US Pilot Labor Thread 7/27-8/3

[EastUS]

Maybe she just meant that she was having a "senior moment".

Roger...I can relate........Umm...what was it we were talking about again?

 

[luvthe9]

Senior to most of you.

I think this must be the blonde chick that was whining to Parker in the last PHX roadshow, That was great entertainment, and not to me

 

[AAA73Pilot]

Sounds like you have fuel management issues. Good aviators keep close track of their fuel at each waypoint, it is an attention to detail thing. Perhaps this is a reason you are an ex-check airman?

Honey, your attempts at disparaging an east poster simply amazes me. Capt. Bud has been retired for a number of years, which is common knowledge, even in the forum. Your backdoor slur was meant to be what? A low key personal attack, which you so proudly pontificate when it happens to you. I love how you always run to mama when you don't like what you hear and claim personal foul. Maybe when you get the experience that he has you might understand what is really being discussed.

 

[AAA73Pilot]

I'm starting to believe it's more a case of "They honestly just don't know any better".

Ditto. An interesting mindset, to be sure.

 

[CaptBud330]

Please don't show your ignorance about oceanic procedures. Time and fuel checks are certainly made. Gatwick has one runway for arrival and departures. The arrival procedure includes a hold at Willow. I have arrived at Gatwick many times with plenty of fuel until Gatwick went zere/zero. Gee, that surely was forecast, NOT. Maybe you are a clairvoyant and would know at 30W the visibility would go tango alpha upon arrival. Hey sweet cheeks, you can only hold for so many turns before you have to make a decision. Gee, I wish we could have flown together. I never would have had to even get a track assignment. You could just wing it. And the reason I'm no longer a Check Airman is because I turned 60.

 

[EastUS]

Maybe when you get the experience that he has you might understand what is really being discussed.

Amen. Whatever my manifest sins of pride and arrogance...I at least know where to show proper respect for an honorable career well flown. I can no longer even assume that the term "respect" is even known to exist out west....Disgusting.

CaptBud330: "And the reason I'm no longer a Check Airman is because I turned 60." Tush and piffle good Sir...you call THAT an excuse? 😉 Seriously..congrats yet again on a "job" well done, and I hope life's good, and continues to be so for many, many years to come.

"Maybe you are a clairvoyant and would know at 30W the visibility would go tango alpha upon arrival. Gee, I wish we could have flown together. I never would have had to even get a track assignment. You could just wing it." Perfect 😉

 

[Mr Furlough]

Oh great! We get to look forward to more lunacy and idiocy from the FO club. More wasting of dues money on another false “safetyâ€￾ issue. Do you understand that you only get one time to falsely throw the safety card and you guys wasted it. The next time a real safety issue comes up the feds and the public will not believe you.

What a childish maneuver to use the ASAP program for political gain. I did a flight from DTW to PHX. The latest bulletin says to plan on landing with 5500 lbs in an airbus. We were planned to land with 7.1 we actually landed with 8.5. Should I file out an ASAP report? USAPA says file every time fuel is not what it was planned.

Are you all so thick in the head that you can not see past the stupidity of USAPA? The damage that they are causing? Do you honestly believe that asking for an investigation into fuel burn will accomplish what you want? The feds are going to show because they have to. They are going to review paperwork. Probably find some errors. Guess who gets called onto the carpet? Pilots. Now USAPA has to waste resources defending these pilots against honest mistakes that would not have been noticed. The feds will probably increase observations. What did that accomplish? The flight plans were legal.

In my opinion if the company had enough evidence to call these 8 pilots in for training. After the debacle that USAPA caused I would have just fired the 8 and been done with it. Let the FO club try and get their jobs back. Waste more resources over a non- incident. Besides, have you asked yourself who was it that asked for the training? Ed Bular (east) Boss Hogg (east) an east chief pilot or someone in the training department all run by former east pilots. It was one of your own.

All of this nonsense just to try and show the company how tough the new club is? Management is shaking their head in disgust ALPA was not the best but at least there was some adult supervision. If an MEC tried to pull this boneheaded maneuver they could at least give some unemotional guidance. Tell them it is not helpful. But not now. Bradford can go off on his little temper tantrum with no one to stop him.

Are you so lost in the 70’s that you think that this kind of stupidity is going to get you a better contract? That causing passenger bookings to go down or increasing fuel costs will improve our contract? You all need a serious dose of reality. This is 2008 an airline is going to fail in order to save the entire industry. Do you think that the government cares who it is? If the new US Airways closed tomorrow would anyone miss it? Domestically. PHL so what other hubs by other carriers are nearby. CTL a small southern city ATL nearby. PHX as you have said leisure market, big deal SWA can pick up the slack. LAS losing block hours anyway. International, a very small percentage in that market. Get real only 19 wide bodies. United has that many in maintenance at any one time. So no US Air would not be missed.

You were saved from oblivion the last time. Don’t count on it this time.

Cleardirect,

I don't agree with your assertions that it is alright to allow the company to conjure up a training cycle for these pilots because they chose to add fuel. USAPA had to step in and make a statement as it reflects the Captains authority. As nobody, and I seriously mean-nobody-can fly an airliner better from his desk than the professionals on site.

My observations in respect to your post is that you are too angry at USAPA, the East, and your company to see the importance of giving our crews the latitude to exercize their own judgement. Perhaps it would be prudent to address that issue rather than that of adding fuel.

Try and calm down and see the benefit of supporting our pilots whom err on the side of safety, a union that will actually go to bat for you, and the possibility that things can get better.

Best

 

[NiceLandingCaptain]

As an ex-A330 Check Airman, I will tell you I would rather have more then less fuel. I can't tell you the number of times we came within just a few hundred pounds of having to divert to our alternate. Only the professionalism of the British Airways crews telling the final controller to let us (meaning US Airways) go ahead of them, allowed us to get to our intended destination.
Until you fly international, don't underestimate the value of more fuel regardless of what dispatch calculates.

I absolutely agree that too much fuel is far better than not enough. Experience does play a large role in determining what the right amount for any given flight should be.

But the chaps in question were adding extra fuel on to 50% of their flights. Not passing judgement here, but if these folks were doing this, why weren't the other widebody Captains doing the same thing? How come only 8 Captains recognized a problem? And why weren't these elite 8 filling out ASAPS to get the whole system changed to something more appropriate.

Could dispatch have been wrong that often?

And the real dealbreaker here is usaps sophomoric advert in the paper. That was a flat out prevarication of the real situation. The leaders of the circus are embarassing the rest of the pilot group.

By the way, CB, how come you're an EX check airman? Did they let you get out of this nuthouse the eastyz have thrown together?

 

[EastUS]

By the way, CB, how come you're an EX check airman?

Words sometimes simply fail to serve. 🙄

"I'm starting to believe it's more a case of "They honestly just don't know any better"."

 

[Eastisleast]

A lot like the DASh-8...no?

You guys are quite simply "outclassed" and it pisses you off...

I understand.

It's not your fault.

You worked for a regional that went to Canada and Mexico

(doesn't make you a hero)

Yeah, we feel real "outclassed". Man I wish Parker would have let your pile of rust airline go down the drain.

 

[lynyrdskynyrd]

How come every other press release from usapa says something about east pilots being some of the most experienced pilots in the world? Does someone have an inferiority complex?

 

[boeingplt]

Yeah, we feel real "outclassed". Man I wish Parker would have let your pile of rust airline go down the drain.

A bit egocentric, don't you think? AWA existed in a virtual bubble, NOT! Brother, we are in this together!

We have been - like it or not - since our collective managements decided to make it so. The real question is,

do we now know what thinking does not work? Is it time for some thinking outside of our collective boxes?

Discuss...

 

[Megasnoop]

But the chaps in question were adding extra fuel on to 50% of their flights. Not passing judgement here, but if these folks were doing this, why weren't the other widebody Captains doing the same thing? How come only 8 Captains recognized a problem? And why weren't these elite 8 filling out ASAPS to get the whole system changed to something more appropriate.

Give us a break, Landing. Your passing judgment here. And your wrong. The letter I saw showed the captain in question adding about 2700# only on 40% of his flights. At holding altitude, that's not even 3 turns, 12 minutes. And that was only for the first quarter of 2008. Europe WX sucked last winter. You don't know where #9 ranked, so don't pretend there's some kind of a big gap between #8 and #9. CPs Yarko and Corbusier are the two biggest self-promoters we've got here in PHL. Regarding ASAPs, YHGTBKM! That's not what they're for. They're for after the scare and after the alleged violation. At least that's what the FAA say.

Aviation Safety Action Program
The goal of the Aviation Safety Action Program (ASAP) is to enhance aviation safety through the prevention of accidents and incidents.

To encourage an employee to voluntarily report safety issues even though they may involve an alleged violation of Title 14 of the Code of Federal Regulations (14 CFR), enforcement-related incentives have been designed into the program. An ASAP is based on a safety partnership that will include the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the certificate holder, and may include any third party such as the employee’s labor organization.

And oh, by the way, USAPA had ASAP up and running within 72 hours of giving ALPO the boot, even though your AWAPPA and ALPO threw the scare that it would be CXed.

And the real dealbreaker here is usaps sophomoric advert in the paper. That was a flat out prevarication of the real situation. The leaders of the circus are embarassing the rest of the pilot group.

What deal? You guys don't want to deal. You don't even care what we negotiate. Your just waiting to sue. Knock yourselves out. USAPA gave the company plenty of warning that we would run the ad if they didn't back off. They called USAPA's bluff. I think Parker got blindsided by his own inept managers. You whine about CA's authority and safety on the silly issue of jumpseats, but you attack us when it comes to fuel and CA's authority.

By the way, CB, how come you're an EX check airman? Did they let you get out of this nuthouse the eastyz have thrown together?

Maybe if you would read with some comprehension, you'd see that Capt Bud RETIRED! Maybe that's why he's an EX check airman. Ya' think? (Europe's beautiful today) Snoop

 

[767jetz]

The way I see it, there are 3 different issues here.

#1 is captains authority.
#2 is whether or not a few captains were abusing their authority to "stick it to the man."
#3 is how USAPA handles these affairs.

Regardless of where you stand on #2 and #3, issue #1 is important enough to make allowances for 2 & 3. It's not like these guys were taking fuel OFF the flight plan. That would be a totally different scenario all together. But as long as a decision is made to err on the side of caution, or to be extra conservative, and does not compromise safety, then captains authority must remain intact.

Just my 2 pennies. Carry on.

 

[EastUS]

Maybe if you would read with some comprehension, you'd see that Capt Bud RETIRED! Maybe that's why he's an EX check airman. Ya' think? (Europe's beautiful today) Snoop

Situational Awareness appears to be an entirely neglected concept in some circles. "Give us a break, Landing." Good thing you didn't say "a brake" as that poster, within a previous thread, noted that with Madrid..among the longest runways in the world, he'd land a 330/no flaps using maximum manual braking, no autobrakes and that the only issue would be to (unbelievable..I know) taxi to the gate before the fuse plugs melt...neg notions of brake cooling procedures..neg concerns for ground personnel safety....and NO...seriously, I'm NOT kidding...all may look it up within the archives. NiceLandingCaptain: "After we touch down, its pretty much max everything - full reversers, heavy breaking, and keep sure you stay on the centerline. The last bit is important because it tells you that you are applying equal pressure to both sets of brakes." "Maybe you'd rather have Semen or Seham - whatever - explain the logic of using autobrakes". "After you've stopped its simply a matter of getting to the gate before all the fuse plugs melt and your tires go flat." NLC: "You eastyz just continue to ad lib your procedures like you always have. Us west pilots will continue to follow the procedures provided in our manuals like we always have." I did wonder what "manuals" he got the "procedures" of using max manual braking, on a runway literally useable as a space shuttle recovery point, and then to blithely taxi with superheated brakes all the way to the gate from....no matter I suppose = Folks..you just can't make this type of "Professional" ignorance and wholesale insanity up....Who would believe it?

I can't think of anyone more qualified to speak for the west on transatlantic fuel planning issues...and that's the saddest part 😉

"You whine about CA's authority and safety on the silly issue of jumpseats, but you attack us when it comes to fuel and CA's authority." Yes...mind-boggling indeed, but sadly typical "thinking" for some it seems. Apparently...it's an impossibly heroic effort to maintain even a "safe" level of awareness when accompanied by a jumpseater..and is righteously declared to be completely beyond the abilities of many out there..but mere trifles, such as fuel, are viewed as insignificant and even "political" in nature. The very same magnificent heroes and world class aviators there that've declared themselves to be utterly unable to even safely fly with merely the hideous distraction of a jumpseater......now turn and preach their clearly superior, nay, even awesome knowledge of atlantic fuel planning to any and all..without their having ever made so much as one such flight themselves...and even to an extremely experienced check airman. What can truly and fairly be said of such people?.... that's at all suitable for any public forum anyway? 😉 I'll just note that the truly scary part is that these people seem to actually believe their own BS, feel that dispatched fuel loads should never be questioned, immediately accept whatever management tells them, and seemingly haven't the slightest clue about even basic fuel planning concepts.

"I'm starting to believe it's more a case of "They honestly just don't know any better"."