Spirit Airlines Strike Update

The way I figure it, Spirit normally takes in close to 2 million dollars a day each and every day of the year.

Not counting the slowdown in passengers over the past 30-60 days, because of the informational picketing, this airline has already lost 4 million dollars in gross revenue for this weekend.

That does not include the extra $100 refund they are promising to customers, nor does it include the extra costs the airline is incurring by trying to "live with" this problem.

If you take the math out a bit further the real losses Spirit Airlines is suffering amounts to $4000 per pilot per day.

In other words they could have already given the pilots an $8000 a year pay raise and kept the airline flying and would have been better off financially.

At some point these management guys are going to read their income statements and figure out the real costs here.

I congratulate those pilots that didn't fall for BB's bait and switch BS. He's going to make a great used car salesman when he's gone from Spirit. Perhaps he will advertise cars for $9 that end up costing $20,000 each by the time all of the options are added.

Joe
 
I'm curious as to how many of you are using your social media tactics to get the word out there on just why this strike is going on? the media outlets are saying pay pay pay but we all know better...it's not *just* pay.

I think other than the picket lines going on at selected locations, we should also be using our social media outlets as our picket line and to help as much as we can.

Lostplanetairman, if there are link/article sources you can give us to relay information across the board then that would be helpful in operating our facebooks, myspaces, twitters, linkedin's etc....let's bring this show to 2010 standards if it's not already been suggested and agreed upon! :)
 
Along the lines of jhugz post, I read that several of the poor, ill Falcon crews use to wear a YX badge. Gee I sure hope they get well and don't return to work until they are fully recovered and safe to fly. ;)


Can somebody explain how a non-Spirit airplane with a non-spirit crew operating with another certificate uses the Spirit call sign?
 
ALPA.org said:
Spirit Pilots Stand Strong in Early Hours of Strike

June 12, 2010 – No rest for the weary, but the determined stay strong. Spirit pilots, and many supporters, returned to the picket line today following the long-awaited strike announcement at 5 o’clock this morning. Their signs had a new message: Spirit Pilots On Strike.

It was the final weapon in their arsenal for gaining a fair contract, one that could cripple the company, further demonstrating the obvious and critical need for airline pilots. Without them, the planes stay parked, and Spirit pilots have vowed not to fly the line until management comes to the table with a deal that recognizes the worth of a professional pilot.

“No one wanted this strike—certainly not this pilot group,” said Capt. Sean Creed, Spirit pilot group chair. “We have sacrificed so much to see this company prosper. Now we are sacrificing our paychecks until we get a contract that reflects our contributions to this airline.”

Media swarmed at all picketing locations, eager to make the most of the strike story. With dramatic scenes of deserted gates and parked, empty Spirit airplanes, reporters from all of Detroit’s major media converged on DTW, where 56 aviators from American Eagle, ASA, Compass, Delta, ExpressJet, and Spirit marched in solidarity under the eye of Detroit police.

Despite suffering the heat of the blazing sun, many marchers had to be ordered to leave the 20-person picket line so that others could take their place. “These guys are acting like they’ve waited four years to do this,” quipped one Spirit captain as he waited in line for his turn.

While the picketers walked the line, other pilots made plans to station observers around the airport perimeter with high-powered telescopes and cameras to ensure that the seven grounded aircraft parked at the airline’s maintenance hangar stay put.

And as Spirit crews continued to trickle back into DTW after being stranded from dozens of canceled trips, Detroit proved its reputation as the cradle of the American labor movement when a group of United Auto Workers unexpectedly arrived to show their solidarity and deliver cases of drinking water for the ALPA strikers.

Members of the Teamsters and UniteHere! Local 355 (the union representing airport in-flight, concession, and retail workers) showed equal support in Ft. Lauderdale, where ALPA pilots from AirTran, Alaska, Delta, Spirit, and United continued circling both the airport entrance en masse and the Spirit gate four pilots at a time due to airport restrictions.

With news of the strike confirmed, Spirit pilots began arriving at the Atlantic City Strike Center early this morning, ready to walk the line. Against a backdrop of three grounded Spirit planes, 21 Spirit pilots and flight attendants, along with pilots from ExpressJet and American, held strike signs while idle Spirit gate agents watched from the terminal windows. Not far to the north, a dozen pilots drew the attention of several media outlets at LaGuardia airport.

“This has not been an easy road for any of us, and an even longer road lies ahead,” said Creed. “Though we cannot tell you how long the road will be, we can tell you how it will end—with a fair and equitable contract for all Spirit pilots.”

Stay tuned.

(Photos from the picket line)
[Video]
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I hope ALPA doesn't mind I'm reposting there stuff. Props to all the other unions supporting.
 
:clap: I'm 100% behind all the pilots. Not to get too political but I was tuning into Fixed ahemm I mean Fox News earlier and unfortunately the argument was one sided. Some new anchor talking with angry pax "yelling yelling yelling and blah blah blah pilots want more money"... Pretty unfair if you ask me.

Either way this serves as a strong reminder to everyone as to how critical pilots are to an airline. Maybe this strike will not only bring the management at Spirit back down to earth, but will also make other airlines more tolerant to the needs of their pilots, since it shows we still have some spine! :beer:
 
jhugz said:
Media swarmed at all picketing locations, eager to make the most of the strike story. With dramatic scenes of deserted gates and parked, empty Spirit airplanes, reporters from all of Detroit’s major media converged on DTW, where 56 aviators from American Eagle, ASA, Compass, Delta, ExpressJet, and Spirit marched in solidarity under the eye of Detroit police.

Despite suffering the heat of the blazing sun, many marchers had to be ordered to leave the 20-person picket line so that others could take their place. “These guys are acting like they’ve waited four years to do this,” quipped one Spirit captain as he waited in line for his turn.
Click to expand...

There sure was a good turnout in DTW today.

I had a multi-hour sit so myself and two other pilots went over. No one was to be found, and we had a flight to do but around 11AM when we were walking away, we saw lots of pilots assembling by the curb. We went back up and found it was starting at 11.

The 20 person picket area had a group waiting the whole time.

I saw Prater on the train yesterday, today Bill Couette was around and Mike Donatelli the national strike preparedness chair was there.

A bit later going up the escalator I saw some shady looking character going the other way in an ExpressJet uniform. May or may not have been Jtrain609. Okay, it was.

Lots of parked jets in DTW. Unfortunate it came down to this -- talking with the Spirit guys and girls, they were surprised but yet not surprised. They knew all along what type of management they were dealing with and now we see.
 
Wendy Morse, UAL MEC chair, showed up at the end of the picketing today also.

Lots of folks out there. I'll be out again tomorrow, then I'm busy for two days, then I'll be back and Wednesday for a little bit. Hopefully this is all wrapped up soon and everybody can go back to work.
 
I was reminded of a scene in the movie "Witness" today.

Near the end of the movie the little Amish boy, Jacob, is the only one in the house when the criminals are invading their house because good-guy John Book (Harrison Ford) is known to be there somewhere. As the bad guys lead the grandfather and mother out of the house as hostages, the grandpa motions to Jacob to ring the bell on the outside of the house.

Jacob rings it vigorously for as long as he can -- the bad guy yells at the grandfather to make him stop. He does but it is too late. All of the Amish neighbors in range of the bell in the countryside throw down their farm tools and run to the house from all directions to see what is going on. Two of the bad guys die and the last one sees what he is up against -- a unified bunch of people who aren't in the mood for his crap and just want things normal again.

* * *​

As I walked away from the curb with my two co-workers, we were perplexed as to why DTW, a Spirit base, would not have anything going on, on day #1, but we hadn't any time to get picketing info during our short layover so we figured we might be in the wrong spot. Only when we got to the curb to head back to the other side of the airport did we see pilots popping up all over the place, right at 11AM. By the time we got back to the curb there were several dozen from a bunch of different carriers, besides 20 Spirit pilots picketing in the spot for that, with many people lined up to rotate in and out. Also in the ten minutes we'd been gone, Wayne County police showed up along with several news media camera people.

Judging by the feelings of the Spirit pilots that I talked to, and the articles we've read online, it seems that the good guys can easily outlast the bad guys in this predicament. The question will be, can the company outlast the bad guy's egos?
 
It should be noted that Spirit only has around 60 FO's and 60 CA's in the DTW now. There are a bunch of guys that live here still, but many have been displaced to FLL and ACY.
 
I really wished I worked in an industry that did actually value my education and paid me voluntarily a wage that I considered "fair" for what we do.

Striking and twisting the companies arm to pay you more works but I guess it just seems a little wrong to me.
 
wheelsup said:
I really wished I worked in an industry that did actually value my education and paid me voluntarily a wage that I considered "fair" for what we do.
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Definitely. Would be great if it were that way.

Striking and twisting the companies arm to pay you more works but I guess it just seems a little wrong to me.
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Are you meaning that while having to resort to the above works, it shouldn't be something you should have to be forced to do by uncaring/crappy management? If so, I agree.
 
When we picketed and subsequently struck at Skyway, we had so many people volunteering to help us. It wasn't seen as greedy pilots versus virtuous management, it was a combination of regional pilots scrapping to break into the middle class and as a parallel, the lady vestiges of the dwindling American middle class attempting to hold on to the American dream. We had LOTS of folks that were on the line with us because our struggle was their struggle.

Not to toot my horn, but a lot of people that have at least a basic liveable wage at the regionals need to think about the sacrifices that Skyway and ESPECIALLY Comair and Mesaba pilots made for the regional industry. Pretty much a sneak peek at why it gets my goad when pilots think they're special because they have a somewhat liveable pay structure, all while forgetting where they were before any labor action by another pilot group.
 
I am finishing up my standup reserve here and enjoyed reading through all of this... is there any picketing going on Sunday in FLL? Who can I contact for information? Did I miss the boat?
 
If you do get a chance to help walk the line with the striking workers, you should take the opportunity to do so.

It will help you understand how to do this if and when it comes to your company. It will make you a better person.

There is no better feeling than to have others helping, showing their support, from other airlines and other industries when you yourself are in the middle of a strike action. It's a morale booster and it shows you that others took the time to demonstrate that they do care about what happens to you.

The management action and attitude at Spirit is pretty close to the worse seen since Frank Lorenzo pulled his crap and was then banned from the airline industry.

To think that Spirit pilots have not had a raise in 9 years at Spirit and then they want to come up with funky rule changes that decrease Pilot's hourly pay by 30% unless they work a lot more hours is almost criminal.

Remember Spirit management started all these additional fees for baggage, etc and made those fees stick across the whole airline industry.

Do you really want Spirit work rules to sweep across the industry as well?

Do you really want to find our that although you actually worked 10 years at Spirit, that you will only be paid at rates for a 5 year employee because of how they calculate your hours flown?

This strike action is a whole lot more than Spirit Airlines. What happens at Spirit is going to affect the entire industry. Make sure you understand what is going on.

Joe
 
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