You have to remember that the reason the FEs are on the street is because Atlas is flying Polar flights. That is what the arbitrator has determined. Where it goes nobody knows. But there will be a very large monetary settlement into several millions of dollars. You also have to remember that the previous arbitration assumption was the company was correct in their position that they were not taking Polar flights, but, it depended upon this arbitration. We now know that the company was wrong. That may cause a lot more money to the company not to mention probably a longer time to settlement.
Until then it is all speculation what will happen down the road. I think much of this thread is ca-ca until we hear the final settlement and verdict. My personal opinion: The FEs will probably not come back, or at least a large portion of them. There are though, a lot of FEs senior to me and I am in the upper half of the merged seniority list so it might not be as many as you might think. Then there is the question of the Captain downgrades, those will have to be resolved. So there is a lot a water yet to go under the bridge before anyone can move on, as you say.
Last edited by layinlow; 5th November 2008 at 02:04.
Reason: addition