Monday, March 8, 2010

Hoping for an overnight

Sitting in the crew room. The Captain, Paul,  sitting ready with me is a guy I enjoy flying with.

When I first started I held a line for 2 months (my base was overstaffed so senior pilots bid reserve and sat at home with full pay!). One of those months was with Paul.

Paul is a great Captain. He treats me as an equal and lets me make the decisions until I make a mistake.

My first, and so far only go around out side of the sim, was with Paul. I was new and thought I could go down AND slow down....at the same time. Yadda, yadda, yadda I had the plane at 1500 feet with the spoilers all the way out, Flaps 20, gear down and still blazing at 190 knots. Wasn't going to work. Around we went. He then hipped me to go down OR slow down. Handled nicely and I learned something.

Paul has been here a while. He used to be a steady line holder. Then my airline decided to move planes around and reduce our base. He has been reserve for a while.

Recently his family decided to move (he was out voted 3 to 1) to another state. He went from living 20 minutes from the airport to living a 2 1/2 hour plane ride from the airport. He is now a commuter who is just one number up from being the bottom guy.

Lately he's been buying a lot of hotel rooms as there haven't been many flights open. The cheapest hotel is a Motel 6 that charges crews $31.05 out the door. Not bad. But not free either.

I had already checked at crew connections and hipped him to one reduced rest overnight we could get. The crew to fly it is at an out station waiting on a plane to leave the base. Once the plane arrives the crew hops in, flies to base then out to the overnight. Right now the overnight is scheduled for 9 hours. The plane is running over an hour late.

As of right now the crew is estimated to arrive 17 minutes before they are supposed to leave. They are parking 23 gates away from the overnight flight. I am thinking we are going to get that flight. I wouldn't mind it. Haven't flow in a while. Getting an overnight tonight would allow me to be at home tomorrow night.

For now...we are both hoping for an overnight.

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