“I’ve been coordinating in the office for a week on behalf of Captain X and have not had an opportunity to put pen to paper. Captain X did a [Florida] turn a little over a week ago and upon arrival there were significant delays returning to [NE hub]. As some of you may know, some station managers indicate they “own” the aircraft while it’s at the gate and that was actually reiterated to me on the phone by [an ACP]. I’d suggest the station manage the boarding process, fueling, catering, you name it and when you want to give us the plane back, call me, I’ll be in the restaurant. This is an attempt to infringe upon the Captain’s authority and we don’t need to accept it and we need to let management know if that’s how they want to play, we can play that way, i.e. I sure hope the station manager has time to manage all the things required to get off the gate at push time and I’ll be in the seat 20 minutes prior to whenever you’ve told me that I can have my aircraft back.
“Captain X initially told the station that he’d like to get boarded up and push close to on time, hoping the delays would get better, however, the station manager did not agree. As we all know, this works often enough to justify doing it and if you are a turn guy, which I am and Captain X is, you know when this is a good idea and when it’s not. All of that would have probably gone unnoticed to management, however when the station closed the door to push the aircraft, they broke something and now they were on a mechanical and it was a significant fix and a wait for parts. Based upon Captain X’s calculations, they were going to wind up flying into the morning around 5 – 6 am, and he let the station manager know at 6 pm that was not going to happen – he didn’t see himself landing anywhere 12 hours from that point in time. We don’t forecast fatigue, but essentially, when you are faced with reality of flying into the morning; one could easily assume that you could say I can’t see myself doing that.
“There was discussion about taking a [famous sports team’s] charter aircraft and letting the company replace it, which they would not. Finally the flight equipment subbed with a B737 and the passengers continued—at least that’s my understanding of the events. At this point they reassigned Captain X and his FO to ferry the broke aircraft, once fixed, to [a southern hub]. He was told the parts would arrive after midnight and the ETD would be 0200, which is when he asked his FO if he was up for that and the FO replied, “I got up early this morning with babies at home and planned on a FL turn, my answer is - I don’t think so”, at which point, Captain X said he felt the same way, so they indicated they were too fatigued to continue on the present reassignment, get them a hotel and they’ll do it in the morning. That’s what happened and the aircraft was fixed at 0145 and ferried in the morning to [southern hub], arriving within a few hours that it would have originally arrived, with a rested crew that continued home to [NE hub] via a DH.
“At this point the issue has been resolved with Captain X and the office as far as what transpired and there should not be any more issues that arise. However, Captain X and the FO have yet to be paid fully for the pairing and I’ve instructed Captain X to talk to [his ACP] and if he meets with resistance, we will roll in with a grievance and take issue with this from the moment the station manager assumed command of the aircraft. I told Captain X that fatigue calls are paid on a case by case basis and in this case it’s reasonable to assume that you set out for a simple Florida turn and all of a sudden the best staffed airline wanted you to fly all night to position an aircraft in [southern hub] and then DH back to [NE hub] at some point in your career. I told him he has the full support of the union. Once again, I think Captain X’s specific issues have been resolved, but the larger issues remain – comments about who is in command of the aircraft when it’s at the gate and if they don’t get their full pay, we’ll file a Level One grievance.”
