D-Day Approaches:  “We know why you wildcat strike.”

Why is OPERATION ORANGE going through the effort to change the laws? Is it nothing more than a petulant grab for what we legitimately lost at the bargaining table, or is there something more to it? Is it all about our paychecks and time off, or do others benefit from what we are doing?

This is why, and it is going to be the way pilot labor relations will be in the future, unless Congress changes the law.

Turbulence Ahead for American’s Passengers

 May 4, 2012

By an American Airlines pilot [1]

Published by OPERATION ORANGE with permission.

Tom Horton is trying to make history.

The newly minted CEO of American Airlines wants to throw out the labor agreements of its pilots, flight attendants and ground workers and force them to work under new rules imposed by his management team. The employees would be forced to take less pay, work longer hours and would lose their pensions. They would pay three times as much for their medical insurance, and would be severely penalized for calling in sick. Mr. Horton also wants to lay off 14,200 experienced workers, and replace them with cheap contract labor both in and out of the US. He also wants to farm out American Airlines flights to other airlines, so if your ticket is purchased on American you may fly on a different carrier. The team also wants to put hundreds of small jets into service, the ones with small uncomfortable seats and tiny overhead storage.

So why is this so historical? After all, the other major airlines have all used bankruptcy court to cut workers pay and benefits, and void contracts with aircraft and parts suppliers. The difference however, is that these airlines negotiated with their employees and exited bankruptcy with labor agreements. Not so with Mr. Horton. His management team, although they told the bankruptcy judge they are negotiating, will not negotiate with the unions. Oh sure, they show up to the negotiating sessions, but they don’t give an inch. Tom Horton, for the first time in history, is going to let the court abrogate the union contracts and force the employees to work under rules that could be considered unsafe.

When the bankruptcy judge rules on this around June 6th, the affect on American Airlines passengers will be immediate. If you’re holding a ticket on June 7th or after, plan on being inconvenienced. Why? Because to use a line from a movie, the employees are “mad as hell and we’re not going to take it anymore.” Simply stated, a large group from all three unions will just stay home. They won’t do this at the behest of their respective unions of course, that would be illegal. They will band together through grass roots organizations like OPERATION ORANGE [2], and take a stand against the corrupt use of bankruptcy courts and the Railway Labor Act by corporations that line the pockets of their executives while employees work under pay rates from 1992.

It is possible however, that American’s passengers will go on their way as if nothing happened. If the management at US Airways is successful in convincing the Unsecured Creditors Committee that a merger with American is in the best interest of all parties, then the American employees will gladly provide the service expected by the flying public. We’ll see. Tom Horton, a celebrated hatchet man whose “been to this rodeo before,” is hell bent on keeping everything to himself and making history. If you plan on flying American Airlines, keep an eye on his next move.

Air Canada Army Of One

 By an Air Canada pilot [3]

February 15, 2012

Republished by OPERATION ORANGE, with permission

I am an army of One – A Captain in the Air Canada army.

For years, I was a loyal soldier in the Air Canada army. I used to fight for the Big Red – Now, I fight my own war.

I used to feel valued and respected. Now, I know I am mere fodder.

They used to exhibit labour leadership. Now, they exploit legal loopholes.

They used to enjoy my maximum. Now, they will suffer my minimum.

I am an army of One.

I used to save Air Canada a thousand pounds of fuel per leg; finding the best altitude, getting direct routing, throttling back when on-time was made, skimping during ground ops, adjusting for winds, being smart and giving the company every effort I could conjure. Now, it’s “burn baby, burn!”.

I used to call maintenance while airborne, so the part would be ready at the gate. Now, they’ll find the write-up when they look in the book.

I used to try to fix problems in the system, now I sit and watch as the miscues pile up.

I used to fly sick. Now, I use my sick days, on short notice, on the worst days of the month.

I am an army of One.

I used to start the air conditioning at the last possible moment. Now, my customers enjoy extreme comfort.

I used to let the price of fuel affect my fuel loads. I still do.

I used to cover mistakes by operations. Now, I watch them unfold.

I used to hustle to ensure an on-time arrival, to make us the best. Now, I don’t share my success.

I used to call dispatch for rerouting, to head off ground delays for bad weather. Now, I collect paid minutes, number 35 in line for takeoff.

I am on a new mission - to demonstrate that misguided leadership of indifference and disrespect has a cost. It’s about character, not contracts. It’s about leading by taking care of your people instead of leadership by bean counters (an oxymoron). With acts of omission, not commission, I am a one-man wrecking crew – an army of One. My mission used to be to make Air Canada rich. Now, it’s to make Air Canada pay.

When they manipulate summer vacation to save their understaffed airline, I will make them pay.

When they force my FO to sit in economy while deadheading with Jazz pilots sitting in first class, I will make them pay.

When they provide me with a sub-standard hotel for me to rest, I will make them pay.

When over-booked customers are denied boarding system wide because of their lack of planning, I will make them pay.

When they force pilots, who have waited 12 years to become Captains, to be FOs again, I will make them pay.

When they try to manipulate my schedule to fix their lack of planning, I will make them pay.

When they trick my FO into flying over his duty day, I will make them pay.

When the CEO receives his 5 million dollars bonus on April 1^st, while I am still 20% below, I will make them pay.

When they constantly violate the letter and spirit of our contract – a contract that’s a bargain by any measure – and force us to fight lengthy grievances, I will make them pay.

My negotiating committee speaks for me, but I act on my own. I am a walking nightmare to the bean counters that made me. Are you listening? This mercenary has a lot of years left with this company; how long can you afford to keep me bitter? I’m not looking for clauses in a contract, I’m looking for a culture of commitment and caring. When I see it, I’ll be a soldier for Air Canada again. Until then, I am an Army of One and I’m not alone.

Airline management and government act as if our world is immune to the relationship between cause and effect. They incorrectly assume that what has been can always be. In the context of pilot labor relations, they assume pilots will dutifully perform their assigned tasks, regardless of the conditions by which those tasks were assigned. This may be true over a short term and under extreme circumstances, as pilots are generally a reasonable breed. However, as we said in October of 2010,

The entire industry is fundamentally broken and being held together by the professionalism of the piloting corps. The reservoir of pilot sufferance is not infinite nor is this safe harbor of pilot patience an area where management should think it can operate indefinitely.[4]

We have talked about a theoretical “catastrophic breakdown” in the air transportation industry, and we are on the precipice of it no longer being consigned to theory. OPERATION ORANGE, for all it has been misrepresented and misunderstood, seeks to prevent such a catastrophic breakdown. We seek a regulatory paradigm where chaos, unprofessionalism, and petulant displays of emotion are obsolete ways of obtaining parity in the influence over pay and working conditions.

If the current paradigm is allowed to persist, natural human resistance to injustice will prevail. However, the form of that resistance is the subject of speculation. We believe the industry will be plagued by pilots hampering the operation by either widespread, passive-aggressive, maladroit piloting, or outright wildcat strikes.

If they have no legitimate way to temper the aggressive nature of the collusion their managers enjoy with the government, they will lash out by less-than-desirable means. When we say, “less-than-desirable,” we mean in a manner that is not easily rectified by the existing managerial and legislative tools.

In other words, Congress (and the Canadian Parliament) needs to act now, before the situation explodes into a chaotic mess that harkens back to the days of rail labor unrest after the Civil War.

What happens when reality is ignored and the heavy hand of government enforces corporate greed and the looting of the industry? What happens when Congress holds hearings on protecting airline employees in bankruptcy, where expert after expert testify that the law needs to be changed, and they do nothing but listen to the hired guns for the banking industry?[5]

You get the environment for wildcat strikes and a persistent “low grade infection” of intentional pilot inefficiencies. The laws passed to help preserve reliable transportation are now the flashpoint and casus belli for labor unrest that imperils such reliable transportation.

This is what happens when there is no pressure relief valve in the system.

American Airlines pilots are at that point, and come June 6th, they could be “something absent in the air.” AMR executives are likely to be granted a rejection of their pilot contract on June 6^th of this year. You would have to be afflicted with a special strain of stupidity to believe the pilots will absorb this hit to their livelihoods, and continue to perform as if it was their civic duty.

Air Canada continues to use government collusion to pressure its pilots into accepting concessions that will lead to permanent outsourcing. If Air Canada keeps being protected by Lisa Raitt, Canadian passengers may have to GO FAR to find a flight.

We receive periodic requests to publish labor angst on the OPERATIONORANGE.org website. This posting is a sampling of two such publications regarding the state of the industry.

We do not endorse wildcat actions, nor passive-aggressive inefficiencies. We wish to have an industry that is healthy and beneficial for all parties involved: shareholders, employees, passengers, customers, and the general public. This isn’t going to happen in the current regulatory paradigm.

These two items we posted portend a grave shift in how things are normally handled. Pilots appear to be fighting back.

We don’t blame them one bit.

Once this gets started, it will be difficult to stop. Perhaps it is time for the laws to be changed. If OPERATION ORANGE is successful, actions such as this, will be obsolete.

Please call, fax, write, and visit your elected officials. They have brought this upon themselves. We are offering a way out.

Endnotes:

[1] Identity is being withheld. It is policy that OPERATION ORANGE not provide names for editorials by active pilots, unless the author requests it.

[2] OPERATION ORANGE is not a wildcat action nor an advocate of such. OPERATION ORANGE is an organized, methodical political protest protected under the First Amendment.

[3] Identity is being withheld. This was originally written by a Continental Airlines pilot and was adapted for the current environment at Air Canada. Any airline pilot could have written this, as airline managerial and government tactics are all the same.

[4] OPERATION ORANGE, Fatigue Mitigation Response, pg 22, available at www.operationorange.org/fatigueresponse.pdf

[5] Protecting Airline Employees in Bankruptcy, available at www.operationorange.org/airlineemployeesinBK.pdf

Commercial aviation industry analyst, Michael Boyd, penned a fantastic article in his April 30^th edition of the “Monday Hot Flash.” He arrived at the same conclusions we did in our February 2012 entry on the OPERATION ORANGE website entitled, “Our Future: If We Choose To Allow It.”

The government and industry are racing toward this “brand virtualization” concept, and the pilot associations are entranced by the metamorphosis. We hope to change the trajectory of this feature of pilot recruitment for purposes of protecting the traveling public against dangerous trends in outsourcing and the annoying deterioration of passenger service. Boyd correctly calls-out the revolving door of low-skilled and low-paid employees, which logically result in low levels of passenger service and operational safety. It seems that the airline support personnel will have to choose between a career in aviation, or one preparing fast food, washing windows, collecting tolls, or grooming pets.

If we don’t act in our own best interests, piloting will succumb to the same fate. This is the model airline management has for pilots, and they have paid off the government to those ends.

We invite you to read Boyd’s article and also encourage you to read his other works. His analysis is far superior to the self-serving bilge offered by Wall Street and other incarnations of the “conventional wisdom.”

(To read Boyd’s article on Boyd Group International’s website, click HERE)

(To read Boyd’s article in PDF, click HERE)

Dealing With The Virtual Airline

By: Michael Boyd, Monday, April 30, 2012

© Boyd Group International, republished by OPERATION ORANGE with permission.  All rights reserved by Boyd Group International, www.aviationplanning.com

It happened in the petroleum industry. It’s happening in the airline business. Or, more accurately, it’s already happened in the airline business. Brand virtualization.

Today, you go to the gas station and pump a brand of gas in to the tank of your SUV. But where that unleaded came from, how it was produced, who produced it, who moved it and who put it into the filling station storage tank, are all different companies, and they can change month to month, and even gas station to gas station across town. The only thing that’s the same is that the sign at the station says “Conoco” or “Shell.”

Twenty years ago, oil companies were involved from the wellhead to the gas pump. Today, it’s different vendors and suppliers for every part of the logistics stream. It’s all been farmed out to independent surrogates.

Tumble to this: that’s exactly what’s happened in the US airline industry over the last 15 years. Today, it’s not only possible, but probable, that you can book a trip on a major airline from a mid-size community on the East Coast to one on the West Coast, and never in the process deal with anybody directly working for the airline brand. It’s all been outsourced.

Think about it. You book the seat on-line. No contact whatsoever with an airline employee. And in the event that you do need human intervention, there’s a better than even chance the guy on the other end of the phone is in a call center in some Third World country. He’s successfully completed Level Three of English As A Second Language, and thinks that “FRA” is the code for “France.”

You go to the airport. Get a boarding pass at a kiosk. Or, have it sent to your iPhone. You flash it at the gate, which, like the rest of the airline brand’s operation at the airport, is staffed by outsourced vendors, or a “regional” airline. You board the RJ, operated by an outsourced vendor. You fly to the connecting hub – to a concourse again where staff are outsourced to a “regional” airline. Board another outsourced flight, and fly to your final destination.

Not one interaction with any staff or employees of the airline brand from which you bought your ticket. Just like at the gas station – the whole process is now virtual. You have no contact with anybody that is directly working for the airline. Vendors, all.

And, you’d best believe that this is sooooo much more cost-effective than having the airline itself do it with their own employees. Airline employees tend to want to make a career at the carrier. They stay around for years, moving up the pay scale. And – yikes! – they may even be in a union, one of those pesky groups that want to bargain for things like pay and working conditions. Truly, it’s much more enlightened to just farm the work out.

Just Like The Fast Food Business.  Youbetcha, it’s better from a cost-approach to outsource this work to vendors. They just hire kids, or maybe not-so-kids, and pay ‘em wages that will encourage them to work a while, and then move on, to be replaced by other bottom-of-the-scale new hires, creating a cycle that keeps labor costs low. It’s the same approach that’s been used in the fast food industry for years. Turnover is the key to low labor costs and a real barrier to union entry.

Sounds great. But what’s been created is a system that is not focused on service. Not focused on excellence. It’s just focused on labor costs. And it’s one that offers employees almost zero potential for career growth – just like at the local Burger World.

This extends across the board: The ramper at East Upchuck has a career path that will last until the ground contract is re-bid in two years. The pilots and flight attendants on the “regional” airline to which flights have been outsourced are really caught in a special bind: there are limited flow-through opportunities to majors, and worse, those mainstay 50-seat jets are going to get retired faster than new jobs will open at majors. (See recent comments by Republic Airlines CEO on the matter, by the way.)

The point is this: there’s not a lot of long-term career-play for employees involved in this oh-so-cost-efficient virtual airline system. But, so what? It works, right?

Here’s a clue: airlines are not the same as Burger World. Slapping secret sauce on a hamburger and keeping the yogurt machine churning out sugary glop is not the same as the skills and training needed to professionally handle an airport passenger service and ramp operation.

So, let’s touch that third rail that we’re not supposed to mention: a lot of this outsourced work is shamefully done. To be sure, there are stellar companies in the business, like SkyWest, where there is a career path, and the training infrastructure in place to make it work.

But that’s not the norm. It’s not uncommon for consumers to get abused (unintentionally, usually) by vendors where the “customer service” staff has less training than a day-old puppy. Situations where they are clueless as to why the flight’s late, or visually looking like they just came from a street fight. Or, hamstrung with really incompetent rules – like, the incidents where people actually standing in line to check-in for a 34-seat airplane are cut off 30 minutes before departure – and responding aggressively when consumers get understandably ticked off.

Why should they care? It’s just a temporary job. If the customer doesn’t come back, no big deal.

Training in customer service skills? Sure, we do a half-day program, you might hear. But to do more would be un-economic, don’t ya know: There’s too much turnover to spend the money,

Future?  Two dynamics are emerging: Ground outsourcing will continue and expand. But in the cockpit, the trend will be toward flying shifted by to the major, simply because of changes in airplane economics. As 50-seaters get retired, we can expect that 80+ seaters be the capacity floor – and they will be flown in-house.

Plan on it.

 Mission Statement: Protecting the Flying Public; Restoring the Profession

The purpose of OPERATION ORANGE is to change the laws governing the piloting profession for part 121 operations, so as to continue to attract the best candidates to keep the air transportation system safe. The pilot aptitude component of the air transportation infrastructure has been looted and destroyed by a generation of airline managers. This asset has been destroyed through the political process and will be rebuilt by the same means. The problem is political; the solution is political.

This action is outside the Railway Labor Act’s jurisdiction. This action is under the protection of the FIRST AMENDMENT to the United States Constitution.

There is nothing our pilot associations can do to further defend a profession that has been destroyed. As long as they are content to continue using failed, traditional tactics, they will continue yielding failure. The law has us with no place to turn. This is the future, and it is accelerating. The results of collective bargaining are a result of the laws governing them. The laws are a result of the present thinking. The thinking needs to change. Nobody will change their thinking until the pilots do so. Once the pilots demonstrate the resolve to withdraw their labor, en masse, lawmakers, regulators, and managers will be forced to change their thinking.

OPERATION ORANGE seeks to use an industry-wide “suspension of service” to bring the issue to the forefront of those who have the power to change the laws. This “suspension of service” must be industry-wide. We have produced a legislative draft, containing our solution.

No part 121 pilot group is immune. Southwest’s CEO has put them on notice that their leadership in compensation and quality of life is in its final phase. Delta, United, and US Airways will certainly come under pressure as their contracts either become amendable or are close to conclusion after integration issues are solved. American’s troubles cover the spectrum and are a glimpse of what awaits the other pilot groups. UPS and FedEx just saw their management groups exempt them from regulations designed to reduce fatigue. Pilot pushing in cargo is now enshrined into law, and more is coming.

We are all in this together. It’s time to act together. Look what 30 years of “beggaring thy neighbor” has given us. Be ready to volunteer your time. Be ready to set the brake and stay at home until things get fixed. It is time to fight back, legally, peacefully, and effectively.

Please take the time to read the information provided at OPERATIONORANGE.org. You can download most of the documents in one zip file:

www.operationorange.org/masterdocs.zip

THIS IS OUR TIME

For a PDF of this posting, click HERE.

 (To read this entire post in a PDF format, click HERE)

1. Read the documents listed in the menu below the orange SOS masthead on OPERATIONORANGE websites.

• Our Fellow Pilots
• Imagine Reading This
• UPS Pilot Speaks Out
• Phase III
• First Amendment vs RLA
• What is illegal about OPERATION ORANGE?
• Talking Points
• The Fair Treatment of Experienced Pilots Act of 2011 – Part 2
• Response to FAA Fatigue Mitigation Proposal
• To The Public
• Chesley Sullenberger’s Congressional Testimony
• Jeffery Skiles’ Congressional Testimony
• Authentication
• Secure Communications

All these documents can be downloaded in a single .zip file called “Master Documents and Signatures” located in the masthead menu.

2. Tell AT LEAST 10 pilots (preferably 20) about OPERATION ORANGE. It is not enough to only tell your flying partner. You must tell pilots at other airlines about OPERATION ORANGE, because it is absolutely critical this be an industry wide operation. It is a failure if only one or two carriers participate.

Tell 4 flying partners (captains tell 4 first officers and first officers tell 4 captains).

Tell 2 fellow captains or first officers at your airline.

Tell 4 friends or associates at other carriers (jump seaters, crew van, hotel lobby, airport terminals, military buddies, etc).

If 200 pilots each recruit 20 pilots, and each of them recruits 5, that’s half of the pilots in the industry.

3. Go Orange. We need a sea of orange operating passenger transportation aircraft. This allows us to identify one another and identify those that either have not heard or do not wish to participate. A large stripe of orange duct tape across luggage or crew bags sends the message. Orange duct tape is available at Home Depot. Existing orange book bag stickers and “CREW” bag tags do not count, unless they are in numbers such that it is obvious what is intended.

The other benefit is that our adversaries will also see this unity and know what is looming if OPERATION ORANGE Phase IV is ever implemented.

Do not underestimate the importance of this step. Without unity, OPERATION ORANGE is going nowhere.

4. Print up cards and stickers to give to other pilots. We have .PDF and .jpg files for OPERATION ORANGE business cards and stickers. You can download them from the masthead menu, or get them from the Master Document and Signature .zip file, and take them to a printer like Office Depot, Staples, Kinkos/FedEx, Office Max, etc. to get them printed up. You could also use your own computer and printer for lesser amounts. There is nothing stopping you from designing your own cards or stickers. The documents are in formats needed by those printers. Office Max has a 7 day turnaround and is very reasonably priced. The Office Max sticker is template ADL 1177 and costs $165 for the first 500. Business cards are $40/1000.

5. (OPTIONAL) Download the PGP trial version and PUBLIC KEYS for The Committee. To prevent our adversaries from corrupting our message, The Committee has arranged for public key cryptography to ensure the message we put out is not forged or corrupted. All the details are listed in the “Authentication” document in the masthead menu.

Not everyone needs to check the documents for authenticity, but enough people must do so and make enough noise if they find anything corrupted so that other pilots can be forewarned.

6. Be professional. Management and government are going to be doing what they always do when pilots attempt to stand up for themselves – take hostages. They do it every contract cycle and this will certainly be no exception.

OPERATION ORANGE will not conclude until all hostages are not only released, but made whole. No pilot shall agree to participate in OPERATION ORANGE unless they are willing to fight for those who are being harassed by management, as one of the objectives of OPERATION ORANGE is to end this practice.

Fly the best plane you can.

Be diligent about following all the regulations.

Save your sick leave.

Wear your uniform with pride.

Observe sterile.

When in doubt, go around.

…and most of all, don’t screw up.

7. Don’t talk to the press. Most in the press corps do not understand our history or goals, and most won‘t take the time to learn. It is much easier for most of them to listen to management and parrot the company line. Many journalists engage in “gotcha” journalism and you may not be able to tell the difference before it is too late. It is best to keep quiet to prevent looking like a fool. Often what you meant to say and what people read will be two different things.

Anyone who has been to SERE knows what we are talking about.

“I have no comment.” Know it. Learn it. Say it.

8. Don’t talk to the cops. What we are doing is not a crime – we are just exercising our First Amendment rights of speech, press, assembly, and petition.

The Bill of Rights is the entirety of OPERATION ORANGE. The same Bill of Rights that gives us the rights to speak our minds, assemble, and petition the government is the one that allows us to decline to talk with the police. Be polite, but if you are not under arrest or being detained (you can ask this), you are free to go.

“I have no comment.”

“Am I under arrest?”

“Am I being detained?”

“Good day, gentlemen.”

Stick to the script.

9. Hammer on your elected officials. “Phase III” is all about pressuring Congress to change the laws. Unless they see pressure coming from a united pilot group, they will continue to do the bidding of those that fund their campaigns. CONGRESS DOES LISTEN!!! You need to speak up.

Go to the “PHASE III” tab on our main masthead menu. All the instructions are there, with a sample letter, list of pertinent officials, and a mail merge instruction kit.

The “Phase IV” SOS is a natural extension of an effective “Phase III” lobbying effort.

10. Check the OPERATION ORANGE websites and FACEBOOK pages periodically for updates. You can sign up for email updates. As Phase III reaches its climax, we will start publishing the tactics for Phase IV.

The success or failure of OPERATION ORANGE depends on the man in the mirror. Only you can stop government-managerial abuse. Only you can restore the vitality of the profession. Only you can protect your passengers.

Will you?

THIS IS OUR TIME.

 Air Canada Pilots are Seeing ORANGE

OPERATION ORANGE has touched nerves outside the confines of the United States. In fact, it is safe to say that wherever there is collusion between government and airline executives, for purposes of gutting pilot livelihoods and looting the wealth of the air transportation infrastructure, OPERATION ORANGE finds fertile ground to plant seeds for a glorious harvest.

All pilots in the US should pay attention to what is happening north of our border, because our brethren in Canada are experiencing what we are experiencing. In fact, the details of our struggle and theirs, are too similar to disregard as anything but coordination.

We made note of how QANTAS, the Australian national airline, is being systematically looted in the same manner airlines in the US have been destroyed. In the case of QANTAS, the matter has been brought to the floor of their parliament, by Senator Xenophon. We published his remarks a few weeks ago.

OPERATION ORANGE has been in contact with pilots at Air Canada and they are in the crucible of war, when it comes to their attempts to gain appropriate working conditions for their labors. It is what American Airlines pilots are now facing, and what United, Delta, Northwest, US Airways, and Continental pilots faced in recent years.

We have been sent two letters by The 97 “squared,” (97% strike vote turnout x 97% voting in favor of strike) a grassroots movement of Air Canada pilots, and have been asked to publish them on our website.

Please take the time to read both letters. These letters could have been written by any professional airline pilot, whether in Canada, The US, or Australia. The stories are all the same, which should give us the courage to pursue these matters jointly, rather than as individual pilot groups that will be picked off by joint effort of global airline management and the governments who protect them.

www.operationorange.org/aircanada01.pdf

www.operationorange.org/aircanada02.pdf

The career you save may be your own.

Your career may be saved by your brothers at Air Canada.

The luggage tag on the above picture has been produced by an Air Canada pilot. They are “seeing orange,” and we hope their southern brothers stand up for the cause as well. If you would like to purchase a luggage tag, CLICK HERE.

We are in this together. Please support The 97 squared (97%x97%).

Baseball bats…hockey sticks…

Welcome To “Phase III” of OPERATION ORANGE

(To read this post in a PDF, click HERE)

We are moving along with our goals of getting the laws governing pilot negotiations changed. Phase I was the initial development of the idea, goals, and methods. Phase II started in late 2010, which was the dissemination of the entire OPERATION ORANGE idea to the major airline pilots. Phase III is the active lobbying of the government to get the laws changed. This is petitioning the government for redress of grievances, and is wholly protected under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.

Phase III is here, and this is what we want you to do.

We are asking all pilots that want the Railway Labor Act, bankruptcy laws, and other regulations concerning part 121 operations changed to take a stand and do something about it. The “man in the mirror” is the one that will save your career and rebuild the profession.

“They” won’t save your career. There is no “they.” There is only “you,” and the guy next to you.

The closest thing to “they” we have is the group of folks collecting 1-2% of our gross earnings to shepherd “Age 65” legislation through Congress, while “they” spend our dues money organizing and benefiting the very operations that are killing off our profession. We have been waiting for “them” to save our profession for 30 years. After that length of time, and hundreds of millions of dues money, “they” are not coming to the rescue.

The “Type 1” pilots already understand this. The “Type 1” pilots are ready to act, and they are the leaders of OPERATION ORANGE.

As we have written over and over again, the eventual “Phase IV” (aka “SUSPENSION OF SERVICE”) must be preceded by a viable lobbying effort. We are not interested in a petulant display of emotion, but a calculated method of bringing the issue into the forefront of the national discussion, on terms we design and control.

Phase IV (the SOS) is a natural extension of Phase III, so here is what we want to start immediately.

We have compiled a list of all the current House and Senate members that oversee aviation law and the FAA. We need to do the traditional, accepted lobbying efforts to communicate with our elected officials. THIS IS VERY, VERY CRITICAL!!!! You must write letters, fax, call, and visit the local offices of your Congressmen and Senators, as well as those that are on the committees that will craft the legislative relief we need.

It may be boring. It may seem futile. It may seem burdensome.

Whatever it may be, you need to be certain that it is essential.

Congress does listen, but the message to Congress does have a very large noise-signal ratio. OPERATION ORANGE is known to both committees, all the major airline pilot unions, as well as CAPA. They know about us.

Now they need to hear from us.

It is essential that you write and fax several times per week. It is essential that you call several times per day. It is essential that you visit your local office whenever you can, and if possible, bring several friends with the same message.

They will listen. The last thing they want is all the airlines shutting down at the same time.

If you call, write, fax, or visit, and reference the objectives of OPERATION ORANGE, you will be taken seriously.

LETTERS:

We will make available a sample letter you can use. Please take the time to address it properly and change details to suit your particular audience. USPS letters do get to Congress, but are delayed to screen the letters for hazardous substances. Faxes make it directly into the office, as do phone calls.

It is preferred that you write your own letter, and include your own concerns regarding the inequitability of the current law. Write extensively about the past 15 years, and how the RLA and 1113 BK laws have been abused. Tell them that what you do is important to the safety of the public as well as the commerce of the nation, and how compensation needs to reflect this priority.

Be respectful, but firm. Tell them that you would rather this end without disruption, but that you are willing to support more persuasive, and fully lawful means of bringing the issue to a successful conclusion.

Congressmen and Senators are addressed as “The Honorable XXXXX XXXXX.” Use this salutation, regardless of your personal opinion regarding their body of work, or their political stances. We need both Republicans (who run the House) and Democrats (who run the Senate and White House) to make this work, so set aside your partisan political identity and biases. Our objectives are to restore our profession, but also build a profession that will continue to carry the public in a safe and efficient manner, as the current recruiting priorities of management imperil that objective.

Send letters to the Washington DC office. This is where legislative affairs are handled. District offices, while important, are mainly for day-to-day constituent concerns, not legislative concerns.

FAXES:

Faxes should follow the same format as letters. Call the Washington office and talk to the staffer that answers the phone. Ask the name of the staffer who deals with aviation legislative affairs and alert them a fax is going to arrive that meets their area of responsibility. Press the case that this is urgent and concerns the future viability and safety of the air transportation system. Identify yourself as a professional pilot and have first-hand knowledge of the subject matter.

Faxes are advantageous because they arrive immediately. If you convert your letter to a PDF, your modern computer will likely have the ability to fax it as a PDF file. If not, spend a few bucks at Kinkos, Office Depot, Office Max, or your layover hotel.

TELEPHONE:

You can call the Washington DC office directly. The staffer that picks up the phone will likely be a young intern that performs receptionist duties. Be exceedingly polite, but firm, and ask to be passed to the member of “Congressman XXXXX’s staff” that deals with aviation legislative affairs. Should you get past the receptionist, be polite and explain the situation. The law needs to be changed or the piloting profession will collapse, and with it the efficiency and reliability that has always been associated with passenger/cargo transportation.

Use the phone call to set up a fax that will follow. Get the staffer to look for the fax and ensure the Congressman/Senator be well briefed on the subject.

EMAIL:

Email is normally not a good way to communicate directly with the elected official. House protocol normally precludes a Congressman from taking a concern from someone outside his/her district. Email is normally where this filter is set up.

Letters, faxes, phone calls, and visits to Congressmen/Senators outside of a person’s district/state are taken, provided it relates to work performed by the Congressman/Senator on a specific committee. This is why we have listed the names, addresses, and phone numbers of the aviation related committees. They will listen to non-constituent concerns, if it relates to their committee work. Obviously, if your Congressman/Senator is on one of these committees, you have a better chance of being heard, since you get to vote for or against that elected official.

If you can get the direct email of the legislative assistant, or the receptionist, you can alert them that an email with a PDF attachment may be forthcoming. Be certain to get permission to do this, and give them the courtesy of not broadcasting that email to everyone you know. Treat them as you would wish to be treated.

VISITATION:

This is, without a doubt, the single most effective way to get your message to an elected official. Writing, faxing, and calling take a level of commitment that pales when compared to the effort needed to dress up and visit an elected official. You can visit a district office, and will likely be seen by a legislative assistant. The chances of seeing a Congressman/Senator in a district office are quite low.

If you visit Washington, the chances of seeing the correct people increase markedly. This is one reason we are trying to schedule an OPERATION ORANGE rally in Washington in late Spring / early Summer. If several hundred, or thousand uniformed pilots canvass Capitol Hill offices, our agenda becomes their agenda.

That’s what we want.

When you visit, please be mindful of what you wear and how you are groomed. Wearing your uniform, with normal grooming standards, is the best way to communicate with Congress. After that, a business suit is preferred.

Please avoid visiting a congressional office in the standard “layover uniform” (blue jeans, running shoes, golf shirt).

When you visit, please communicate the same you would in a letter or fax. The chances of seeing the elected official are still low, but your chances of getting five minutes with an influential staffer are quite high, provided your timing is good and you have patience. Appointments are normally accepted and honored.

Additionally, there is strength in numbers. If you can arrange for four to six (perhaps more) to visit with you, your message will be heard in a much “louder” fashion than if you present yourself as a lone wolf with a single issue.

Stick to the issues, and build rapport. Concentrate on the abuse of the RLA and BK laws, and how they have been used to enrich airline executives at the expense of employees and the traveling public. Be polite, but not obsequious. Ask how you can help the elected official understand what it is really like out there in the trenches, as he/she has likely been purposefully insulated from that reality by airline trade associations, like ATA/A4A.

Tell the staffer how you wish to be part of the solution.

END GAME:

It is important for all of us to do this on a frequent basis. Letters and faxes need to go two to three times per week, and phone calls need to be daily chores. Visitations need to be done as frequently as scheduling permits.

However, the following statement is EXCEEDINGLY IMPORTANT:

WHILE OPERATION ORANGE IS IN “PHASE III,“ DO NOT, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, CONDUCT YOUR PETITIONING OF THE GOVERNMENT IN ANY MANNER THAT COMPROMISES YOUR ABILITY TO MEET YOUR CONTRACTUAL FLIGHT SCHEDULE!!!!!!

This imperative only applies as long as OPERATION ORANGE is in “Phase III.” We are going to establish our legal, First Amendment protected right to petition the government for redress during this phase.

When “Phase IV” is announced, we will ask that you conduct these very same activities on both your “days-off” as well as your “days-on.” We will ask that you petition the government for redress, under the protection of the First Amendment, on days you are scheduled to work, as well as your days off.

That is protected activity and can’t be enjoined. That is the SOS.

Waiting for our unions to ride to our rescue is futile. We need to operate in a manner that brings the issue to Congress, in a legally protected context. The Constitution prohibits the Congress from passing a law abridging that right. It is what our Founders intended, so let’s use it.

It’s our First Amendment, too.

We are asking quite a bit of all of you. How much is your career worth? Is it worth a few hours of writing, faxing, calling, and visiting, or are you content to take what crumbs fall off Tilton’s, Horton’s, Anderson’s, Parker’s, and Smisek’s table, as you opt for “peace in your time?”

They stole hundreds of thousands, if not millions, from each of us. It’s time to fight back. It’s time to let Congress, the FAA, management, and our unions know we are no longer content to fund and facilitate their comfort and avarice.

It’s your First Amendment. Are you going to use it? If so, here is where to start:

House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, Aviation Subcommittee

http://transportation.house.gov/Subcommittees/aviation-members.shtml

A PDF of House Subcommittee members is available at:

www.operationorange.org/housecontact.pdf

US Senate Aviation Operations, Safety, and Security Subcommittee

US Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions

A PDF of Senate Subcommittee members is available at:

www.operationorange.org/senatecontact.pdf

A sample letter for your use is available at:

www.operationorange.org/sampleletter.docx

[UPDATE - MAY 3, 2012] We have updated the Senate contact list to include the committee that has oversight of labor and pensions. This is called the “HELP” Committee (health, education, labor, and pensions). The Senators on the HELP Committee can receive correspondence directly from the committee, unlike the House committee on aviation. You may also send letters, in bulk, to the senior partisan on the HELP Committee and their staff will distribute the letters to the party members on the committee. You can correspond with the entire HELP Committee with two packages. If this changes, we will republish this and let you know of the new protocol.

We have also included a MAIL MERGE zip file for publishing many letters at one time. Download the zip file and open the “READ ME FIRST” PDF. It gives all the instructions you need to use MS WORD to write many letters at the same time.

Please take this seriously. The career you save may be your own. When Congress hears from 8000 pilots, you will get action on restoring your career. As long as we (as pilots) give off the impression that we are content to suffer under the current regulatory paradigm, Congress will meet that contentment with inaction. It’s our Congress, too.

Only you can save your career.

THIS IS OUR TIME.

For more information, please visit www.OPERATIONORANGE.org

Send this video to every pilot you know. Post this on your FACEBOOK page.

More videos will follow in the next few weeks.

The Failure of the Railway Labor Act

(To read this posting in PDF, click HERE)

120 years ago, the rail industry was linking American cities and promoting American commerce. This vital national resource was necessary for the growing, post-war nation to become the economic titan of the 20^th Century.

Things were not smooth on the railway labor front. Burdened with high fixed costs, rail management frequently changed the pay and working conditions of its employees, prompting wildcat strikes. Armed troops were often summoned to quell labor unrest and put down violence.

It didn’t take much in the way of prescience to understand this feature of labor relations was at odds with the growing industrial needs of a rising nation, so Congress passed a series of laws aimed at streamlining labor unrest. Most were considered failures until the Railway Labor Act was passed.

In that agreement between industry and labor, it was decided that each party needed to relinquish its primary tactic in attempts to secure its own interests: labor would organize into official unions along craft and class lines, and agree to a series of burdensome conditions that needed to be met before engaging in labor stoppages; and management would not interfere with union operations and representation, while also agreeing not to unilaterally change the pay and working conditions of employees without meeting the same burden as the union.

Unlike labor contracts that fall under NLRB, where both parties are largely free to engage in activities in their own interest at the conclusion of the contract, those collective bargaining agreements in rail (and eventually airline) industries would carry past any deadline by requiring both parties to still act as if they were in force, thus maintaining a “status quo” in the working environment. This purpose was ostensibly to prevent disruptions in commerce that relied upon the rail system of the United States. The theory being that small disputes would be prevented from swelling into large disputes.

The law, as most laws, was crafted by industry. What industry gave up in terms of ability to unilaterally change working conditions and coerce employees away from union membership, it gained in terms of greatly reduced exposure to labor stoppages. All industries that have very high capital costs (such as rail and air) are vulnerable to cash-flow interruptions. Labor disruptions are magnified in such an environment. Management had just crafted a tool that would remove, or largely shield, their Achilles’ Heel.

When a RLA contract came to be renegotiated during times of higher employee leverage, management could feign “good faith bargaining,” but drag its feet. It had relatively little incentive to achieve a deal under such circumstances, since it would be raising its costs. The RLA simply afforded management the ability to defer that cost.

Labor was not without its tools. Under this arrangement, labor could also feign maintaining the “status quo,” while slowing down, or “working to the rule.” Eventually, both sides would grow weary of this war of attrition and achieve peace by crafting a new working agreement. It was a flawed system that worked, especially in a regulated environment. Each side was allowed to “cheat” in small part and US commerce suffered a little, but not greatly.

Airline deregulation hit in the late 1970s, and Frank Lorenzo entered the scene with big dreams of slashing his own employee costs and undercutting the high cost structure of rival airlines. He knew it would be against the law to simply decree his new cost structure, and that the RLA prevented him from imposing it at the conclusion of an employee contract. He needed a way to unilaterally impose his grand vision on his employees without running afoul of the RLA.

He started a non-union carrier and began buying stock in unionized carriers. Eventually, he had control over Continental and Eastern – both unionized carriers. He now had the ability to shift assets from one airline to another, thus creating a distressed financial condition in the unionized carriers. Eventually, he filed for bankruptcy and allowed the US Bankruptcy Court to do for him what the RLA prohibited him from doing himself.

The strict seniority system in the US carriers put tremendous pressure on Continental employees to save their airline. If Continental had been liquidated, its employees would have been jettisoned into the marketplace, where they would have been treated as brand-new employees at rival airlines. This environment was one where Robert Crandall promised to expand his airline (American), but only if the new employees were paid “B-Scale” wages and benefits.

It would have been a double-whammy for adrift ex-Continental employees, and Lorenzo knew it.

What Lorenzo could not achieve at the bargaining table, he attained in bankruptcy court. The RLA had been circumvented. How did ALPA (the largest pilot union in the US) respond? By telling Continental pilots to “work under protest,” as Lorenzo kept his financing together to eventually break the ill-fated strike.

Congress responded by changing some bankruptcy laws, giving the appearance that it was labor friendly, but in the financial free-for-all of the 1980s, those laws were weak and interpreted as only requiring that management give the appearance of “good faith bargaining,” as it smashed employee contract after employee contract in federal bankruptcy court.

The same holds true today, but only worse. Airline employees are the only unionized employees in the US that are prohibited from striking if their contract is unilaterally changed. Unionized employees under the NLRB are allowed to walk off the job at the conclusion of their contract, and rail employees under the RLA are exempted from having their contracts changed by bankruptcy proceedings, as they fall under Section 1167 of the bankruptcy code, rather than Section 1113. Simply said, if you want to find liquidity in reducing unionized employee compensation, airline employees are the most inviting target – they can’t fight back. You get a free shot.

The Federal Bankruptcy Court of Southern New York is the preferred venue for airlines to file for bankruptcy. This court has sustained an unbroken record of dismantling airline employee contracts, and has faithfully issued ruling after ruling in favor of management. It has issued a ruling, in the case of the Northwest Airlines Flight Attendants, that establishes how the RLA is only applied selectively, and large portions of other labor law prohibiting judicial interference in collective bargaining agreements do not apply.

This is a venue where the airlines would certainly like to confine the discussion of collective bargaining agreements, since the chosen venue conducts itself like an extension of the executive boardroom, rather than a court of law. Should this wrinkle in the law (airline employees are subject to unilateral amendment/rejection of their RLA agreements, but are enjoined from striking in response to such action) be appealed to the United States Supreme Court, the airlines stand to lose a large part of their legal arsenal.

In Detroit and Toledo Shoreline Railroad Co. v. United Transportation Union, 396 U.S. 142, 155 (1969), the Supreme Court opined about the RLA in the following manner:

“Only if both sides are equally restrained can the Act’s [Railway Labor Act] remedies work effectively.”

Since the unbroken string of empirical evidence from the Southern New York District Court shows that the RLA is to be applied selectively, and then only at the behest of management and the creditors, it stands to lose a great deal if one of their tortured opinions is reviewed against the facts.

The current “law of the land” (as far as the jurisdiction of Southern New York goes) is in the case of the Northwest Airlines Flight Attendants, who rejected tentative agreements with the airline, and served notice of their right to engage in “self-help.” The court initially concluded that the RLA and Norris-LaGuardia Act prohibited the court from interfering with the normal process of the consequences of a unilateral rejection of the collective bargaining agreement.

This was appealed and overturned. The reasoning behind the reversal was somewhat convoluted, but was essentially tethered to the idea that a work action, by a labor group of a carrier in bankruptcy, would harm creditors, the public, and the airline. As such, the bankruptcy provisions would override the concerns of the union.

In other words, the natural consequences of the airline’s actions are too detrimental to allow.

This has been the preferred tactic of airline management over the past several years. They are free to take drastic action, and are allowed a defacto “consequence-free environment” to operate by an activist court and activist National Mediation Board.

Rather than allow the victims of their intentional recklessness the ability to take action to entice management away from such dire actions, the courts and mediation boards simply restrain the employee response and allow management to operate undaunted.

We saw this in the arbitration where American Airlines pilots petitioned to exercise a clause in their contract, allowing them the ability to force AMR Corp. to downsize its pilot-outsourcing operation, American Eagle Airlines, if the amount of “active” American Airlines pilots fell below 7300. The arbitrator argued that allowing APA (the pilot union representing American Airlines pilots) the ability to force the drawdown of American Eagle, it would do irreparable harm to American Airlines, its passengers, and ultimately the pilots of American Airlines.

The end result? The arbitration board counted furloughed pilots, including deceased pilots or pilots flying for other airlines, such as Jet Blue, as “active pilots.” This kept the number of “active” American Airlines pilots above 7300.

This is outcome-based law, which is another way of saying “the absence of law.” As long as management can super-size their malfeasance, the courts will be there to force employees to clean up the mess.

We have now come full-circle and have returned to the condition we had in the 19^th Century rail industries, but under the guise of bankruptcy and public interest. Management has effectively found a way to get all they want from the RLA, while denying employees any means of getting what they want. Unilateral imposition now has to go through the black-robed marionettes, rather than directly from the executive suite.

Doubtful? Go look at the devastation in airline pilot contracts over the past decade, since the reliable enjoining of unions from engaging in low-grade work actions (slow-downs, sick-outs, work-to-rule, etc.).

Now, go look at the compensation of airline executives over the same timeframe. If airlines have been in financial peril, you wouldn’t know it by looking at the compensation packages of airline executives.

The problem is the law, and so is the solution.

This will not come easy. The Railway Labor Act is protected by many powerful interests in Washington. The rail employees want to keep the law the way it is, since they are under section 1167 of the bankruptcy code, making their contracts untouchable. The large labor organizations don’t want to revisit changes the labor law, since the only group harmed is airline employees. ALPA is too busy spending mainline pilot dues money trying to organize flying for the very airlines being used to outsource mainline pilot flying (ALPA is quickly becoming the “regional airline“ union). Congress doesn’t want to rock the boat in an election year or in a non-election year, since comfort and status-quo are the two highest imperatives for Congressional reelection. Financiers certainly like the RLA/1113 combo, because it represents free money from employee pensions and earnings.

As long as pilots are there to “take one for the team,” the law works just fine for everyone else.

Who is going to get things changed? When the typical pilot gets done looking at his running shoes, sulking, and impotently complaining about how the law is stacked against him, he can look in his bathroom mirror. Looking back, will be the person that must change things.

When several thousand airline pilots decide they have had enough, they will get things changed, but not a moment before.

As long as pilots are content to let their impotent unions do the work for them, nothing will change. The unions value their relationships in Washington too much to jeopardize them for the purposes of improving the careers of those that pay their exorbitant salaries and expense accounts.

Either way, the status-quo will change. Pilots will not endure this forever. As we said in October of 2010:

The reservoir of pilot sufferance is not infinite nor is this safe harbor of pilot patience an area where management should think it can operate indefinitely.

The RLA was created to deal with the natural consequences of injustice, borne of opportune caprice. It worked as long as both sides approached the situation with restraint and some sense of honor. That framework no longer exists, as unions have been stripped of their relevance by the courts, Congress, and their own political ambitions. The labor situation is such that a catastrophic failure is imminent, which will logically result in widespread disorder in a vital national resource.

Pilot unions are only interested in continuing to play out a hand they know they will lose. The salaries and expense accounts of their leadership will have the least risk if they continue to provide hospice care for a dying profession, rather than leverage their contacts to change things for the better. This is NOT leadership, but cowardice masquerading as relevance.

As long as pilots are content to behave according to a set of rules that ensures their defeat, everyone will smile and reassure them in their efforts. Once pilots decide to unite, take matters into their own hands, and take the fight to the doorsteps of those that benefit from pilot indifference, the law will change.

It is time to make those luxuriating in the comfort of pilot concessions, and pilot docility to feel the discomfort of having the status quo change.

We are citizens.

We have the power levers in our hands.

We can unite.

We shall prevail.

Welcome to Phase III of OPERATION ORANGE.

THIS IS OUR TIME.

For more information, please visit www.OPERATIONORANGE.org

BASIC STRATEGY:  THE WAY WE SEE IT

(To read this post in its entirety (PDF), CLICK HERE)

There are essentially four types of pilots as it relates to implementing a nation-wide “sit down” protest of the current regulatory paradigm.

TYPE 1- Pilots who want to do an SOS right nowand are not squeamish in the slightest bit about doing it. These pilots are the most important part of this effort, because they are the sharp tip of the spear. They are the ones with the energy needed to get the word out to their peers and they are the ones who see the vision for the future of our profession. They know that nothing comes without standing up for yourself. They know that managing is the process of “what is,” and that leadership is the substance of “what can be.” They are the leaders.

The challenge is to convince them that there are a few bricks that have to be set prior to the SOS and that their enthusiasm needs to be channeled into setting those bricks.

TYPE 2- Pilots who want to do an SOS, but are somewhat risk averse and wish to see how the initial skirmish plays out prior to committing to the effort. They need a little nudging to get into the fight, but when they engage, they will bring the heaviest punch.

The challenge is to show them that with unity, they can achieve their purposes and to convince them that with that unity, “what can be” is much better than “what is “. In order to accomplish this the TYPE 1 pilots must convince them to do something they have never done in their lives – disobey.

TYPE 3- These are the pilots who like the concept, but would rather spend their time pointing out all the reasons it won’t work. These are the people that see an obstacle and decide what can’t be, rather than viewing the obstacle as an opportunity to take us where we never thought possible. They have an excuse for every failure, and they see it everywhere they look.

These pilots will be the ones talking about how they can do everything better. They will jump into the fight as soon as it is won and crow the loudest about how they always knew this would work.

The challenge is to ignore their words and lead their actions.

TYPE 4- Pilots who have no interest in changing anything. They are content to take what management gives them and are just “happy to have a job.”

HOW WILL THE “SIT DOWN” PROTEST WORK?

If Phase IV (the actual SOS) is needed to bring leverage, it will have to come after we have a critical mass of pilots willing to implement it. This is something we need to get right the first time. We will announce the SOS date approximately 6 to 8 weeks prior to the actual event, which will give everyone plenty of time to position for it. The basic strategy will be for those pilots who are most enthusiastic about changing the regulatory paradigm in our industry (TYPE 1 pilots) to bid/trade to ensure they will be scheduled to be on duty when the SOS date arrives. This is one way we can ensure the initial wave is effective.

The mathematics of this “sit down” protest favor us. We need to aggressively recruit pilots in the next few weeks and months to help the more risk averse pilots join our ranks through the concept of “safety in numbers.” There are other benefits to the aggressive recruitment in the early stages which we can not discuss at this time. We ask you to trust us on this.

As “safety in numbers” builds, it will be easier to recruit. This is what we mean by “critical mass.” It will be increasingly easy (for a time) to build our numbers, while at the same time it will become exponentially more difficult for management to keep the planes in the air during the SOS. They have put themselves at a tremendous tactical disadvantage by staffing the airlines for perfection and treating every pilot on the property like dirt for their entire career.

In a hypothetical scenario, we only have only 1/6^th of the pilots scheduled to work prepared to implement the SOS. Our scenario has three first officers for every captain, since first officers are less risk averse and have more to gain than captains, many of whom are just trying to run out the clock and don’t want the boat rocked.

For every 100 flights scheduled to depart the Eastern Time Zone on the first morning of the SOS, the airlines will have staffed approximately 205 pilots. Let’s say that 27 first officers and 9 captains (TYPE 1) call in sick (“ORANGE-OUT”) for whatever reason. Roughly 33 of the flights will have to be restaffed. The crew desks will immediately call every reserve pilot available and they will be lucky to get half to the airport by mid-morning. They will likely be fresh out of reserves by noon Eastern.

67 flights departed the East Coast on schedule and most will end up at the mid-continental hubs within two to three hours, where the process will repeat.

We anticipate SOS participation at the hubs to be less than the participation rate on the coasts, but the damage is already done. For every 100 hub flights scheduled for mid-morning, they need the same 205 pilots. 21 first officers and 7 captains “ORANGE-OUT.” That’s another 25 flights that need to be restaffed, but the airline already burned through all their reserves with the early morning wave that left the hubs as the East Coast originations were in the air. Add in another 66 pilots that didn’t make their hub connections because they either called-out or were stranded with the East Coast wave, and now fully half of the mid-morning hub complexes are grounded…all through the Central Time Zone.

The crew desk is out of reserves. Half the planes are grounded. We have misconnected passengers, planes, cabin crews, and pilots all over the system. It is unbridled pandemonium in Minneapolis, Chicago, Dallas, and Houston, to say nothing of what is happening in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Washington, Charlotte, Atlanta, Orlando, and Miami.

Guess what is the top news story on all the airport CNN televisions? Guess what the pilots on the West Coast hear as they are waking up? Guess what happens when the TYPE 2 pilots get a shot of courage? Guess what happens when the TYPE 3 and TYPE 4 commuters get stranded?

All this, and the West Coast and the afternoon wave of East Coast pilots are not even scheduled to be at work. Denver, Salt Lake, and Phoenix just sent their initial wave. They hear that the air transportation system has been crippled and suddenly SOS participation goes parabolic as the remainder of TYPE 2 pilots and most TYPE 3 pilots jump in.

It’s over.

The various airlines order a system-wide stop to limit the damage. Apparently the pilots weren’t bluffing. Apparently 30 years of abuse has consequences. The question becomes, “How do we get 50,000 pissed-off, jacked-up pilots back in the airplanes, now that they have the system grounded?”

Every news outlet in the world runs this at the top story and the Capitol Hill switchboard melts down.

The pilots who self-identify with being TYPE 1 pilots will be asked to bid/trade to be in the most critical positions as the SOS is implemented. Since most of us work 15 days a month, we can concentrate our firepower in the most critical part of the system because that same 1/6^th of the pilots can be made to look much larger if they all attempt to schedule themselves to work on the SOS date. Let our weaker sisters work the non-critical dates.

That’s what 1/6^th of us can do. Imagine if we had half. If we have half, Phase IV won’t be necessary. The more we have the quicker it shuts down.

We will release additional and more detailed tactics when we announce the SOS date. We ask you to trust us in the interim. We know pilots are control freaks and want to know everything. You will be told 6 to 8 weeks prior and will have plenty of time to prepare. Please be patient and spend your efforts recruiting pilots into the operation.

Some chatter has come about using ORANGE stickers and adornments and how that may be trivial. It most certainly is not. We don’t have a registry of pilots who will participate, nor would we want to. We need to have a “sea of orange” in the airplanes to show solidarity with each other. The more important feature is broadcasting our intentions to government and management. This is their nightmare scenario.

We have developed some designs for pilots to print out and pass around. We can’t do everything ourselves, as it would be counter-productive for us to set up a post office box for people to request stickers. Postal boxes require identification, and you can see the problem that creates.

There are printable designs for all levels of commitment. You can print out a few cards on your home printer, should you wish. You can also go to a printer and have them print stuff for you.

Think about what 50 pilots can do if they each took the file “SOS STICKER” (located in the “Graphics Download” .zip file in the “Pilot” portion of the masthead menu on the OPERATIONORANGE websites) to OFFICE MAX and had them print out 500 stickers. The design number is ADL1177, and prints a 4” x 3.875” sticker. It costs $165 plus tax for 500. The turnaround time is one week. We have made it in both .JPEG and .PDF, which are the two formats OFFICE MAX uses for that order.

Your cost is two weeks of per diem money. If you go in with 10 pilots, it costs you less than post flight refreshment. You can sell them for 50 cents or 3 for a dollar, and recoup all your investment, plus a little left over.

If 50 pilots (that’s 1 in every 1000) do this, we would have 25,000 stickers plastered on book bags and rollaboard suitcases. There is your “half” of the pilots in the industry.

Imagine what would happen if the bag room at a pilot domicile had anywhere from one third to one half of the pilot book bags with OPERATION ORANGE stickers exposed to the room and the chief pilot walked through. Orange would get his attention and the SOS Morse code motif certainly would. He would write down the website address, look it up, realize what is happening, and call his boss. The other chiefs would also be doing the same thing. Pretty soon, the execs will all be on conference call about the development.

You can also buy orange dots at OFFICE MAX (Avery 5471) and pass those out. OFFICE MAX will print on those for pennies a page. All you need to do is spend 10 minutes with MS PAINT to create the SOS Morse code dots and dashes, save it as a .JPEG for them to print, and you will have hundreds of tiny “SOS” stickers for your airport ID bundle. Total cost? Less than three cents each.

If you want more plausible deniability, that’s when you need to become a Miami Dolphins, Philadelphia Flyers, Syracuse, or Univ of Tennessee fan and plaster those stickers all over your bag. Orange duct tape is available at any home improvement box store and is the easiest and most deniable way to show solidarity with your fellow TYPE 1 pilots.

We can use this to help create that “critical mass” of pilots that we desperately need.

Would you wear an orange sticker on your ID bundle, and two on your book bag for the pay and scheduling provisions of Section 4 of the proposed legislation? A new contract every 3 years per Section 1? Labor protective provisions of Section 5? Better fatigue mitigation of Section 2? No harassment provisions of Section 6?

The return on investment is off the charts. You will make back whatever you put into this on the first day Section 4 takes effect.

OPERATION ORANGE will gain the attention of management/government and it will float to the top of their inbox. It is reasonable to assume they will try something to dampen our enthusiasm. They will either attempt to threaten, scare, or buy us off cheap. All we ask is that you realize this is an expected response and to use the opportunity to gauge how nervous they are. Please hold the line and keep building solidarity with your fellow pilots across the industry. If we all hold together, we can all make “what can be” our reality.

THIS IS OUR TIME.

The “One Level Of Safety” Charade: It Isn’t Just Pilots

 With all the clamor over the issue of pilot fatigue, resulting from the Colgan 3407 crash, the FAA and industry were able to divert attention away from the consequences of hiring the cheapest pilots they could find. PBS FRONTLINE produced a wholly accurate depiction of the consequences and conditions of the emerging “lift-contracting” model being pushed by the major airlines. In “Flying Cheap,” PBS FRONTLINE and Miles O’Brien uncover the dark truth: there is not a uniform level of safety in the piloting profession, despite the industry and FAA telling us there is.

The facts don’t lie – that’s what executives are for.

“One level of safety” exists only in the rhetoric, and everyone in the FAA, airline management, and skilled airline employee ranks knows it.

The statistical anomaly in the US airline safety record of the past 15 years, along with declining ticket prices (subsidized by forced pilot concessions), has mollified the traveling public. This has prevented the FAA, Congress, and airline executives from being forced to answer uncomfortable questions about the structure of the United States air transportation system. Colgan Air 3407 and US Airways 1549, less than a month apart, provided a glorious opportunity to finally address the underlying rot within the system, but those sounding the alarm over the future of the piloting profession were applauded, and then promptly dismissed.

Airline executives fought the increased minimum qualifications for part 121 new-entrant first officers, arguing that watching PowerPoint presentations in a classroom is far more valuable than “towing banners above the beach.” Airline executives callously assured the surviving family members of Continental Connection 3407 that “they had fixed the problem” regarding piloting aptitude – when they had not. It was just an empty bromide to quiet the inquiry into their own malfeasance.

The new fatigue mitigation regulations (part 117) did nothing more than codify the wish list of airline management, regarding pilot pushing, and developed a sinister method of chipping away at what safety protections pilots have won over the years of collective bargaining (FRMS). Pilots will now be forced to fly longer days, more hours per week, and longer periods over their “window of circadian low,” by sleeping in crew rooms – the very practice the FAA/NTSB insisted resulted in fatigue for Colgan Air 3407. Pilots will be forced to “certify” they are fatigue-free, but given no protections for declining an assignment.

What did the pilot associations do? Nothing, except write letters, act proper, and “work within the system.” That is exactly what politicians and executives want them to do.

When we insist that airline management does not care about your safety, we are on solid ground. The record of just the past three years is sufficient to sustain that charge.

Executives DO NOT care about your safety. They have lawyers, insurance, and politicians to cover that contingency. They are only interested in extracting concessions to gain control over the operation and looting the substance of the company out of sheer avarice.

This pathology is not limited to the piloting portion of the operation. They have already outsourced safety in the maintenance of the aircraft to the lowest bidders on the globe, in places far away from the watchful eyes of the FAA and third-party investigators.

Once again, PBS FRONTLINE covered this in its feature entitled, “Flying Cheaper.” It shows how United Airlines maintains its aircraft in Communist China, which keeps “inspections“ scripted and sterile. Even contract maintenance within the United States is shown to be engaged in shoddy maintenance practices, falsifying records, and eschewing accountability.

One would think the FAA would crack-down on such practices, but the FAA responds in the same fashion they do when they KNOW airlines are falsifying records, and using unrealistic scheduling practices to skirt FAA regulations – silence. The imperative is not to upset the outsourcing / “lift-contract” model being pushed by the industry. No Congressman wants to answer to voters that may have to pay an additional $40 for a family of four to see teenagers dressed as Disney characters…as they countenance the sweeping of 50 bodies under the rug. If a grown man injects steroids to assist in swatting baseballs over a fence, the wrath of Congress awaits, but willfully endangering the flying public, looting the industry, and stealing from lifelong employees…nothing but crickets.

KIRO news, in Seattle, investigated this facet of aviation and uncovered the same thing PBS FRONTLINE uncovered in its investigation. The response by Congress and the FAA will be the same, as airline executives insist this practice is necessary to remain competitive.

Gone are the days of heavy maintenance being done by FAA licensed mechanics within the United States. American Airlines is the last holdout of US-based maintenance, and with the bankruptcy filing of its corporate shell, it is absolutely certain they will be sending their fleet of airplanes to far-flung jungles, to be maintained by $2/hr labor.

$2 per hour…that’s 1/4 the rate to assemble hamburgers at Jack-in-the-Box. The barista that prepares a $6 “tall-skinny-extra hot-peppermint-mocha-latte-decaf-hold the whip” at the airport Starbucks makes 5 times what the crew maintaining the machine that will fly at 83% of the speed of sound across the ocean makes, so passengers can save $5 .

You know its bad when Robert Crandall, former American Airlines CEO, holds the position that all heavy maintenance should be repatriated in the interest of safety, accountability, and the US employment base.

As KIRO news reported, the commonality between all the offshore maintenance facilities is “cheap, cheap labor.” This maintenance is also done in an environment where the military, government, port authority, and the company work together to keep journalists out and employee opinions confined. Guns and badges enforce the secrecy of El Salvador’s AEROMAN maintenance company. Communist China also keeps prying eyes away and garners 40% of United Airlines‘ maintenance.

Ahhh…the sweet smell of the “free market” at work.

Loose-lipped employees are threatened with termination, in a Third-world nation where $2/hour is a good job. Why are they threatened with termination? Because the American people may not appreciate paying money for passage on airlines where street urchins perform aircraft maintenance, correct or not, and send the airplane back to service, even if the work isn’t completed. After all, there is always another non-English speaking 18 or 19 year old willing to jump at the chance for $20 per day, and plenty of US airline executives making mid-8 figures willing to pay them to keep their mouths shut.

Compliance over experience and judgment…where have we heard that before? Yes, it is also the model of next-generation pilot recruitment and retention.

The paperwork says everything is safe, and the FAA proclaims “one level of safety.” The American public swallows it and is grateful for saving a few dollars. Ignorance is truly bliss.

Both shared safety concerns that they believe could affect the airworthiness of some passenger jets, starting with what they called “rush-rush” mandates which don’t always allow time for proper repairs. They say Aeroman goes strictly by the book to ensure turnaround time. If the repair manual says grinding down, then filling in a scratch should take two hours, that’s the maximum time limit, whether it’s done properly or not.

They tell KIRO Team 7 Investigators, they personally witnessed dangerous fixes go out the door.

Interpreter for Aeroman Employee #1: “A unit can arrive with a dent, a computer for example. Somebody with no experience can just push it through, not knowing that it’s actually faulty equipment. Those are the errors he sees.”

Interpreter for Aeroman Employee #2: “He says yeah. It concerns him to the point. He said he knows that some of these new guys come in and sometimes for the fear of losing their jobs, (shortcuts) could go unreported.

There is documentation to back those concerns up. KIRO Team 7 Investigators uncovered some recent reports of sloppy repair work connected with Aeroman in El Salvador. In 2009, a US Airways jet had to make an emergency landing in Denver after Aeroman employees installed some door components and seals backwards. And we confirmed at least two more recent serious errors, both dealing with mixed up wiring.

You can read the entire KIRO report HERE.

Why is this important to an effort to change the regulatory paradigm for pilot labor? Isn’t this essential to freeing up money to pay pilots? The airline executives insist they are just trying to scrape up the money to attract good pilots.

Interlaced within the endless droning-on about how “safety is their number one priority,” airline executives are implementing their next-generation model for airline operations – outsource everything. Fire career, US-based FAA licensed mechanics and hire 18 year old, non-English speaking “helpers” in far-flung jungles and Communist dictatorships. Issue pink slips to thousands of former US Navy fighter pilots, US Air Force tanker/transport pilots, and highly experienced corporate pilots so as to start up mal-regulated, shoddy, and dangerous “regional airlines” staffed by problematic, poorly trained, under experienced, and overworked 24 year old pilots living in employee parking lots.

“One level of safety,” says the FAA.

“Safety is our number one priority,” say the airline executives.

“What’s the cheapest fare to Orlando?” asks the American people.

Why is the issue of outsourced heavy maintenance important to OPERATION ORANGE? Because it shows where the priorities truly are. It conclusively shows how it won’t take much for the airline executives to look at the impending dearth of new US commercial pilot applications (a problem of their own creation) and lobby Congress to allow foreign pilots and foreign carriers authority to operate point-to-point within the US.

Someone has to stand up to them. Mainline pilots are the last line of defense in management’s quest to kill thousands in the name of cost containment.

It is time for the various pilot associations to realize this is a coordinated attack by airline executives with the cooperation of the FAA, Congress, and foreign aviation corporations. No pilot group is immune, regardless of how things look today. Being “the last to fall” does not serve the membership of any pilot association, and they had better act in unison to repel this wholesale destruction of a vital national resource. Any pilot association with the goal of being “the last to fall“ should ask the American Airlines mechanics if it is worth it. In the end, you still fall.

Please write your elected representatives.

For more information, please visit www.operationorange.org

The life you save may be your own. The career you save may be your own. The dignity you retain may be your own.