They have resorted to 150% pay for CA's only to pick up trips in the first week of the month. They say they have the rest covered but I still see a ton in there. I will not be helping out especially for regular pay. Everyone here has come to the conclusion to "let the wheels fall off". While I would absolutely love to get a new base (hopefully somewhere out west with mountains) and fly the -900 (if nothing else just to have the auto temp controller
) Most are in the mindset here that we need to teach mgmt a lesson and get a contract first and foremost. Working all of us to a burn out point and trying to get away with paying FO's and CA's the same to fly the -200 and -900 will not last. We can't staff what we have and everyone here has had enough of this 8 year old contract. While it is unfortunate that the flight crews are now limiting themselves to simply flying the contract we "can't fix stupid". There have been 2 flights in the last 4 weeks that I have had cancelled b/c they forgot to send a crewmember in to operate it. Each time I saw the issue ahead of time and called scheduling. They did not care to even hear about it and when I called to tell them we don't have a complete crew they just said "oops" I guess that one is cancelled. That is not a way to run an airline and this company will learn the hard way between attrition (up a net of 9 pilots through all of 07 after hiring hundreds) and fines for cancellations the company can only screw themselves for soo long before something must happen. I am eager to see the results of the next mediated session. We have proposals on the table, a 99% strike vote, and are willing to meet whenever. The company has yet to even issue a retort and has been apprehensive to meet. Time will tell.
