My sympathies to the Belgian pilot group...
xxx
Nothing changes with the good old days of Sabena, and if it is not the "Administration de l'Aéronautique", it is inept management of airlines, or idiots in the fiscal and taxation ministry...
xxx
Belgian pilots, hold on tight - SNBA will be forced to double your salaries, or as a tradition in Belgium, close the doors and put thousands of people out of work. Airline managers do not realize that the most important employees are pilots and engineers who work for them, the people who break planes, and the people who fix them.
xxx
I am at the end of my career, fat, dumb and happy to fly a 747 in Argentina and I recall 40 years of the airline industry in Belgium... what a mess... I do remember failing the exam to enter pilot training at the EAC, because of my poor Flemish language abilities... how do you report "downwind" in Flemish...? Is it "
wind in het gat...?"...
xxx
Then I remember the October 1973 war, a layoff from PanAm, with plenty of hours on 707 and 727s, and knocking the door of a famous "Mr. Destrée" at the Administration de l'Aéronautique" and trying to get a licence to fly for Sobelair, who kindly told me "
Où avez-vous trouvé vos licences FAA, mon garçon...? Dans une poubelle...?" - (Where did you find your FAA licences, my boy...? In a trash can...?).
xxx
Then it was the PanAm bankruptcy in December 1991, this time I had to re-expatriate myself, to Argentina, as a 747 captain. Everybody laughed at me in Belgium... see, "we" in Belgium, we have Sabena, and the "mutuelles"... And the "chomage..." - But 10 years later, 2001, Sabena was next on the list of entering history books. Sabena was famous as the experts of Europe-Africa air traffic... all gone.
xxx
Now you are left with SNBA... no better management. Your only weapon now is to tell them, money, money or we quit. What is the ABPNL doing...? There are enough jobs available, worldwide, and Belgian pilots have good reputation to be considered for hiring anywhere.
Mes meilleurs voeux à tous.
xxx
Happy contrails