Tomorrow is [2-Sep-2008], massive ramp down of domestic schedule
 

Tomorrow we'll see one of the largest cut in capacity since 9/11. Here are some of the cuts, compared to last week:

Cleveland especially is going to lose a lot of flights (though some are seasonal anyways:

- lost service to ABQ, AUS, BHM, BNA, CHS, CRW, CVG, DSM, DTW, GRB, GSO, IAD, JAX, LEX, LIT, MEM, MIA, NAS, ORF, OKC, OMA, SAT, SAN, SAV, SJU, TOL, TUL, YOW

- reduced frequency to ATL, BOS, LAX, MCO, PWM, RDU, SFO, TPA, YYZ

- seasonal service to LGW and CDG ends

- downgrades of aircraft on BDL, RSW, SDF, MSN etc.

New flights will start to: DUJ (Du Bois/Jefferson County), FKL (Franklin, PA), LWB (Greenbrier, WV). And increased service to JFK (from 1x to 3x Q200).

Houston doesn't fare as bad. It will

- lose service to BDL, CLO, CHA, GYE, IAD, LOV, MGM, NAS, OAK, RNO, SRQ, TLH

- lose frequencies to BOS, ORD, DAL, DEN, GUA, JFK, LAX, LFT, LIR, LIT, MCO, MFE, MIA, RSW, SAN, SDF, SEA, SJU, TUS, TYS, VPS, YVR, etc

While many of the frequency cuts are normal for season, some are very severe cut, and very early in the season. For example, MCO from 7x to 5x; or LAX from 13x to 10x.

Ouch. It still hurts to look at all of those cuts!

Aside from SAN and LAX I can't say that the cuts/reductions will affect me much, though I did fly CLE-BNA and BNA-CLE 24 times over the last 5 years. I'm glad I don't need to fly that route anymore.

Meanwhile, Newark will:

- lose service to ABQ, ACK, CCS, CGN, DAB, LIR, SLC, SJC, SRQ,

- lose frequencies to ATL, CHS, CUN, FLL, JAX, MCO, MIA, MSY, RSW, LGW, SAN, SAV, SFO, SJU, TPA

But it will gain a frequency to BHM, CLT, RIC, STL, YYZ; BOS will see larger 737 versions on many flights and not just 735s.

Of course big cuts are to FL, especially FLL, which goes from 9x to 6x. But also TPA, from 6x to 4x. SJU goes from 5x to 2x.

LGW loses one of the two 757s, so LGW will only get two flights a day. One from IAH (764), and one from EWR (752).

And payroll will stop cutting paychecks for 180 of our junior pilots...... :td:

DRW

FYI: MFE doesn't really lose anything. We lose 1 COEX flight on Saturday (the 6:15) but we see #1585 upgraded to a 738 from a 735/3 for most days.

OPFlyer - Thanks for pointing that out.

Anyways, this also marks the end of stations ACK, CHA, CGN, OAK, RNO, SRQ, TOL; and I believe also CLO, GYE, and perhaps a couple other places in Latin America and Caribbean.

I am sure many of the 735s will be quickly parked.

And of course, XJET is also ending its branded operations.

Newark also loses service to TUS.

What is unfortunate about the IAH-TUS cuts is that all flights are now on ERJ's. :td:

The SAN cuts are normal for this time of year. For years, the CLE-SAN flight has been seasonal and there are only three EWR-SAN flights during most of the year.

Looks like STL also lost a frequency to CLE, and in fact loses all service on Saturdays.

Service to JFK from both IAH and CLE ends later this month, around September 26-27 too.

Correct...the cutting of service on Saturdays is an annual event.

And, interestingly, the price of jet fuel has gone down about $1.00/gallon, or about 23%, since July, according to an article in today’s NY Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/02/bu...l?ref=business

“The average price for jet fuel last week was $3.32 a gallon, according to the Department of Energy.

The price of jet fuel peaked in July at $4.27, prompting airlines to take a series of drastic measures that are affecting travelers.“

Of course, it’s also presently more than $1.00 higher than it was post-Katrina, 3 years ago, when it jumped up to $2.42/gallon, a spike of about 50 cents from before it hit New Orleans and the Gulf.

So, depending on how CO hedged fuel prices a short while ago, this drop in the price of jet fuel may mean very little to CO.

What does that mean? Can you enlighten that some more please?

Due to the schedule cuts and parking of aircraft, the airline wanted to furlough 450-500 of our 5,000 pilots. They offered several programs to mitigate the total numbers including early retirements for our senior pilots, a leave of absence program, and a voluntary reduced flying (VRF) program which cut 25% of one's schedule for the next 18 months.

I believe they had approx. 160 take the early retirement and had over 100 take the leave of absence. Another 160 or so took the long term VRF, which had the effect of reducing approx. 40 furloughs.

The company came to the union this week and offered 'no furloughs' in exchange for relief on several contract provisions. Tying in furloughs with contract negotiations torqued off quite a few people and both the company and the union drew lines in the sand if you will......the union didn't want to open Pandora's Box, and the company was using these 180 guys as bargaining leverage. The company is trying to relax our scope clause (RJ flying, partner airline codeshare, etc.) and wanted ALPA to relax scope in exchange for those jobs.

Anyhow, the bottom line is that 180 of our junior guys are hitting the streets this week.....

DRW

Thanks for the clarification.

At the beginning of this year, airlines in Europe were complaining they can't find enough pilots. One of them was LH, just to let everybody know! Not sure if working in Europe is an alternative for those guys.

Is the attempt to relax scope a hint (or a wish on CO's part) that larger regional jets are in the works? Scope would have to be adjusted to get something akin to an E170/E190 type to be operated by non-mainline, no?

I don't know any of the details on what the company wants. I do know (only from an ALPA update provided us) that the company came to the union and offered no furloughs for some scope relief.

My personal opinion is that the company has this massive gap coming between ERJs and 737-7/8/900s and they would like to bring a lot of 170/190 type aircraft on property. CAL ALPA's stance is that if they come online they will be flown by CAL pilots at CAL wages. The company would of course like for them to be flown by someone at RJ'like wages....

I truly think this will be the largest issue to be dealt with on our contract negotiations.....

DRW

(Apologize for the thread creep...)

Since at least some RJs or is it all are flown by non-CO crew, meaning the planes belong to XJ or some other Regional.(The Qs too)

What would happen if that Regional not owned by CO gets a fleet of the 190s or even 733s. Does the contract forbid CO from using those types of planes if they arent flown by CO itself? with CO crews

alot of the European carriers use AirBus while the CO guys are trained and licensed for Boeing. So 1 it will mean back to school for them. 2- it would also mean probably alot less in pay then what they were used to and Europe even with the strengthening US$ is still alot more expensive then being Stateside. 3- dont think too many will want to relocate their whole family especially any that have kids still in the school system. Then again some might not have any choice.

Cleveland especially is going to lose a lot of flights


These cuts will affect me quite a bit. What really makes it bad is that the connections are now at least $100 more than the direct flights but you get no choice in taking a NS or a connection :confused:. For example, CLE-BOS goes to one NS a day (around 9AM). If you want to go any other time, you have to conect in EWR and pay a premium of $120 or more to take it. So you get it both ways, having to connect and having to pay more.

In my worthless opinion, if you are going to inconvience me by makng me connect, at least have the decency to charge me the non-stop rate (or give me back the NS).

I flew a few times CLE-MHT which is appx an hour North of BOS theres also PVD appx an hr South. think its RJs only but it might at least offer you some better flight times

I"m here in Chattanooga (CHA) waiting for my Delta flight and eavesdroping on the last flight out for CO.

The agent is explaining why the rount is cancelled and she said, "Yeah, they're always full!"

If they're always full then why are they cutting it?????
If it's priced too low....and always full.....then CO isn't charging enough for the flights. Why didn't they raise the prices in order to me profitable and THEN decide if the loads justify it.

I JUST DON"T UNDERSTAND.

"Yeah, tey're always full" Maybe ther really arent, i'd like to know.

randidliyo

I smell sarcasm.

What I find perhaps most interesting is that nowhere on rkkwan's lists is Las Vegas. No cuts to LAS service, hmmm. McCarran arrivals have been running down 5-7% for the last few months and overall Vegas visitation down 1-3% (suggesting some of the air arrivals falloff is connecting pax on US or WN). The outlook is somewhat bleak, so interesting that CO hasn't cut back capacity. Perhaps their yields have been healthy...

My September Skyguide shows, post-September 2:

CO1467 weekdays, around 7:30 am (733/735)
CO130 MThF, 11:25 am (73G)
CO1030 except Sat, 3:24 pm (738)
CO230 except Fri/Sat, 7:15 pm (733)

and other flights on weekends. . .

The biggest cut yet to come is the cut of US's last bank of flights and that will have a huge impact. I suspect most of the reduction in McCarran's overall capacity will come from that cut alone. There's gotta be at least 20-25 red-eyes that US currently runs that will *poof* be gone.

IIRC, the scope clause, for practical purposes, means that CO cannot operate or contract to operate any aircraft that seats more than 50 passengers without using CO pilots at CO wages. That would mean that they cannot go into the marketplace and just outsource all CO operations to other, less expensive carriers who would operate for less than CO would pay to its regular pilots and for mainline aircraft.

US, king of cheapness at any cost, operates E-190s as mainline with F cabins. CO should consider the same to fill the gap in the fleet.

If they have a mental block against operating them at mainline wages (or are afraid of setting a precedent) I can see why the economic arguement for that doesn't win out.

I'm sure they would, but for the scope clause.

Wouldn't operating them as mainline mean they are allowed within the scope clasue?

I have, sadly, already these cuts in the available CLE to LAX flights... It is portion of the cycle that we are currently in. Hopefully, we are approaching the bottom of the bell curve. :D

If they operated them with CO mainline pilots and paid those pilots CO mainline wages, I think it would be allowed; but that would never happen, because it would defeat the cost savings that operating such RJ's normally seeks to achieve.

Offhand, I do not know the actual language of the scope clause; but in essence, it prohibits CO from operating or contracting to operate any aircraft with between 50 and 100 (or so) passengers, in order to protect the mainline pilots from losing hours to regional/contract carrier pilots by a shift of capacity away from smaller 737's to aircraft like the E190. I do not know whether it actually allows them to use mainline pilots if they elected to operate such aircraft, or if they would have to amend the pilots' contract and negotiate such a provision before going forward with a plan to operate such aircraft with mainline pilots.

The missing perspective is that CO pilots would want 735 rates for flying the E90/E70/CR9/CR7. The pilots re of the opinion that replacing the flying is okay, but the pilot rates will not be going down. Therefore its generally better, from a cost perspective, to fly the larger a/c unless the operating trip costs are reduced.

What AC (Air Canada) did was to reduce the pilot wages for the E75/E90 comensurate with the reduction in seats from 319 to E90. The rates are a little higher than regional pilots get, but not much higher.

This is what CO pilots should do. They need to create a new class of short haul flying to accomodate the E90 and then staff rates adjusted to that level. But the pilots will not allow this approach.

The scope clause does not prohibit CO from operating any aircraft, though it does prohibit them from contracting the operation of aircraft under certain circumstances. I also don't know the specifics of ALPA's scope clause at CO, but the main restriction generally relates to aircraft size. There is absolutely nothing stopping CO from operating aircraft with 50-100 (or more) seats; they just need to be operated by CO, using CO crews, and not by contract companies or subsidiaries.

The only thing they would need to negotiate is a new set of pay rates. While I'm sure the pilots would be happy to accept the current Small Narrowbody payrate, the company is almsot certainly not willing to pay that much for an airplane that is so much lower capacity.

As noted elsewhere, the E190 is flown as a mainline aircraft at USAirways, where the scope clause, while more relaxed than at CO, still does not permit an aircraft that size to be conracted out. The pilots negotiated a mainline pay rate for it, albeit a lower pay rate than they get for the 737/A320.

DEN-CLE is down to one flight a day...yikes.

I was also a bit surprised. But they just invested in a new PC there, and held the poker tournament as well. Clearly, they want to increase marketshare at LAS.

doobierw, maybe you can also enlighten the following for me/us.

What happens with the crew of CO110 that worked on last nights flight? EWR-CGN?

Will they deadhunt home CO111 of today or will the take a flight tomorrow by the way of AMS or take a train to FRA or something?

I believe the crews deadhead back on the same aircraft.