US AIRWAYS SINKING FAST!

[psyops]

On the QT, I learned that Airways management has told the ALPA leadership that it must have small jets or go out of business. Management has given them a few weeks to try an make deals for their current and soon to be furloughed pilots with the code share commuters. Management has even gone so far as to solicit the managements of the regionals on ALPA's behalf, so that when they announce more layoffs and the allocation of hundreds of small jets to code share partners, they and ALPA can both say that they tried their best.

Meanwhile, not one of the code share partners have signed on. This in spite of the ALPA pilots inference that by giving their furloughees safe harbor, that Airways management will somehow think kindly on their respective airlines. Unfortunately for the Airways ALPA leadership, the commuter partners they seek to influence are not stupid enough to believe that Airways management cares one lick about furloughed pilots. They know the reality is that Airways management will do what they think they have to, regardless of who is nice to the people they lay off. It's a dog eat dog world, and the idiot Airways pilots who refused small jet integration are paying with the jobs of those junior to them. US Airways is a monument to egotism, stupidity, and narrow-mindedness.

[ 04 February 2002: Message edited by: psyops ]</p>

[typhoonpilot]

Psyops:

While I have to agree with the last line of your post, the rest of it is somewhat inaccurate and lacking in historical background. The USAirways pilots and employees all know that more Regional Jets are necessary in order to be a competitive airline, however an agreement must be reached with management so that the mainline employees don't just give their jobs away to the lower paying Regionals.

Prior to May of 2000 the USAirways pilots stood ready to negotiate a deal for more than the allotted 70 aircraft allowed at the Regionals. Unfortunately Wolf and company were too busy trying to sell the airline to United to talk about such inconsequential things. When the sale of the airline broke down in mid 2001, and after Gangwal publicly stated they had no Plan B, management started a campaign to get more Regional jets. Their propaganda included statements that the pilots were not cooperating in this effort. The pilots just laughed at the obsurdity of such statements, but still stood ready to negotiate. It was management that continually slowed the effort by not coming to the negotiating table. In recent weeks that has changed.

This is classic Stephen Wolf negotiating and the pilots union is not bowing down to it. A fair and equitable deal will be reached.

Now, as for the Regionals not signing on to a deal, the management and unions at Mesa, CCair, Trans States, and even Skywest are very interested in a deal that would include hiring some of the furloughed USAirways pilots. It is a win-win deal for both sides. The furloughed pilots would get jobs and the pilots at the regionals would get more jets to fly. In a few years when the furloughed pilots return to the mainline the jets would still be at the regionals and the pilots remaining there would have moved up quite nicely.

Another part to this whole story is that USAirways is parking 40 Fokker 100 jets in the desert at the same time that the RJ manufacturers are trying to come up with 70, 90, and even 100 seat RJs. USAirways and before them Piemont and PSA had the FK 28 and Bae 146 in operation way back in the 1980s and, at least in the case of Piedmont, made money hand over fist flying them as the new RJs are used today.

Yes psyops, USAirways is a monument to egotism ( CEO ), Stupidity ( past President ), and Narrow-Mindedness ( the rest of managment ).