New CEO at US Airways

03-06-2002, 01:24 PM

US Airways Names David N. Siegel President and CEO
ARLINGTON, Va., March 6 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- US Airways Group's board of directors today named David N. Siegel president and chief executive officer and board member of both the holding company and its US Airways, Inc. airline unit. Stephen M. Wolf will retain the title of chairman of both companies in a non-executive capacity. Wolf, 60, reassumed the position of CEO of US Airways Group and US Airways, Inc. in November 2001 following Rakesh Gangwal's resignation from the company.

Siegel, 40, is currently chairman and CEO of Avis Rent A Car System, Inc., a subsidiary of Cendant Corp., and has extensive experience in the airline industry, having spent seven years at Continental Airlines in various senior management roles, including president of its Continental Express subsidiary.

``We are extremely pleased to announce that an executive of Dave Siegel's abilities and energy will be joining US Airways as chief executive officer. He brings a broad understanding of the business, a proven track record of accomplishment, and, importantly, exceptional skills in working with people,'' Wolf said.

``While this is a particularly challenging time for the airline industry, I'm delighted to return to commercial aviation, where I spent much of my career,'' said Siegel. ``I have long viewed US Airways as an airline with a strong franchise and tremendous potential, and I look forward to working with the company's 36,000 employees in charting our future direction.''

As president of Continental Express from 1995-1999, Siegel improved the unit's profit contribution by $250 million annually and led its substantial improvements in operational performance. He also negotiated the largest aircraft order at the time in the regional airline industry as the launch customer for Embraer 145/135 regional jets.

At Continental Airlines, he also served as senior vice president of planning and scheduling, where he played an instrumental role in Continental's financial and operational turnaround, and as vice president of corporate development. Prior to joining Continental, he served as director of corporate planning at Northwest Airlines. Before joining Avis, he held executive positions at Budget Group and eVolution Global Partners, a corporate venture capital firm. He began his career as a consultant at Bain & Co.

Siegel earned a master's degree in business administration from Harvard Business School and a bachelor of science degree, magna cum laude, in applied mathematics-economics from Brown University. Siegel, his wife and daughter will relocate to the Washington, D.C., area.

SOURCE: US Airways

Wingman · 03-06-2002, 03:10 PM

Great. Another Harvard MBA to run another airline. Lets see, that makes him third behind Leo Mullin of Delta and Donald Carty at American.

What this industry needs is innovation, not more MBAs'.

smoothjazz · 03-06-2002, 05:59 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Wingman
Great. Another Harvard MBA to run another airline. Lets see, that makes him third behind Leo Mullin of Delta and Donald Carty at American.

What this industry needs is innovation, not more MBAs'.

I agree with you Wingman... Must agree...

03-06-2002, 06:14 PM

Does this mean ANOTHER livery change

TZTriStar500 · 03-06-2002, 10:05 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Wingman
Great. Another Harvard MBA to run another airline. Lets see, that makes him third behind Leo Mullin of Delta and Donald Carty at American.

What this industry needs is innovation, not more MBAs'.

Excuse me, but Mr. Seigel did a damn good job at COEX to turn that basket case of an airline around. I think he would do a great job at fixing US except that a**hole Wolf is still the Chairman and probably won't let him. Also, if you don't have an MBA, who do you think is then qualified to run a large major airline? You have got to have some qualifications to take a job like this and they are not going to hire a guy from outside the company without these qualifications unless they come up through the ranks.

Marc Hookerman · 03-06-2002, 10:38 PM

Thank god you responded Christian. I would of if you wouldn't have...

Guys, Mr. Seigel is a good deal. Wolf is still a severe drag, but it might work out...I wish him lots of luck. He has a big sh*t burger to clean up...

pi737 · 03-06-2002, 11:06 PM

I've heard good things about Mr. Siegel. Wolf didn't want to run this thing, so maybe he will stay out of the way and let Siegel try his hand. I'm glad for the change.

Tony

Scott · 03-07-2002, 12:27 AM

Great! I agree with Wingman! A tad less ivy-league education and a bit more grass-roots horse sense. Sorry, no livery change as long as wolf pulls the strings!

03-07-2002, 10:40 AM

Hey wingman, if you don't want an MBA to run the airline who would you want to see? The unions? Ask United how that grand experiment worked out and call us back......

Seriously, Siegel is a good guy and will knock the right skulls and shake the right hands. He knows what has to be done and will try and get everyone to buy into the idea of turning the airline around and righting the ship. There is some serious cost cutting to be done (highest CASM in the industry) and some mainline flying will indeed be shifted over to RJs and infuriate US pilots because of "lack of job opporunities". They want job opportunities? Fine. Let Siegel go in there and get the job done and right size their current operations. Otherwise there will be no job opportunites and all the US pilots will be S.O.L. and going back to working as flight instructors and bitching about their lousy pay. If they give Siegel an honest shot of fixing things they just might work out in the long run. How can you not when you have the majority market share at DCA and LGA?

pi737 · 03-07-2002, 01:42 PM

Phil,

You sound like you have an axe to grind with US pilots. Have we done something to piss you off?

Don't believe everything you read. We have been trying to get a RJ deal for a long time, the company was too busy trying to sell the company. Their lastest offer was limited RJs in US colors, but unlimited code sharing RJs in non US colors. Great deal considering about 50% of what is left of the US system could be replaced with contract carriers.

US has cut back more than any other major carrier. Almost 300 of the 1150 pilots to be furloughed were covered by a no furlough clause and were furloughed for about 8 years in the 90's. We had a concessionary contract in '97 to pay for that, and the minimum growth provisions that the company dumped after 9/11. It's not like we are all asking to 747 Captains. We are just looking protect the jobs of those who were not supposed to be furloughed and help the others find employment.

USAirways pilots have been looking for a leader for a long time. I believe we will give Mr. Siegal a chance to be one. I am excited about the change.

Tony

03-07-2002, 03:16 PM

Tony,

Thanks for your opinions and your view on it as a US pilot. Since I am merely an outsider looking at the overall picture of what is going on at US, I apologize if I came off as having an axe to grind. However, there is still a large gap to be filled between the pilots and management if there is to be a compromise made that will enable the company to restructure and be viable going forward.

You mention the RJ agreement and there are some issues with that. Yes, US can contract out RJ flying from third party carriers, but this is not always the best thing to do. Most carriers require a guaranteed margin or "Cost Plus" contract, and this can get quite expensive, turning what could have been a profitable market into a mediocre "also ran". Increasing US RJ flying internally is what is needed and should be the core for express flying going forward.

Compared to other airlines I do think US pilots are relatively rational. I think your group as a whole realizes that US will never be the size of UA or AA or DL and because you don't have the large equipment the pay rates will be a bit lower too. This is a Catch 22 in that if pilots demand rates similar to the big boys US will be hurt immensely because they don't have the size and depth of the Big 3 to absorb those costs.

It will be interesting to watch the Siegel era unfold at US. I wish you guys the best.

pi737 · 03-07-2002, 03:31 PM

Phil,

Thanks for the good wishes. I may have taken your post wrong. US pilots get bashed a lot.

A few items. We would love to see the RJ flying come to either the mainline or the wholly owned commuters. We have approx. 1050 pilots furloughed right now that would probably like to be flying them. I think the level of service would be much better. Problem is the company says they can't afford to buy the aircraft. I think they want to contract them out to lower cost operators, but you know what they say, you get what you pay for. They could put as many RJs on the mainline as they want today. We can't even stop them until we agree to a pay rate like some carriers can.

As far as costs go, we do have higher costs. In our last contract we agreed to a parity plus 1% agreement that was supposed to get our costs in line. That agreement led to us(pilots) getting a 17% last year! The people running this company for the last 5 years have been idiots.

Several of Mr. Siegal's coworkers at CO were at PI when I got hired in '86. C.D. McClean(sp?) hired me. I like the way they think and hope Mr. Siegal thinks the same way about his employees.

Tony

b737gearboy · 03-07-2002, 05:24 PM

First of all Tony, thanks for the good posts. Phil, I can not think of one airline that has permanently shrunk to become profitable. Wolf has raped and pilliged(sp?) this airline to a point that it may cease to exist. There is no doubt that U needs more regional jets but it is management that has continually dropped the ball on this issue. If they were so important to mgmt why did they agree to a limit of 35 rj's during the 97 contract? Why did Gangwal call RJ's a fad? Why didn't mgmt negotiate for more rj's during the United merger debacle? Why did mgmt wait to negotiate unitll Jan 02? I don't mean to rant and rave but U mgmt has taken our contract and thrown in it in the trash.
A furloughed US Airways pilot, and still unemployed.

03-07-2002, 06:33 PM

Don't get me wrong, I never said U management was the sharpest team in the industry or Rocky and Bullwinkle didn't get rich and fat while trying to merge with UA. They've made some stupid decisions (Metro Jet to name one) and they've done some things that will still be felt years to come.

I never said shrinking the an airline to profitability is possible. In fact, it makes it worse in many ways. What happens when you park planes and are forced to furlough pilots? Do you lay off the high-priced, arguably over paid senior pilots? No, due to union rules the lowest seniority pilots get laid off first, resulting in a unit cost increase on what remains in your network. Getting rid of some overcapacity (meaning big jets) and switching to RJs is an entirely different matter. Do you really need 5 737s a day to BUF from PIT and PHL? No. You would most likely be better off with a few RJs and a couple of jets on peak trips. This would help to reduce the costs a bit and rationalize capacity.

What about BWI? U just signed a deal with Southwest last week to sell the 25+ gates. What was once a mini-hub for U is now gone, so what do you do with those planes? Park even more aircraft? Lay off even more staff? As the cuts run deeper their unit costs are going to continue to rise to a point where the breakeven load factor is so high that it's impossible to make a dime, even in good times like TWA experienced.

Look at the facts: PIT, PHL, and CLT can't grow too much more. LGA is in gridlock, and the international component (excluding the Caribbean stuff) is almost a joke. They are not ever going to be a big 3 carrier and they will never be able to handle the cost levels of a big 3 carrier. I think management and labor combined need to start discussing wage levels, eliminating scope clauses, and figuring out how to reshape your company so pilots like you can get back to work ASAP. I hope you get called soon.

pi737 · 03-07-2002, 08:26 PM

Gearboy-sorry to hear your still out of work. Maybe we should stop the RJ negotiations until our new CEO is in office. Maybe he can make some sense of it. Hope you are back soon.

Tony

b737gearboy · 03-09-2002, 09:57 AM

Phil,
Thank you for comments. I feel compelled to respond to some of your statements.
1 The gates in BWI were not sold to SWA, it was a deal with the state of Maryland. I don't know if you have been to BWI but the gates being sold are a very long walk from SWA's gates.
2 The "hub" in BWI has been scaled down for so long it allowed SWA to easily come in kick U's butt. Another mgmt blunder.
3 Over paid? I am so sick of this kind of crap. If you want the big salaries at an airline become a pilot or manager.
4 There is quite a bit of room to grow in PIT and CLT the problem is O and D traffic.
5 U enjoys some the highest load factors over the Atlantic, yield may be the problem.
6 The scope clause will never be eliminated, granted there will be modifications. The pilot group has been ready to negotiate since May 2000 when we approved a letter of agreement for an additional 35 rj's. Part of the agreement mandated immediate negotiations for a comprehensive agreement that wouls have paved the way for many many more rj's. One problem, mgmt refused to come to the table untill January of this year.

Obviously there are many, many problems with US Airways. I like most others question wether the airline will even survive. It's my opinion that many of us will never be recalled, and for this reason I am trying to move on.

USAirways85 · 03-09-2002, 10:39 PM

usairways has room to grow at phl, although not that much they still can grow. they just built a 35 gate commuter terminal with 25 gates that can handle rj's, so usairways could probably handle many more commuter flts than they have now. also with a new international terminal in a little less than a year and 18 international gates, usairways could significantly expand transatlantically and even more to the carribean even though they have many flts to the carribean as it is.

Sentinel Chicken · 03-09-2002, 11:16 PM

I've been quietly following this discussion and this has to be the most interesting thread on DAC in a long, long time! A couple things come to mind that maybe you guys can shed light on for me here.

Gearboy pointed out that there's no limitations on capacity at Pittsburgh and Charlotte, but there's not enough O&D traffic out of those locations. I seem to remember reading somewhere that for a hub to be successful, it has to generate a significant amount of O&D traffic or the hub fails. This was pointed out to be factor (though clearly not the ONLY factor) in the demise of Western Pacific (hub'd at COS) and Braniff II (hub'd at MCI). There was an article in a local paper when I used to live in Kansas City that suggested MCI would never be a viable hub since there's not a whole lot of O&D traffic there. But it seems to me there are a lot of similarly sized cities to KC that have hubs- Milwaukee and Omaha are hubs for Midwest Express, Memphis for Northwest and Cleveland for Continental. And then there are cities that are ex-hubs (Nashville and Raleigh for American). Is O&D the only factor?

American's pilots at one point recently suggested folding the RJ's into the mainline and have them flown by mainline pilots. Is this what is being considered for USAirways? My understanding of what American's pilots were suggesting was to get the furloughed pilots first to fly the RJs then get from the ranks of American Eagle. It seems to me this is a bit of an about face by mainline pilots in regards to RJs, isn't it?

b737gearboy · 03-10-2002, 10:13 AM

Hey Chicken,
It's my understanding that O and D traffic is the bread and butter of an operation as you might well imagine. If you are flying from BOS to CLT it definitely saves the airline big bucks to fly you nonstop rather than connecting you through PHL. That's been the problem with PIT and CLT, the local traffic base just isn't there. CLT is a growing city and the numbers are getting better as the city expands. Things look good for CLT as it may become the next ATL. PIT on the other hand is a problem, declining population and industry base to draw from. PHL as I understand it has been a gold mine (if there is such a thing for U) for the airline because of the many corporations and population base. U's hubs require a tremendous amount of feed to be profitable, just like CVG and CLE. Thus this underscores how important rj's are for US Airways. By the way as you might have read U's specialty is said to be to fly one from nowhere to nowhere. It's kind of funny to me that Wolf and Gangwal are supposed to be great minds in the airline business yet Gangwal when asked by the employee groups about the need for additional rj's back in 1997 he stated they are a "fad". He could be right to some extent but lets save this for another discussion. As for other factors hurting U, geography. The hubs are pretty close together with nothing in the midwest or west coast.
As for rj's being flown on mainline it was proposed by Gangwals plan B from outerspace (the title of an actual article you might have read) that some 70 seat rj's would have been flown on mainline. Thats the funny thing about it, if mgmt wants unlimited rj's on mainline they can have them tomorrow and there is even a payscale in our contract. But as we all know they would rather pay peanut wages and benefits to the commuters. As for an about face, some might think it is beneath them to fly a small regional jet. However with so many jobs going to the commuters some have finally had a paradigm shift. For me I don't care what I fly I just want the most pay with the most days off. Sounds kind of selfish but my ego and self happiness has never been determined by what I fly. Hope answered some of your questions, fire away with more if you want.

b737gearboy · 03-10-2002, 10:18 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by USAirways85
usairways has room to grow at phl, although not that much they still can grow. they just built a 35 gate commuter terminal with 25 gates that can handle rj's, so usairways could probably handle many more commuter flts than they have now. also with a new international terminal in a little less than a year and 18 international gates, usairways could significantly expand transatlantically and even more to the carribean even though they have many flts to the carribean as it is.

They do have the facilities to grow as far as terminals and gates. The problem is traffic saturation. I think they need to cut out some of these ridiculous short haul turboprop routes such as PHL-ABE and others. They ought to focus on rj's,med size jets, and international flying.

USAirways85 · 03-10-2002, 12:48 PM

they need to get the rj's. they are operating too many mainline aircraft on short routes. such as flts from phl to buf, syr, rdu, greensboro, albany, and a few others i cant think of. if they put rj's on these routes they can probably ease congestion somewhat. they could also send mainline aircraft to other possibly new cities or even start getting rid of the 733's, eventhough i think they have great # of 733's.

b737gearboy · 03-10-2002, 01:46 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by USAirways85
they need to get the rj's. they are operating too many mainline aircraft on short routes. such as flts from phl to buf, syr, rdu, greensboro, albany, and a few others i cant think of. if they put rj's on these routes they can probably ease congestion somewhat. they could also send mainline aircraft to other possibly new cities or even start getting rid of the 733's, eventhough i think they have great # of 733's.

The problem is RJ's use the same amount of concrete as mainline jets. The rj's are unable to use rwy 26 in PHL, what a complete waiste of money that was by the way. If the loads are poor to the aforementioned cities then rj's might be called for. My point is to use PHL for mostly mainline and rj's and use PIT to connect to ABE and many of these short haul routes. Flying a Dash8 or a 1900 is almost a waiste of time, follow CO's example in EWR. CO replaced Brasilia flying with rj's. But hey I am just a caveman err pilot so what do I know.

USAirways85 · 03-10-2002, 07:01 PM

now i would like to see usairways do the following, very doubtful they will in the immediate future though:
First like i said they need rj's. they should some how expand rwy 26 in phl to handle them. they should get a big amount of emb-135's to replace all those dinky 1900's and sf3's. then they should get the emb-140 to replace the dash-8's. they should get more crj's and 145's. then they should get a small amount of crj-700's to take some of the routes now handled by 733's or 734's.

Sentinel Chicken · 03-10-2002, 08:02 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by b737gearboy
Thats the funny thing about it, if mgmt wants unlimited rj's on mainline they can have them tomorrow and there is even a payscale in our contract. But as we all know they would rather pay peanut wages and benefits to the commuters. As for an about face, some might think it is beneath them to fly a small regional jet.

Wow, I didn't realize that there already was a pay scale accomodation for RJ pilots flying for the mainline. Every news article I've seen thus far likes to blame the lack of RJs at USAirways (or any other airline for that matter) on either the scope clauses or resistance from the mainline pilots. I seem to remember one Aviation Week article where Boy Wonder Gangwal stated that to get RJs in the mainline "big concessions" would be needed from ALPA. I always figured it was a pay issue, but now I see what you're saying- the concessions if I understand this right are that they want to give RJ pilots MUCH less than what the pay scales provide for, right?

It sounds then, that the mainline pilots want the RJ pilots to make more than what management will provide. Is that a fair assessment? Because if so, the vocal protests of some RJ pilots I hear (and the RJ Coalition or whatever that group's exact name is) sound pretty ridiculous.

So it sounds like management gets around this by assigning RJ routes to RJ pilots with the regional affiliates since they'll pay/offer less than what those same pilots would make flying the same RJ for the mainline. So is that where the scope clause comes in? It seems to me that the scope clause would be a pointless argument if RJ pilots flew for the mainline.

And yes, I do know several mainline pilots who look down on RJs as "beneath them".

I've been fascinated by this given American's pilot union and their recent proposal to fold in American Eagle's RJ operations into the mainline.

b737gearboy · 03-10-2002, 10:09 PM

Chicken,
YES to all your questions! The scope clause simply attempts to prevent outsourcing of jobs. Look at what happened to the the DC-9's at Delta, soon as the rj's came on line the 9's were history. Don't get me wrong, if a market will not bear flying a larger aircraft then an rj is appropriate. Sorry to cut this off but gotta go watch 9/11.

03-06-2002, 01:24 PM	#1
CAL 757-300 Guest Posts: n/a	New CEO at US Airways US Airways Names David N. Siegel President and CEO ARLINGTON, Va., March 6 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- US Airways Group's board of directors today named David N. Siegel president and chief executive officer and board member of both the holding company and its US Airways, Inc. airline unit. Stephen M. Wolf will retain the title of chairman of both companies in a non-executive capacity. Wolf, 60, reassumed the position of CEO of US Airways Group and US Airways, Inc. in November 2001 following Rakesh Gangwal's resignation from the company. Siegel, 40, is currently chairman and CEO of Avis Rent A Car System, Inc., a subsidiary of Cendant Corp., and has extensive experience in the airline industry, having spent seven years at Continental Airlines in various senior management roles, including president of its Continental Express subsidiary. ``We are extremely pleased to announce that an executive of Dave Siegel's abilities and energy will be joining US Airways as chief executive officer. He brings a broad understanding of the business, a proven track record of accomplishment, and, importantly, exceptional skills in working with people,'' Wolf said. ``While this is a particularly challenging time for the airline industry, I'm delighted to return to commercial aviation, where I spent much of my career,'' said Siegel. ``I have long viewed US Airways as an airline with a strong franchise and tremendous potential, and I look forward to working with the company's 36,000 employees in charting our future direction.'' As president of Continental Express from 1995-1999, Siegel improved the unit's profit contribution by $250 million annually and led its substantial improvements in operational performance. He also negotiated the largest aircraft order at the time in the regional airline industry as the launch customer for Embraer 145/135 regional jets. At Continental Airlines, he also served as senior vice president of planning and scheduling, where he played an instrumental role in Continental's financial and operational turnaround, and as vice president of corporate development. Prior to joining Continental, he served as director of corporate planning at Northwest Airlines. Before joining Avis, he held executive positions at Budget Group and eVolution Global Partners, a corporate venture capital firm. He began his career as a consultant at Bain & Co. Siegel earned a master's degree in business administration from Harvard Business School and a bachelor of science degree, magna cum laude, in applied mathematics-economics from Brown University. Siegel, his wife and daughter will relocate to the Washington, D.C., area. SOURCE: US Airways

03-06-2002, 10:38 PM	#6
Marc Hookerman DC-10 Lover Join Date: Oct 1999 Location: Saint Louis, MO USA Posts: 352	Thank god you responded Christian. I would of if you wouldn't have... Guys, Mr. Seigel is a good deal. Wolf is still a severe drag, but it might work out...I wish him lots of luck. He has a big sht burger to clean up... __________________ Jet Noise : The Sound of Freedom* Midwest Express Airlines "The Best Care in the Air"

03-07-2002, 12:27 AM	#8
Scott Insane Collector Join Date: Mar 2000 Location: Escondido, Ca. USA Age: 50 Posts: 2,763	Great! I agree with Wingman! A tad less ivy-league education and a bit more grass-roots horse sense. Sorry, no livery change as long as wolf pulls the strings! __________________ Fly the Friendly Skies of United uniTED takes wing Feb 12, 2004

03-07-2002, 10:40 AM	#9
CAL 757-300 Guest Posts: n/a	MBA Hey wingman, if you don't want an MBA to run the airline who would you want to see? The unions? Ask United how that grand experiment worked out and call us back...... Seriously, Siegel is a good guy and will knock the right skulls and shake the right hands. He knows what has to be done and will try and get everyone to buy into the idea of turning the airline around and righting the ship. There is some serious cost cutting to be done (highest CASM in the industry) and some mainline flying will indeed be shifted over to RJs and infuriate US pilots because of "lack of job opporunities". They want job opportunities? Fine. Let Siegel go in there and get the job done and right size their current operations. Otherwise there will be no job opportunites and all the US pilots will be S.O.L. and going back to working as flight instructors and bitching about their lousy pay. If they give Siegel an honest shot of fixing things they just might work out in the long run. How can you not when you have the majority market share at DCA and LGA?

03-07-2002, 03:16 PM	#11
CAL 757-300 Guest Posts: n/a	No axe here Tony, Thanks for your opinions and your view on it as a US pilot. Since I am merely an outsider looking at the overall picture of what is going on at US, I apologize if I came off as having an axe to grind. However, there is still a large gap to be filled between the pilots and management if there is to be a compromise made that will enable the company to restructure and be viable going forward. You mention the RJ agreement and there are some issues with that. Yes, US can contract out RJ flying from third party carriers, but this is not always the best thing to do. Most carriers require a guaranteed margin or "Cost Plus" contract, and this can get quite expensive, turning what could have been a profitable market into a mediocre "also ran". Increasing US RJ flying internally is what is needed and should be the core for express flying going forward. Compared to other airlines I do think US pilots are relatively rational. I think your group as a whole realizes that US will never be the size of UA or AA or DL and because you don't have the large equipment the pay rates will be a bit lower too. This is a Catch 22 in that if pilots demand rates similar to the big boys US will be hurt immensely because they don't have the size and depth of the Big 3 to absorb those costs. It will be interesting to watch the Siegel era unfold at US. I wish you guys the best.

03-06-2002, 03:10 PM	#2
Wingman Registered User Join Date: Aug 2000 Location: Bangor, ME Age: 34 Posts: 429	Great. Another Harvard MBA to run another airline. Lets see, that makes him third behind Leo Mullin of Delta and Donald Carty at American. What this industry needs is innovation, not more MBAs'.

03-06-2002, 06:14 PM	#4
ccdj747400 Guest Posts: n/a	Does this mean ANOTHER livery change

03-06-2002, 11:06 PM	#7
pi737 Collector Join Date: May 2000 Location: Jamestown, NC USA Age: 43 Posts: 138	I've heard good things about Mr. Siegel. Wolf didn't want to run this thing, so maybe he will stay out of the way and let Siegel try his hand. I'm glad for the change. Tony

03-07-2002, 01:42 PM	#10
pi737 Collector Join Date: May 2000 Location: Jamestown, NC USA Age: 43 Posts: 138	Phil, You sound like you have an axe to grind with US pilots. Have we done something to piss you off? Don't believe everything you read. We have been trying to get a RJ deal for a long time, the company was too busy trying to sell the company. Their lastest offer was limited RJs in US colors, but unlimited code sharing RJs in non US colors. Great deal considering about 50% of what is left of the US system could be replaced with contract carriers. US has cut back more than any other major carrier. Almost 300 of the 1150 pilots to be furloughed were covered by a no furlough clause and were furloughed for about 8 years in the 90's. We had a concessionary contract in '97 to pay for that, and the minimum growth provisions that the company dumped after 9/11. It's not like we are all asking to 747 Captains. We are just looking protect the jobs of those who were not supposed to be furloughed and help the others find employment. USAirways pilots have been looking for a leader for a long time. I believe we will give Mr. Siegal a chance to be one. I am excited about the change. Tony

03-07-2002, 03:31 PM	#12
pi737 Collector Join Date: May 2000 Location: Jamestown, NC USA Age: 43 Posts: 138	Phil, Thanks for the good wishes. I may have taken your post wrong. US pilots get bashed a lot. A few items. We would love to see the RJ flying come to either the mainline or the wholly owned commuters. We have approx. 1050 pilots furloughed right now that would probably like to be flying them. I think the level of service would be much better. Problem is the company says they can't afford to buy the aircraft. I think they want to contract them out to lower cost operators, but you know what they say, you get what you pay for. They could put as many RJs on the mainline as they want today. We can't even stop them until we agree to a pay rate like some carriers can. As far as costs go, we do have higher costs. In our last contract we agreed to a parity plus 1% agreement that was supposed to get our costs in line. That agreement led to us(pilots) getting a 17% last year! The people running this company for the last 5 years have been idiots. Several of Mr. Siegal's coworkers at CO were at PI when I got hired in '86. C.D. McClean(sp?) hired me. I like the way they think and hope Mr. Siegal thinks the same way about his employees. Tony

03-07-2002, 05:24 PM	#13
b737gearboy Senior Collector Join Date: Nov 2000 Location: KMHT Age: 40 Posts: 248	First of all Tony, thanks for the good posts. Phil, I can not think of one airline that has permanently shrunk to become profitable. Wolf has raped and pilliged(sp?) this airline to a point that it may cease to exist. There is no doubt that U needs more regional jets but it is management that has continually dropped the ball on this issue. If they were so important to mgmt why did they agree to a limit of 35 rj's during the 97 contract? Why did Gangwal call RJ's a fad? Why didn't mgmt negotiate for more rj's during the United merger debacle? Why did mgmt wait to negotiate unitll Jan 02? I don't mean to rant and rave but U mgmt has taken our contract and thrown in it in the trash. A furloughed US Airways pilot, and still unemployed. __________________ GO BUCKEYES!!!! NATIONAL CHAMPS!! O----H----I----O

03-07-2002, 06:33 PM	#14
CAL 757-300 Guest Posts: n/a	Don't get me wrong, I never said U management was the sharpest team in the industry or Rocky and Bullwinkle didn't get rich and fat while trying to merge with UA. They've made some stupid decisions (Metro Jet to name one) and they've done some things that will still be felt years to come. I never said shrinking the an airline to profitability is possible. In fact, it makes it worse in many ways. What happens when you park planes and are forced to furlough pilots? Do you lay off the high-priced, arguably over paid senior pilots? No, due to union rules the lowest seniority pilots get laid off first, resulting in a unit cost increase on what remains in your network. Getting rid of some overcapacity (meaning big jets) and switching to RJs is an entirely different matter. Do you really need 5 737s a day to BUF from PIT and PHL? No. You would most likely be better off with a few RJs and a couple of jets on peak trips. This would help to reduce the costs a bit and rationalize capacity. What about BWI? U just signed a deal with Southwest last week to sell the 25+ gates. What was once a mini-hub for U is now gone, so what do you do with those planes? Park even more aircraft? Lay off even more staff? As the cuts run deeper their unit costs are going to continue to rise to a point where the breakeven load factor is so high that it's impossible to make a dime, even in good times like TWA experienced. Look at the facts: PIT, PHL, and CLT can't grow too much more. LGA is in gridlock, and the international component (excluding the Caribbean stuff) is almost a joke. They are not ever going to be a big 3 carrier and they will never be able to handle the cost levels of a big 3 carrier. I think management and labor combined need to start discussing wage levels, eliminating scope clauses, and figuring out how to reshape your company so pilots like you can get back to work ASAP. I hope you get called soon.

03-07-2002, 08:26 PM	#15
pi737 Collector Join Date: May 2000 Location: Jamestown, NC USA Age: 43 Posts: 138	Gearboy-sorry to hear your still out of work. Maybe we should stop the RJ negotiations until our new CEO is in office. Maybe he can make some sense of it. Hope you are back soon. Tony

03-09-2002, 09:57 AM	#16
b737gearboy Senior Collector Join Date: Nov 2000 Location: KMHT Age: 40 Posts: 248	Phil, Thank you for comments. I feel compelled to respond to some of your statements. 1 The gates in BWI were not sold to SWA, it was a deal with the state of Maryland. I don't know if you have been to BWI but the gates being sold are a very long walk from SWA's gates. 2 The "hub" in BWI has been scaled down for so long it allowed SWA to easily come in kick U's butt. Another mgmt blunder. 3 Over paid? I am so sick of this kind of crap. If you want the big salaries at an airline become a pilot or manager. 4 There is quite a bit of room to grow in PIT and CLT the problem is O and D traffic. 5 U enjoys some the highest load factors over the Atlantic, yield may be the problem. 6 The scope clause will never be eliminated, granted there will be modifications. The pilot group has been ready to negotiate since May 2000 when we approved a letter of agreement for an additional 35 rj's. Part of the agreement mandated immediate negotiations for a comprehensive agreement that wouls have paved the way for many many more rj's. One problem, mgmt refused to come to the table untill January of this year. Obviously there are many, many problems with US Airways. I like most others question wether the airline will even survive. It's my opinion that many of us will never be recalled, and for this reason I am trying to move on. __________________ GO BUCKEYES!!!! NATIONAL CHAMPS!! O----H----I----O

03-09-2002, 10:39 PM	#17
USAirways85 Master Collector Join Date: Sep 2001 Posts: 643	usairways has room to grow at phl, although not that much they still can grow. they just built a 35 gate commuter terminal with 25 gates that can handle rj's, so usairways could probably handle many more commuter flts than they have now. also with a new international terminal in a little less than a year and 18 international gates, usairways could significantly expand transatlantically and even more to the carribean even though they have many flts to the carribean as it is.

03-09-2002, 11:16 PM	#18
Sentinel Chicken Go-Getters Go Ozark Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: DFW/THE GREAT STATE OF TEXAS Posts: 4,167	I've been quietly following this discussion and this has to be the most interesting thread on DAC in a long, long time! A couple things come to mind that maybe you guys can shed light on for me here. Gearboy pointed out that there's no limitations on capacity at Pittsburgh and Charlotte, but there's not enough O&D traffic out of those locations. I seem to remember reading somewhere that for a hub to be successful, it has to generate a significant amount of O&D traffic or the hub fails. This was pointed out to be factor (though clearly not the ONLY factor) in the demise of Western Pacific (hub'd at COS) and Braniff II (hub'd at MCI). There was an article in a local paper when I used to live in Kansas City that suggested MCI would never be a viable hub since there's not a whole lot of O&D traffic there. But it seems to me there are a lot of similarly sized cities to KC that have hubs- Milwaukee and Omaha are hubs for Midwest Express, Memphis for Northwest and Cleveland for Continental. And then there are cities that are ex-hubs (Nashville and Raleigh for American). Is O&D the only factor? American's pilots at one point recently suggested folding the RJ's into the mainline and have them flown by mainline pilots. Is this what is being considered for USAirways? My understanding of what American's pilots were suggesting was to get the furloughed pilots first to fly the RJs then get from the ranks of American Eagle. It seems to me this is a bit of an about face by mainline pilots in regards to RJs, isn't it? __________________ *Piss on noise abatement!*

03-10-2002, 10:13 AM	#19
b737gearboy Senior Collector Join Date: Nov 2000 Location: KMHT Age: 40 Posts: 248	Hey Chicken, It's my understanding that O and D traffic is the bread and butter of an operation as you might well imagine. If you are flying from BOS to CLT it definitely saves the airline big bucks to fly you nonstop rather than connecting you through PHL. That's been the problem with PIT and CLT, the local traffic base just isn't there. CLT is a growing city and the numbers are getting better as the city expands. Things look good for CLT as it may become the next ATL. PIT on the other hand is a problem, declining population and industry base to draw from. PHL as I understand it has been a gold mine (if there is such a thing for U) for the airline because of the many corporations and population base. U's hubs require a tremendous amount of feed to be profitable, just like CVG and CLE. Thus this underscores how important rj's are for US Airways. By the way as you might have read U's specialty is said to be to fly one from nowhere to nowhere. It's kind of funny to me that Wolf and Gangwal are supposed to be great minds in the airline business yet Gangwal when asked by the employee groups about the need for additional rj's back in 1997 he stated they are a "fad". He could be right to some extent but lets save this for another discussion. As for other factors hurting U, geography. The hubs are pretty close together with nothing in the midwest or west coast. As for rj's being flown on mainline it was proposed by Gangwals plan B from outerspace (the title of an actual article you might have read) that some 70 seat rj's would have been flown on mainline. Thats the funny thing about it, if mgmt wants unlimited rj's on mainline they can have them tomorrow and there is even a payscale in our contract. But as we all know they would rather pay peanut wages and benefits to the commuters. As for an about face, some might think it is beneath them to fly a small regional jet. However with so many jobs going to the commuters some have finally had a paradigm shift. For me I don't care what I fly I just want the most pay with the most days off. Sounds kind of selfish but my ego and self happiness has never been determined by what I fly. Hope answered some of your questions, fire away with more if you want. __________________ GO BUCKEYES!!!! NATIONAL CHAMPS!! O----H----I----O

03-10-2002, 12:48 PM	#21
USAirways85 Master Collector Join Date: Sep 2001 Posts: 643	they need to get the rj's. they are operating too many mainline aircraft on short routes. such as flts from phl to buf, syr, rdu, greensboro, albany, and a few others i cant think of. if they put rj's on these routes they can probably ease congestion somewhat. they could also send mainline aircraft to other possibly new cities or even start getting rid of the 733's, eventhough i think they have great # of 733's.

03-10-2002, 07:01 PM	#23
USAirways85 Master Collector Join Date: Sep 2001 Posts: 643	now i would like to see usairways do the following, very doubtful they will in the immediate future though: First like i said they need rj's. they should some how expand rwy 26 in phl to handle them. they should get a big amount of emb-135's to replace all those dinky 1900's and sf3's. then they should get the emb-140 to replace the dash-8's. they should get more crj's and 145's. then they should get a small amount of crj-700's to take some of the routes now handled by 733's or 734's.

03-10-2002, 10:09 PM	#25
b737gearboy Senior Collector Join Date: Nov 2000 Location: KMHT Age: 40 Posts: 248	Chicken, YES to all your questions! The scope clause simply attempts to prevent outsourcing of jobs. Look at what happened to the the DC-9's at Delta, soon as the rj's came on line the 9's were history. Don't get me wrong, if a market will not bear flying a larger aircraft then an rj is appropriate. Sorry to cut this off but gotta go watch 9/11. __________________ GO BUCKEYES!!!! NATIONAL CHAMPS!! O----H----I----O