JetBlue and ALPA has an AIP!

Nick said:
I enjoyed flying three workdays between Christmas and May 1
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A couple of questions on this.

Didn't you guys get into this profession because, for the most part, your love of flying and aviation? Seems the opposite if you fly 3 times in 5ish months.

Also, after not flying for such a long stretch don't you become rusty in your skills? I get the recurrent training etc, but is that comparable?

Thanks
 
A80TRACON said:
Nick said:
I enjoyed flying three workdays between Christmas and May 1
Click to expand...

A couple of questions on this.

Didn't you guys get into this profession because, for the most part, your love of flying and aviation? Seems the opposite if you fly 3 times in 5ish months.

Also, after not flying for such a long stretch don't you become rusty in your skills? I get the recurrent training etc, but is that comparable?

Thanks
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Flying for work is by far better than sitting at a desk but it is still work.
 
A80TRACON said:
A couple of questions on this.

Didn't you guys get into this profession because, for the most part, your love of flying and aviation? Seems the opposite if you fly 3 times in 5ish months.

Also, after not flying for such a long stretch don't you become rusty in your skills? I get the recurrent training etc, but is that comparable?

Thanks
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I think of it this way. Yes, I love flying and aviation.

Because of that, I am planning on airline flying for another ~30 years as long as I am legally/health able to.

With the above timeline in mind, if September-October-January-February-March-April can result in a total of one week of work on reserve (in base), then why not enjoy a month of being on call and let the lineholders move the airplanes!

One's category may not always be properly staffed so I think of it as a 'make hay while the sun shines' type of thing.

Plus, for me anyway, I've bid back to having a schedule until August has passed since the reserves will be flying more.

And as far as skills go, I don't know what other people do but I do pickup the tablet and go through some memory items and limitations when I periodically download newsletters, must-read bulletins, etc. After a month and a half round-the-world trip where I didn't even think about work, I actually did sit down and review my procedural flows.
 
A80TRACON said:
Didn't you guys get into this profession because, for the most part, your love of flying and aviation? Seems the opposite if you fly 3 times in 5ish months.
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Not really. I got into flying because it pays well, has pretty good scheduling flexibility and lots of time off to do other things. Yes, I enjoy it more than other jobs I've had, but it's still a job.

Also, after not flying for such a long stretch don't you become rusty in your skills? I get the recurrent training etc, but is that comparable?
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I checked out in a new plane in January and have only flown 5 times since then, and because all the captains I've flown with are sub 100 hours (it's a new fleet type) I haven't been able to be PF on any of them. It's been hard to remember what I'm supposed to be doing and brandhave actually bid a line most months (although I keep getting pulled off trips due to them doing IOE) just to get familiar with the plane.
 
A80TRACON said:
A couple of questions on this.

Didn't you guys get into this profession because, for the most part, your love of flying and aviation? Seems the opposite if you fly 3 times in 5ish months.

Also, after not flying for such a long stretch don't you become rusty in your skills? I get the recurrent training etc, but is that comparable?

Thanks
Click to expand...
I love flying but I also love time off. Flying a little while getting paid a lot is the dream. Right now I’m flying a lot but only getting paid a decent amount.
 
Here’s the thing on proficiency as I’ve seen it. Flying ~100 hours a year is fine for proficiency iff you have substantial time in type and operation under your belt, which most of the senior guys playing the reserve game do. I flew ~100 hours a year as a maintenance manager at my last job and it was fine even single pilot IFR in a high-workload airplane because I started with a few hundred hours in type flying 25 minute legs and over a thousand flying into the same airports. New job pace is 250ish and definitely don’t have the same level of comfort and proficiency flying more than twice as much because I just don’t have as much time in the airplane. But that’s just me, and I’m a pretty terrible pilot so probably summa y’all don’t have the same issue.
 
OneNineHundy said:
ATN_Pilot said:
It just shows the difference in mentality. At the purple menace, reserves are to be abused because they’re junior fodder. At real majors, reserve is just a legitimate lifestyle bid.
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Out of interest is there an airline other than Airtrain that you would work for?
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Hee hee...flying with a former Tranny right now. He explained a lot to me about the said person. All makes sense now.

Sent from my Moto G (4) using Tapatalk
 
ATN_Pilot said:
I wouldn’t work for any airline now. I’m quite happy to be out of the industry. But had you asked me over a decade ago when I got hired at the Tran, I’d have told you every major except Southwest.
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Even American, with them being APA, and not ALPA. Not trying to flame, I always thought being at an ALPA carrier was important to you.
 
mwflyer said:
Even American, with them being APA, and not ALPA. Not trying to flame, I always thought being at an ALPA carrier was important to you.
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I'm the guy who got ALPA at AirTran. We had an independent union when I got hired. I was an elected officer in the independent union we had. Being at an ALPA carrier was never a requirement for me, just being at a union carrier. Granted, I prefer ALPA, obviously. But I would have absolutely loved a job at UPS, and there's virtually no chance that they'll become an ALPA carrier at any time in the near future.
 
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