SCOTAIRWAYS NOT SOUNDING GOOD!!!
 

Hi all,

Friend of a friend at Scotair says it aint looking good for the future!Lots of capts/fo's leaving and more to come!!! Anyone else heard any of this aswell??:ugh:

I have a friend that used to have a friend that may have been in aviation.
He say 'Pilots move on to bigger paypackets when the big airlines need more pilots'.
Told this to another friend who says his friend said it was 'always the way'.
Off to join a friend watching some paint dry ..................

Yeah ....... I know I bit! :bored:

What was the original name of that outfit? and did it start at Ipswich?

Sucking. Named after the founders surname.

Suckling Airways and yes.

Dreadful woman

NS

It was originally founded at Ipswitch as Suckling Airways. After complaints from the flying club about damage to the grass runway they relocated to RAF Wattisham before finding a permanent base at Cambrige.

As far as I know they are still based, or have their head office at Cambrige, but they no longer operate scheduled flights from the airport. (The odd weekend charter still operates from EGSC)

So are they sinking??
 

Come on jester42 you seem like you know whats happening? Whats the Capts salary and package? Does it compair with other tp outfits?

Not authoratitive by any means, but PPJN suggests that the payscales at SAY are about average for the sector. Certainly, on inspection, it's not significantly better or worse than other similar carriers (eg WOW, EZE).

This sounds more like, as Jester said, ScotAirways feeling the effect of some upward movement in the industry rather than having problems with the business model.

Will see what happens when BA increase to 7 flights per day into Lcy.:\

sucking airways
 

Many top people at scotair. Learnt a lot there. Wonderful aircraft.

Howling mad woman though.

ragga

BA Connect to increase EDI-LCY-EDI to 7 per weekday... Just one question and that is where is the additional capacity going to come from? Half the Avro fleet is in the process of going to Swiss, and the aircraft parking/pax boarding facilities at EDI are diabolical now - nevermind the summer schedule!

Did hear of a possible merger between CB and BE using the Dash8-400 on the LCY route.

Its the Banking community in EDI that is putting the pressure on BA to increase the frequency. One certain Royal Bank of ..... is throwing cash at the route and asking for dedicated facilities at each airport for their staff, including dedicated check-in, executive lounges and ultimately - their own aircraft! Trust me, this has been looked at and is simmering away, pending the quality, reliability and value for money they get from Connect and CB.

Dreadful Woman
 

How can you say she was a dreadful woman!!!
If it wasn`t for her Suckling Airways wouldn`t exist.
You lot of tossers would still be in your flying clubs,
looking for your first aviation job.
She was the first one in and the last one out, every day
and every weekend.
Suckling was and is her baby, god help anyone that
upset the child.

Well Said WiFi,
I'm sure there were plenty in the short haul world that thought she was "howling mad", many of those companies do not exist now - all of the other original european 328 operators for instance. Credit where its due, the 30 seat game is tough and she's still doing it.

Wifi

I tend to agree with you.

I knew MS from the early days of the airline when she would call on travel agents in the Manchester area during the early days of the airline when they fly the Dornier 228.

I would sum her up as an astute business woman who knew what she wanted, knew what she was selling, and above all was a person who kept her word.

I just wish that there were more people in our industry who could - certainly in those formative years - be relied upon. :)

Scottie Dog

And don't you love the way she used to whip up pax meals in her kitchen... that would all be illegal now.

Having said that, I have witnessed her throwing temper tantrums and hissy fits. She may be astute, but she was also, without doubt, a nightmare to deal with.

Perfect manager then. :\

:p

The murmurations of La Merlyn could be wondrous to behold and a veritable assault upon the eardrums!
No doubt her ability to completely transliterate English prose into something she wished to hear and that only she could understand came from her days of studying for The Bar. She once laboured under the illusion that the Chief Pilot had written CAP 371. Never quite so generous would he have been?
She could be really quite explosive when it came to protecting Suckling baby; deranged even and very often totally and incomprehensibly wrong. However, although it took a strong man to stand up to her and a devious and courageous one to get around her foibles, I never knew her to carry a grudge much beyond the end of the tantrum.
The Sucklings gave a lot of first time starters their jobs and have made a very significant contribution to aviaton in England. In fact, in my never so humble, Roy, Merlyn and their airline have put more into aviation in this grey little country than most. For their services they deserve gongs far more than some of those who have received titles for doing nothing much more for flying than raising shareholder's expectations and their own pension portfolios.
I well remember the unsolicited and unprofessional vituperative comments that used to come over the ether up and down the east coast from other pilots in other airlines who had flown for Suckling in the past. Those aviators would not be where they are now had not the 'Cambridge Caligulas' given them work in the first place.
I must admit that the bludgeoned gnomes in operations at Cambridge might have had a rather harder time of it of a dark winter's night but quite frankly, having seen at first hand what some of the aforementionedly challenged people could get up to of their own volition - :E .
There were and for aught I know still are, some very fine people working for Suckling and some very fine training was made available, albeit vicariously, to those who to some might have seemed untrainable at times. It was a fine place to cut some teeth !
A few words on Scot Air? Thanks to Brian Souter's funding the airline was able to proceed with its acquisition of the Do 328 fleet. A more sophisticated turbo prop would be hard to find. Certainly there was a great deal of taxing taxying to and fro (RIP. John), but at the end of the day I would warrant that there are many who now sit proud and tall in their Airbuses who are damned glad that they had the opportunity to fly five television screens and two propellors around the airwaves for the Sucklings.
I don't know that I'd much want to see Roy in the House of Lords although Merlyn might liven things up a bit for Labour's prospective pig swillers, but if the likes of Bishop and Branson can pull knighthoods out of their hobbies (?) I certainly do not see that the Sucklings do not deserve similar accolades for their life's work and their contribution to that of others. :D

Cavortingcheetah,
Meow... get those claws back in. We probably have worked together at SAY and I know that MS is a big problem, but its her baby and if she wants to ruin it then its no longer our mortgages at stake. Your words about the Ops "Gnomes" and that they are "Challenged people" is a bit harsh.
Now, have your saucer of milk and think how lucky you are.
C.T.

Gongs for the Sucklings
 

vbmenu_register("postmenu_2462269", true); Cavortingcheetah you put a compelling case for a gong for the Sucklings. Failing that may be they have a spare million or two just sitting around!!!!!!!:confused:

So where too now?
 

I agree with posts saying they (Ms/Rs) deserve praise for giving lots of people a break when other companies just laughed and also for suviving lots of difficult times in the industry but my question is what happened to the drive behind the company that got them to where they are now? I mean for years their has bin no expansion with fleet or routes?Is this a sign that maybe the Sucklings no longer have the final word on what happens!!:ooh:

I've had the pleasure of an arguement with MS and she is indeed a difficult person to deal with.

spent 3 1/2 years flogging around in suckling 228s-bugger all money,900(+)hours per year-and would not have missed any of it.what a great way to learn your craft! the 'bus i fly now is apiece of ease compared to those days.
loads of respect is due to roy and merlin,and i hope their baby is doing ok.

:)

I think that those who, notwithstanding the odd little tirade with La Merlyn, really did benefit from Suckling, should drop a note to the powers that be recommending a knighhood/damehood for the two of them for services to British aviation.
The Do 228 was the most crazy flying fun. An aircraft which was most ably suited for the task of getting the passengers where they wanted to be regardless of certain extraneous niceties too numerous to mention.
Good luck to the big baby and, dare I say it, to the wonderful people in operations who, through the thick and the thin, when the proverbial slammed into the predictable, managed to convince (if that's the appropriate word) crews that they really should do that which perchance would have raised, at the least, a quizzical eyebrow at that most magnificent insitution of aviaton derangement, BALPA.:ok:

I am astonished to see people defending this grubby little outfit in its 228 days, or its crashingly offensive and vituperative pet dragon at all.

All I can say is some of you have very short memories indeed, or else an unhealthily low survival instinct. Of course many of us benefited from a start there, but at what cost to the nerves?

.

Jesus! Doesn't that just say it all! And you want to honour these people???

QED!

;)
What Ho ! Armed for war! I can sympathise with fibrils all aquiver, certainly can.
Cost to the nerves? Well, a bit like having permanent root canal work as I remember but, since, elephant like I have a long memory and a healthy survival instinct; I shall say no more.:hmm:
Well, at least not for the nonce!
Toodle Pip. :rolleyes:

GOING GOING GONE
 

Over past 5 months 6 capts/2 fo's left and presently another 3 capts/3 fo's working notice period.:ouch:

Please switch off the lights . .
 

. . when the last one leaves to conservice power :)

:hmm:


London City is an amusing place to put matters mildly indeed, so much so that a certain Italian 328 operator prohibited FOs from taking off or landing there.
The pilot attrition rate in an airline like Suckling/Scot will indeed always be high. It always was and I would not read too much into the present move-on rate amongst the present crews.
I too, wish them well and still think that if the likes of Bishop and Branson have reaped rewards for their services to aviaton, then so too should the Sucklings.
I have to agree with the likes of Ronnie Barker. If you took the bull by the horns, dilemmas were usually resolved in a fairly expeditious manner and young Roy, in his little glass office was far more approachable than many airline bosses with whom I have come in contact.:D

or, perhaps, any form of defects...

Gawdelpus, how bad does it have to get before people stop blethering about gongs, instead of lawsuits?

:rolleyes:

Suckling turned out a master race of pilots. There was a no female culture to distract the brave aviators from their task, something for which many were grateful. Intrepid, stern jawed and used to dealing with any eventuality thrown into the maelstrom by meteorology, magnet or management; these brave men soldiered on so that they might bring their expertise and well honed instincts for survival to the benefit of other carriers. Other airlines, recognising the training for what it was, leapt into the breach to recruit from the ranks of the Suckling Pilots - true commandoes of the air - brave few survivors of the wrath of a chattering Merlin.
As those who now leave walk down the Cambridge corridor of fame that leads from Marshalls to the main road, saluting those who march up the same dark alleyway to take their places, let us reflect on the excellence of the operation that turned out such paragons of aviation . Men unbroken, undaunted and adaped to go into the war of the skies with the barest of equipment, no food, no sleep, no drink. For the creation of such magnificent survivors, accolades are due!:D

What.........
 

Someone once told me i'd meet alot of great people in this business but also alot of w:mad:ers!! Think a prime example is above me right now.:ooh:

Will ScotAirways seek to replace these guys, or will it all go down in the column marked 'natural wastage'?

There's no change on their website; they're not advertising for pilots and they reiterate their 'please don't call us or expect acknowledgement of CVs' policy.

Does anyone know any different?

They are advertising for DE Captains and there is a fairly constant rate of type rating courses for new F/O's (every 12 weeks maybe less). Send CV to chief pilot and if your lucky yours will be top of the pile when he picks the next four candidates. It does help if you know a present employee who could recommend you.

DE Captains harder to come by, seems payscale is average to say the least compared with others.:{

Returning to the original question, as a result of the upturn in the industry there are a lot of pilots leaving, mainly for better paypackets flying jets, which is understandable, F/O's are at suckling in their first job and always looking to move on to bigger and better.

The Captains have been there (generally) since pre sept 11th and haven't been able to move until the last 12 months or so. All this seems to me natural progression and not as has been stated "the beginning of the end".

It is true that as pre-mentioned the payscales are poor and therefore DE Captains are hard to come by, and now the promotable F/O's have either left, are leaving, or do not have enough Total time.

This company has had and continues to have six figure sums pumped into it by it's shareholders, who refuse to be beaten by BACON on it's Edinburgh routes. I would say the lights will not be turned out just yet, and for new pilots the D328 is the best a/c to learn the trade on and will undoubtably be a great basis for a future Airbus pilot.