Well it’s been a tough couple of weeks. I’m off to the coast in the morning for a road bike trip that I’ll tell you more about later.
In the mean time I’ll spare both you and myself from any reiteration of events during these last few weeks but I would like to take a moment to comment on this debacle of airline merger hell we now find ourselves in - that’s you and me. I say that because I work in it and you either do too or, you’re a customer of this industry.
We are in the process of watching the airline industry completely reshape itself. It’s profound, alarming, and quite honestly downright scary as an employee to watch. The current phase of that restructuring is the merger mania we’re in now. Everyone’s panicky to get merged as soon as possible both out of desperation over the price of oil and in wanting to take advantage of the current administration that’s still in office. Airline managements feel the democrats (if they should win) would be less favorable to anything which would make the American public suffer anymore.
Now a little about mergers: Airline mergers are never good. That’s just an opinion and I realize a strong one at that, but in my own experience that always seems to be the case. Airlines merge not because they want to, but because they have to. Some in the “know” would also argue that there are no such things as mergers- that there are only just ‘acquisitions’ where one airline (the stronger one) absorbs a less stronger one. I guess I’d have a hard time arguing against that.
So seeing that airlines merge because they have to, it might make you wonder why. Here’s a short answer- It’s because when the market turns downward the airlines are at the ‘tip of the stick’ so to speak. It’s just an industry which feels the market’s highs and lows much more sensitively then many other industries. When people’s discretionary income goes down they don’t travel as much, plain and simple.
In these situations the airlines find themselves overloaded with too many employees, routes, and equipment. That’s when they cut back and often times merge when cutting back alone is not enough. You could almost call this the “basic tenants” of airline operating principal- A sad but true reality. But what comes when merging isn’t enough? Many of my peers and I feel that with the price of oil only going up, we are in very scary, uncharted territory now.
It’s hard when these things happen for us pilots because along with our pay our lifestyles also suffer. Many of us have to transfer to another airplane, domicile, and/or sometimes even have to move out of state just to keep our jobs. But that’s all based on seniority- when you were hired versus every other pilot. The longer you’ve been with an airline, the better off you are. Think of it as a totem pole. Those pilots that have been with the airline the longest tend to suffer the least when it comes to reduced flying and cutbacks.
All one can do is be prepared. I do this by continual study of the industry, which by the way this site and podcast are great for. So, if I had to make a few (albeit bold) predictions now, I’d guess that we’re going to see the following in the coming weeks and months:
American will merge with Continental and British Airways will have some kind of stake and/or alliance in the resulting combined company
United and USAir will merge and should not face the same kind of government grief they did before- I think this administration will be kinder in light of today’s woes. The resulting company’s future in my opinion is very dark though. I can already feel the tectonic plates of pilot discontentment brewing beneath this one and to say it’s going to get ugly on the pilot side would be an understatement. Plus there’s heavy overlap on both company’s routes which will require dramatic restructuring/cutting of people and equipment at an equally dramatic cost to the pilots involved.
All and all we’ll end up with just a few major airlines in the United States when the dust settles. When this exactly is… is anyone’s guess. But here’s what it will mean to the flying public:
Fewer choices in airlines
Fewer choices in routes
Higher fairs
Longer waits
Increased growth at the regional airlines which will equal increased utilization of smaller regional aircraft
So, with all this uncertainty I figure I need a little time to myself to regroup. Like I posted on Twitter, I purchased a road bike. I’ll be heading off to Cambria, California tomorrow for a ride along the Big Sur. I’m hoping to get all the way to Ragged Point and back (24.4 miles each way) but we’ll see. One of the cool things is that I’ve got a GPS (typical geek) and can plot my actual course on Google Maps. So I’ll do that and post it here when I get back. Also, I’ll get another podcast out this Thursday or Friday.
Thanks for your continued patronage! ~Capt’n Chris
There are few things in my ‘decades’ long life we’ll say that still surprise me. Isn’t that sad? Of course certain crimes are still shocking, but right now I’m talking about my ever growing and unacceptable insensitivity to governmental mismanagement and unaccountability. It used to be that I’d hear of a crooked politician and be at least a little shocked. Now we hear about stuff like this quite often.
But when it comes to the TSA, they seem to be held to a higher level of accountability. This is because they directly effect us - You, me and every other American who goes to the airport. Every time we travel we have to endure this governmental beast of a bureaucracy - For me, it’s every time I go to work.
So when I heard about this TSA story I was not only shocked, I was quite appalled and then plain irate.
In it, MyFoxColorado.Com is reporting on a screener who brought a gun through a security check point, was caught, and then did not face any charges as a result OR even loose his job. To talk about this double-standard on the scale required would take hours or even days, but that’s not my point and I don’t think you’d stay long enough anyway.
Rather, I’d prefer to take this discussion to a higher level. The was an excellent article on April 25, 2008 in The Wall Street Journal by Peggy Noonan entitled, “The View from Gate 14″. It’s a highly suggestible read. Noonan describes how as a country we have become desensitized to unacceptable pat downs, pokes, prods, and other violations of our rights at TSA checkpoints - while at the same time we seem to be harboring an ever growing anger towards our elected officials for this “guilty until proven innocent” attitude they have taken against us while at the airport.
As an American Citizen, I watch first hand as my right to be proven guilty turns into a ‘right’ to be proven innocent every time I go to work or otherwise fly on the airlines. In this case, here is a TSA agent who was proven guilty, and then made innocent through the same perverted sense of airport justice that assumes everyone is guilty no matter what… Except TSA agents, apparently.
It’s ridiculous. It’s insane… but it begs a few basic questions:
What’s the real reason he got off?
What would have been the real outcome for one of us “non TSA folks?”
Why the double standard???
It’s questions like these that the American People are going to have to get answered, or else we’re all just going to be continual victims of our own ignorance.
I have had the privilege of taking part in an email exchange with a couple of Airline Captains who flew during Edward Daly’s era. One was even a World Airways Pilot. I asked for and obtained permission to duplicate those emails here. I would love for these guys to join up on PlaneMadness.Com (HINT… HINT..) but until then, this is the next best thing. I think this kind of insight into airline yesteryear is absolutely incredible and deserves all the attention I can give it.
You can see the emails at the bottom of this post. Capt’n Chris
Here’s another top-notch find from PlaneMadness Member SpeedBird48.
It’s Dan Rather from 1975 doing a report for the CBS Evening News on the deteriorating situation at that time in Da Nang, South Vietnam.
On the directive of it’s owner, Edward J.Daly, World Airways sent a number of flights into Da Nang to transport stranded refugees out of South Vietnam.
On this final flight, the US Embassy and the Vietnamese government warned that they would be unable to secure the airport from mobs of people. Still, Daly wanted to send one last flight in to pick up women and children and transport them to safety.
Instead, crowds mobbed the Boeing 727 after landing as it continued moving on the tarmac. Daly himself fought off soldiers who were pushing women, children, and their own relatives out of the way to get a spot on the plane.
So instead of a load of women and children, the 727 was mostly full of men, who shockingly had pushed their own family members out of the way to get on. The plane was also heavily over-loaded, and people were jam-packed in the cargo compartments - with the doors still open in flight.
After departure, the pilots were never able to get the gear up, as their were people in the wheel wells. The rear stairs never came up either, as there were also a number of people clinging to them as the airplane climbed- Most of which fell off but Daly crawled out onto the stairs himself and pulled the one last survivor in.
This is a tale of heroism and bravery on World Airways and Edward Daly’s part.
Many thanks to SpeedBird48 for the link.
Capt’n Chris
—– Original Message —–
Sent: Wednesday, April 23, 2008
To:
Subject: World Airways - Last Flight from Da Nang
Bob, one time I landed at E.L. Cord’s Fish Lake Valley ranch. (E.L.Cord founded American Airlines and hired C.R. Smith) The ranch foreman told me that the day before a guy named Ed Daley was there, in a Citation jet, and he got off the plane wearing a brace of revolvers. The foreman thought it was pretty cool. <g>
—– Original Message —–
Sent: Wednesday, April 23, 2008
To:
Subject: World Airways - Last Flight from Da Nang
Steve, I knew all those guys. My only “combat” experience with Ed Daly was in 1979 when we were on strike and he came to the picket line with a revolver. He was waving it all over the place. I was about 3 feet from him and turned to go get my picket sign when I heard the damn thing go off. I dived into the iceberg plants and then heard the bastard laughing. He fired off a couple more rounds then left. He used to come out and arm wrestle us on the picket line. He was very strong. He was known to show up to union negotiations with a gun, slap it on the desk and say, “OK you sons of bitches let’s talk!” Our union was the Teamsters and he even scared them. I’ve got a lot of Daly stories some funny but most were sad. He was a mega drunk and won World in a poker game.
While that flight was going on I was flying Rescue HC-130s for the USAF.
BTW, We had to watch that video during new hire indoc and some recurrents until Daly died. He was an SOB but definitely a real man. Loved to fist fight to settle problems.
Bob
p.s. Sometimes on a quiet night I can still hear all my different airline uniforms fighting in the closet! World always won-must be the Daly legacy!
How unbelievably beyond completely cool can this be? I’m serious folks the ‘awesome’ factor here is so far off the charts with this one, that it’s in low Earth orbit by now. This guy put what he calls an “afterburner effect” on his R/C Turbine F-16. Now whether or not that constitutes a real afterburner I don’t know, however his use of the word ‘effect’ has me thinking it’s just that. An effect.
So after watching the video and thinking about it, I went searching the internet just to see if any companies were offering a real R/C Turbine with a real afterburner - Turns out there is one. It’s a German company and some details can be found here.
| 
Well it’s been a tough couple of weeks. I’m off to the coast in the morning for a road bike trip that I’ll tell you more about later.
~Capt’n Chris
There are few things in my ‘decades’ long life we’ll say that still surprise me. Isn’t that sad? Of course certain crimes are still shocking, but right now I’m talking about my ever growing and unacceptable insensitivity to governmental mismanagement and unaccountability. It used to be that I’d hear of a crooked politician and be at least a little shocked. Now we hear about 
Capt’n Chris
