my experience…
in the States and a few years ago, the three airlines I was working at, which shut down, were very simple and clean cut events. We were notified that they were shut down and our last regular paycheck that we had received before the day they shut down was all we got. The last one was in Denver, during a through stop, supposed to go to Atlanta, I think it was. Went in to get the paperwork and was told to wait. Within about an hour, details a little fuzzy since this was Oct ‘95, we ended up going back to the aircraft, getting our flight bags and headsets, shut it all down and closed the doors.
we then teamed up and removed all pilot flight bags from the crew room since we suspected the doors would be locked and no further access would be allowed. It was a sobering experience. One individual lost control and began throwing computers and other office gear against the walls to destroy as much as he could as a sort of revenge for his sudden unemployment. He was soon stopped. I was one of the ones carrying bags out, including my own. Due to the ‘assembly line’ method used, I was soon downstairs feeding the bags onto trollies that others were going to take out to their cars and then to a house to enable the absent pilots to pick them up later.
we sat at home for a few days waiting to hear if there would be some resurrection, (it had been operating under chapter 11 for quite some time. Had shut down once before for a few days, but started up again) but it’s been 28 years to the month now. I still dream about it starting up again, (typical useless emotional attachment), since it was the airline that I upgraded to captain on the B737 and very enjoyable company to work at.
‘Home economics’ forced me to focus on replacing the job as soon as possible and I made no effort to pursue any further legal recourse. I couldn’t afford the shoes required to chase them.
my father had been a manager in the trucking industry and advised us to not expect anything from such a pursuit.
trickle down economics at work. Those higher up the ladder grab whatever money might be flowing downhill and it never seems to get very far down that ladder.