Pilot Profession
- Thread starter nostradamus
- Start date
exB717Flyer
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Unions are simply powerless to counteract the "perfect storm" of high fuel prices and an anti-labor government. This profession will improve when conditions improve. In the meantime it's only damage-control.
I have twenty-three years left of airline flying and I intend to make the best of it. I started professional flying back in the dark days of the early nineties and felt things would be improving by the time I got to the airline level. I was right, at least for a while. Let the young'uns figure things out for themselves.
I have twenty-three years left of airline flying and I intend to make the best of it. I started professional flying back in the dark days of the early nineties and felt things would be improving by the time I got to the airline level. I was right, at least for a while. Let the young'uns figure things out for themselves.
BoeingBoy
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I take no credit for this - it was supposedly written by a pilot taking early retirement from one or another airline. But it seems to fit the thread title.
Jim
-------
Guys,
It has been a fun 28 years for me and my only regret was that we
senior slugs left the airline bidnez worse off than we found it. If
good intentions count (and they don't) we had 'em.
Our pilot group operated in the fog of self assurance for too long.
Eastern? Pan Am? It'll never happen to us, etc.
Back then, senior guys like me could schedule trips in such a way
that our regular days off could be linked by a two-week vacation,
which would stretch the total time off to four weeks. If I remember
correctly, we also got five paid personal days -- and this was
during a time when the airline made record profits. Drinking on
deadheads to a layover was encouraged. Our biggest onboard problem
was choosing between the steak and the lobster. Smoking in the
cockpit was allowed and brought some pretty nice, smoking flight
attendants up for a foot rub by yours truly.
DC-10 Captains in 1977 made enough money to buy two pickup trucks a
month. Engineers never paid for a beer. The party on layovers was
generally in my room and the booze was free, courtesy of "survival
kits" packed in air-sickness bags provided by the flight attendants
I kept giving those foot rubs to.
Nobody ratted on anybody else. Conflicts were handled in-cockpit and
you could actually go into a chief pilots office and volunteer that
you screwed up on something.
Chief pilots back then were older guys who played a lot of golf and
didn't go to the office much. They wouldn't think of telling you, as
it happened in my case, that you were abusing sick leave when the
truth was that you were dying of cancer. (Not that I'm bitter about
that.)
If you did get summoned to see the big Kahuna at the General
Offices, he bought you lunch. Remember, those were gentler times.
We went from a smallish, well-run, obscenely profitable airline that
knew it's market to a huge company owned and managed by N.Y. bankers
and MBA types that never loaded a bag or pulled a chock, and
perfumed princes who I wouldn't hire to mow my lawn because they'd
hold too many meetings about how to use the starter rope.
I can't tell you how much I detest those guys. They took something
beautiful and fun and turned it into a charnel house of back-
stabbing, PowerPoint charts, elitism and idiocy. At every turn they
screwed the pooch, peed in the pool and blamed us, the pilots.
We went from being the highest paid in the country and being
considered by management as the airline's greatest asset to being
the least paid, least regarded in the industry and considered by the
perfumed princes as liabilities. They made the atmosphere so rank
with their incompetence that over a thousand of the most senior
guys, including this one, bailed out of the best job on the planet
because we have zero optimism for the airline's continued survival.
Even now I get so angry when I think about it that the drugs I'm
taking for this cancer thing won't calm me down. Sure, I might have
fought to get my medical back and in a few years I might have made
it -- but for what purpose? I'd take a pay cut coming back to the
line.
Besides, who the hell would care? When I was on the line and sicking
out every other trip due to the uncontrolled growth of an unknown
lung tumor, I heard weekly from the chief pilot about their latest
pie chart on how you pilots were "gaming the system." When I spent a
month this summer in the hospital literally dying, I never heard a
peep from anybody at our "family airline." Not a "How are ya?" Not
a "Kiss my ass" -- nothing.
So much for 28 years of "loyal service"!
I'll be like most early retirees -- I desperately miss the flying
and I even more desperately miss you guys, but management that
wouldn't be able to run a Sonic drive-through on a slow day and
the "job" itself?
Nah!
It is time to literally drain the swamp around my hurricane-damaged
house, rebuild and get on with things. Maybe I'll finally get that
big rig and do the truck driving I always threatened to do. I'll
definitely keep flying the Champ.
It looks like, with the airlines backing out of their pensions, me
and the wife will have to get jobs. I hope I can say, "Welcome to
Walmart," without having a seizure.
So -- goodbye, I guess.
It was an honor flying with you. Thanks for covering my ass for all
those years (you know who you are).
I love you guys.
Jim
-------
Guys,
It has been a fun 28 years for me and my only regret was that we
senior slugs left the airline bidnez worse off than we found it. If
good intentions count (and they don't) we had 'em.
Our pilot group operated in the fog of self assurance for too long.
Eastern? Pan Am? It'll never happen to us, etc.
Back then, senior guys like me could schedule trips in such a way
that our regular days off could be linked by a two-week vacation,
which would stretch the total time off to four weeks. If I remember
correctly, we also got five paid personal days -- and this was
during a time when the airline made record profits. Drinking on
deadheads to a layover was encouraged. Our biggest onboard problem
was choosing between the steak and the lobster. Smoking in the
cockpit was allowed and brought some pretty nice, smoking flight
attendants up for a foot rub by yours truly.
DC-10 Captains in 1977 made enough money to buy two pickup trucks a
month. Engineers never paid for a beer. The party on layovers was
generally in my room and the booze was free, courtesy of "survival
kits" packed in air-sickness bags provided by the flight attendants
I kept giving those foot rubs to.
Nobody ratted on anybody else. Conflicts were handled in-cockpit and
you could actually go into a chief pilots office and volunteer that
you screwed up on something.
Chief pilots back then were older guys who played a lot of golf and
didn't go to the office much. They wouldn't think of telling you, as
it happened in my case, that you were abusing sick leave when the
truth was that you were dying of cancer. (Not that I'm bitter about
that.)
If you did get summoned to see the big Kahuna at the General
Offices, he bought you lunch. Remember, those were gentler times.
We went from a smallish, well-run, obscenely profitable airline that
knew it's market to a huge company owned and managed by N.Y. bankers
and MBA types that never loaded a bag or pulled a chock, and
perfumed princes who I wouldn't hire to mow my lawn because they'd
hold too many meetings about how to use the starter rope.
I can't tell you how much I detest those guys. They took something
beautiful and fun and turned it into a charnel house of back-
stabbing, PowerPoint charts, elitism and idiocy. At every turn they
screwed the pooch, peed in the pool and blamed us, the pilots.
We went from being the highest paid in the country and being
considered by management as the airline's greatest asset to being
the least paid, least regarded in the industry and considered by the
perfumed princes as liabilities. They made the atmosphere so rank
with their incompetence that over a thousand of the most senior
guys, including this one, bailed out of the best job on the planet
because we have zero optimism for the airline's continued survival.
Even now I get so angry when I think about it that the drugs I'm
taking for this cancer thing won't calm me down. Sure, I might have
fought to get my medical back and in a few years I might have made
it -- but for what purpose? I'd take a pay cut coming back to the
line.
Besides, who the hell would care? When I was on the line and sicking
out every other trip due to the uncontrolled growth of an unknown
lung tumor, I heard weekly from the chief pilot about their latest
pie chart on how you pilots were "gaming the system." When I spent a
month this summer in the hospital literally dying, I never heard a
peep from anybody at our "family airline." Not a "How are ya?" Not
a "Kiss my ass" -- nothing.
So much for 28 years of "loyal service"!
I'll be like most early retirees -- I desperately miss the flying
and I even more desperately miss you guys, but management that
wouldn't be able to run a Sonic drive-through on a slow day and
the "job" itself?
Nah!
It is time to literally drain the swamp around my hurricane-damaged
house, rebuild and get on with things. Maybe I'll finally get that
big rig and do the truck driving I always threatened to do. I'll
definitely keep flying the Champ.
It looks like, with the airlines backing out of their pensions, me
and the wife will have to get jobs. I hope I can say, "Welcome to
Walmart," without having a seizure.
So -- goodbye, I guess.
It was an honor flying with you. Thanks for covering my ass for all
those years (you know who you are).
I love you guys.
B
BottomFeeder
Guest
pitguy said:
[post="305906"][/post]
PitGuy,
What I find funny is that you did not even know the airline that you worked for has the identifier AAA.
The best part of AAA is that your GONE.
pitguy
Veteran
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- Aug 21, 2002
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- 0
What I find funny is most of these scabs are still there suffering for pocket change. I left on my own terms because I could not work for morons that did not pay well.
...and I know about All American. I just may not be as old as you. No crime there. As Martha Stewart would say “It’s a good thingâ€.
I do agree about the best part is me being gone. Gee... that is a no brainer. I left and make a lot more cash. Work for a great stable company. Have better benefits. About 1/10th of the stress I had before. Yes, life is good. How is it working out for you???
...and I know about All American. I just may not be as old as you. No crime there. As Martha Stewart would say “It’s a good thingâ€.
I do agree about the best part is me being gone. Gee... that is a no brainer. I left and make a lot more cash. Work for a great stable company. Have better benefits. About 1/10th of the stress I had before. Yes, life is good. How is it working out for you???
Boeingboy, that letter breaks my heart 🙁
nostradamos, I don't know what to say, its a totally different industry now.
Its been downhill since deregulation, just took awhile for the shine to wear off, I guess.
Now, its not a job to make money and gain respect.
Everything's different.
At my company, FAs are not even allowed in the cockpit to visit anymore. WTF?
nostradamos, I don't know what to say, its a totally different industry now.
Its been downhill since deregulation, just took awhile for the shine to wear off, I guess.
Now, its not a job to make money and gain respect.
Everything's different.
At my company, FAs are not even allowed in the cockpit to visit anymore. WTF?
