, Dave Odell, and 300-400 other AW F/Os hired in 2002-05 would have been furloughed absent the US merger, as AW went into Chapter 11, perhaps never to emerge. In light of this new disclosure from the carrier’s President, there is clearly no support for the explicit premise of the Nicolau Award that these AW pilots had more job security and better promotional prospects than US pilots hired in 1988, including hundreds
who had never been furloughed for a single day.


Crew News 05/29/2008 session in PHX, in the next to the last segment which is titled: Protecting Employees, Scott Kirky states the following to a room full of West pilots, " I feel 100% certain that every single person in this room is better off because of the last merger occurred - there is a high probability that none of us would have jobs at this airline - none of us would have jobs - and at a minimum a lot of us wouldn't have jobs."

 

[Pi brat]

You claim that without the "merger" AWA would have gone away. Yeah, I know, Parker said we might have entered bankruptcy without it but, isn't he the same guy that said openly in a crew news that he often says things that aren't true for effect?

How many times have I given links to the '04 and '05 AWA financial results that show the state of AWA finances, only to hear the sounds of silence from the west? Do you really believe that you would have been as well off today with a stand alone AWA as you are with the merger?

 

[Pi brat]

The merger has strengthened both carriers financially. According to the Company’s SEC Form 10-K filing for 2006, AW reduced its net loss from $397 million in 2005 to only $37 million in 2006 while US reported a net profit for 2006 of $345 million. The SEC Form 10-Q filing for the first quarter of 2007 states that the holding company for both carriers, US Airways Group, Inc., now has more than $2.5 billion in cash and short-term investments, a dramatic improvement for two companies that were admittedly struggling with liquidity issues in 2005.

At the May 9 session of the Joint Negotiating Committee, Scott Kirby, President of the Company, revealed to the assembled representatives of both pilot groups and ALPA National that he had headed a project code-named “Project Zanzibar” for AW in 2005 and that the legal papers for a Chapter 11 filing had been prepared and a plan developed for AW's bankruptcy in the event that the merger failed to come to fruition. Project Zanzibar was AW's only Plan B. It is now beyond dispute that the junior AW pilot, Dave Odell, and 300-400 other AW F/Os hired in 2002-05 would have been furloughed absent the US merger, as AW went into Chapter 11, perhaps never to emerge. In light of this new disclosure from the carrier’s President, there is clearly no support for the explicit premise of the Nicolau Award that these AW pilots had more job security and better promotional prospects than US pilots hired in 1988, including hundreds
who had never been furloughed for a single day.

Or, as he said in the PHX CN a few months ago, that the major airlines action of lowering their costs was the "death knell" for AWA. But most won't listen Black Swan, they can't. Because if they admit the truth it makes defending the Nic that much harder.

 

[Ames]

How many times have I given links to the '04 and '05 AWA financial results that show the state of AWA finances, only to hear the sounds of silence from the west? Do you really believe that you would have been as well off today with a stand alone AWA as you are with the merger?

Yes, I absolutely do. The slanted articles you provided prove nothing. Financial statements, plain and simple go a lot further in exposing the truth.