How times have changed.
 

Rumour is, so far three crew have resigned from CX rather than be drafted to fly the 747.

Perhaps they were anti-vaxxers and forced to resign. Will be an interesting court case, should someone decide to drag CXit to court over unfair dismissal :}

Being drafted onto the 747 was just the straw that broke the camels back. People are fed up with this pathetic contract, this incompetent government and generally a bleak outlook for a very long time. Any of us that have managed to get away to our home countries, see that people are resuming some semblance of a normal life, albeit with some restrictions. You never have to worry about being rounded up and sent to jail because you spent 5 mins with an individual that tested positive for covid. If you test positive, the advice is to stay home and self-isolate and come to the hospital if your condition worsens. Contrast this to HK where the CHP and the police show up in full hazmat suits and drag you away against your will.
This job and this city are finished, maybe that is by design? Who knows?
It just takes a little push, for these individuals the push was the 747 course. Anybody who can leave, will leave. There is no point in staying in this miserable place any longer.

There are rumours of losing some of the quarantine alleviations for crew later this month. If that happens it will load a few more straws onto the camel.

They are doing it wrong. Get the rating, then leave. :E

Those 3 must be absolute millionaire morons, don’t they realise how valuable a B747 type rating is…….

you don’t know their personal situation, maybe there are things more important than more money..

Yes as in not being treated like :mad: for hauling rubber dog :mad: around, and almost permanent incarceration on your supposed days off.

Cathay is really burning its bridges with this ‘cannot’ attitude.

-late rosters
-no sympathy for missing a duty due to changing covid rules.
-late notice of unpaid leave.
-based crew could fly sectors from outside hkg to in, 24 hrs in a hotel, fly back, no weeks of quarantine…. ‘Cannot’
-no reduced roster option any more.

etc etc

People who haven’t seen wife and kids overseas in over a year, insane.

The company needs to be more flexible, not only to rake in more money on the business side, but more so on the human side.

Honestly when you call someone a moron for not wanting to fly the most "iconic passenger aircraft of all time" you truly live in a different world.

I think covid has given most a glimpse of a world outside of Cathay, no longer were you constantly distracted by the fast paced rat race that comes with the lifestyle... whereas before the money was worth putting up with the inconveniences, now that is no longer the case and people have realigned their priorities in life.

Many more guys will resign way before their retirement date, just wait until the 2 year ARAPA transition ends

The company has too many crew and they cannot fire enough of them fast enough.

So make the crews life miserable any which way you can and they will leave on their own.

I reckon the company could do a lot more to make life easier with all these crazy hk gov covid restrictions but they have too many of us and therefore don't wanna help. Rather let the crew suffer so they leave.

They also have the perfect tool to find rock bottom, POS18.

Got too many crew? keep slashing conditions till they go. Don't have enough crew? Slightly increase conditions till you have what you need.

The company will always be able to pay the absolute minimum they have too, why would you ever want to pay above and beyond what you have too ever again...

They’re going to have to explain all the empty flight decks at the annual shareholders meeting, once business returns.

when will that be? :rolleyes: lets be real, flying isn't returning to pre-pandemic normal for HK anytime before 2023...

2023? What happens if there is one case of the Omega variant in HKG, Australia, or NZ in 2023? There doesn't appear to be any stop date for the COVID zero lunacy, so I think 2023 is being overly optimistic.

Covid is never ever going to go away, unfortunately.

it will have to be another thing to manage like the flu, except that you either have to get the vaccine or get covid and survive it in order to prevent a large amount of deaths or long covid.
Then booster shots for the elderly, after this new variants won’t really matter.

Eventually governments will figure this out and grow some balls and open up the countries, zero covid strategy will not work.
politicians care only about one thing when they make decisions; how does this make me look?
the only way forward is opening up, sooner or later.

Nobody knows how or when this insanity will end. If I had to guess, HK will be one of the very last places to lift restrictions and only when big brother says so. Cathay doesn't care about you, your family or your mental health. Maybe the flight decks will be empty when and if this thing turns around and maybe they will be forced to improve the contract when that happens.
For myself, they could go back to A scale and I wouldn't stay. Working for this organization is not worth it. There is far more to life than money.

HK's priority is opening the boarder to China. They don't care about any other international destination. They will even restrict everywhere else just to get that China boarder open.
China has covid cases, HK does not yet it's China that doesn't want to open.. that's when you know it's political.

HK and China will be one of the last places on the planet to ditch the zero covid policy.

Picture a bubble around HK and China and outside of that bubble is everywhere else and everywhere else is back to pre covid flying...

On a side note, recently CX put up all that advertising in kitty city about their new brand "cathay" and all those dumb slogans like move beyond. What a waste of money...

Oli777

Morons? FFS you have no clue what the Cathay guys have gone through. Your attitude is the reason this industry is a complete mess. You obviously are missing a lot or do not have a family or children or a backbone to work it out

dabz

Recently? The new group branding has been there since it was announced. You have got to get into the office more for some good old bootlicking. You'll see the changes sooner.

Maybe the Lamb Curry should apply the new FDMM to solve the Covid crisis

smogluver

You have no idea what the Cathay guys have gone through? Did I read that right? Being paid and sitting at home and having 600+ SO’s that worth nothing in this aviation world, whilst locals were displaced? Who’s the moron here? MORON!

Moron? Everybody here is a moron. You are, I am and the proof is people( morons ) paying brand new price for jeans with holes in them.... Now who's the moron?

wait, sitting at home having a great time, partying 24/7 and getting paid for it for the last +1.5 years?! I'm sorry, but if there are 3 people out there that resign because they can't do a few weeks away from home, well then that says something. (hence why I said they must have a very rich hubby to fall back on) It will not be forever, if you have to "sacrifice" a few weeks every month or two, then why is that so bad? The problem comes from guy & girls with a silver spoon mentality that have never had to wash their own dishes, let alone do their own laundry. No one is asking you to screw yourself over, or work for free (even thought the 777 crew are having the time of their lives all for free!) Would it not be fair to say, wow CX has given me +1.5 years of free money, maybe I could help them out for a few weeks until all this settles down, if that takes 1 year or 2, so be it. It will not be forever, rosters, time off, normal flying will return.

There are those who did actually sacrifice a lot to get into CX, like the Saffers on contract away from home for 2 months plus on rotations in crap countries in shocking accommodations, military pilots who are away just as long if not longer etc, they did it for 10x longer time periods. It's not the end of the world and a 747 rating is incredible to have.

And no I'm not a company man or a commie from the Mainland, but I do hate silver spooners who moan.

----you may now start the backlash, aaaaand go!----:}

There is writing on the wall, and while I commend your optimism It does not reflect the gravity of the situation.

The fiirst recovery will be / is domestic air travel.

​The second is travel within unions / partnerships. EU or Canada - US, HK - mainland as examples.

​​​​​​The third is intercontinental. The leisure marked will not return to this segment for many, many years, maybe never. Point to point travel to HK is not enough, Cathay sells transit between Asia and the rest of the world. That puts the airline in the worst possible situation considering virus mutations and the highly ustable travel advisories being constantly amended. The lack of standardised vaccine passes, various vaccines being used and the different amount of doses being applied to various populations compunded by the out-of-synch regional outbreaks makes for grim propects of intercontinental travel.

And that's before even mentioning the political situation in HK. A gweilo airline has no future in that landscape.

Just saying.

"A gweilo airline has no future in that landscape." - I think the plan has clearly been that it WON'T be such an airline in the foreseeable future - it will be another Chinese airline but with a higher than average number of non-Chinese pilots - for a while............

My point exactly. Politically, it's a non-starter to even insinuate that a Chinese airline needs non-chinese pilots. For the manpower, perhaps, but not because they bring anything to the table that the Chinese don't already have. Cathay has been insinuating that point for 73 years; the Asian airline with a western mindset, which does not fly well in Beijing (pun intented). .

Of course you can argue all day long about culture, CRM, experience, adaptability and just culture, but it will be an absolute waste of time because it all comes down to politics.

Cathay can still sell transit if the airport can handle the movement of people without infections

You're really not getting it. What transit passengers? Going from where to where? You're not going to see any recovery in transit before you see a rise in point-to-point.

Relatively big numbers are still able to transit. The Chinese were using CX when the 5/1 was in place as it was a guaranteed jump back to the states.

" but it will be an absolute waste of time because it all comes down to politics."

and economics - why pay expats when you can pay locals?

Rie

But it's not about the ability to transit. It's about the global movement of passengers of which CX had a significant share. That global movement of passengers is not coming back anytime soon, perhaps never.

Carriers that operate domestically or within regions / unions will see a significant recovery on much shorter timelines.

Don’t tell NC this, as he/she/it/LGBTQ+/XYZ/E=MC is adamant that the good times will come flying back to HK and CXit :ugh:

Oli777

Have you already forgotten about the 40%+ permanent pay cut? That part is certainly forever. Not that it matters to me, I voted with my feet!

"I'm not a company man" after saying we should help them out....

Still better than those who probably had to take a paycut forever….

Putting the main aspect of this thread aside for a moment, of what possible “value” is a B747 type rating? Is anyone looking for rated 747 pilots? Seems like an A350 or B777 rating would be far more useful for the years ahead.

Yep, Atlas and Kalitta to name two, and the 777 rating is useful there as well. If you have the right to live and work in the US that is.

I flew the -400. Nice to fly. So, if your sitting on your ass and haven't any Boeing time, grab the -8 rating. If it doesn't work out for you quit.

A number of the European B744 freight operators are recruiting/have recruited recently. Some of them also have a large contingent of pilots from legacy carriers waiting to return when seats become available after their fleets were closed down. This will generate jobs for people with B744 ratings.