Nancy

So what is happening with United Airlines again?

Everything is chaos at O'Hare. Can anyone blame pilots for not working overtime?

Where's Hoffa

Pilots USUALLY work 'overtime'.
The issue is that their contract has expired and they are trying to leverage the airline toward a favorable new contract by displaying their power.
Whether you or I could consider it 'unfair' that they work overtime would require that we had knowledge of their compensation for doing so.
I'm sure most pilots would LOVE to work overtime for 3X the pay. That's not what they get though.
So it's really a waste of time trying to guess who is "in the right", the pilots or the airline. We'll never know the real financial details.

Nancy

I guess I wasn't clear in my rant *s*.

I don't care about United's labor problems. Why are they cancelling flights and their schedule is really no schedule. The flying public is paying the price here.

My husband has been in 'United hell' all day and is still not at his 'final destination'....sounds so ominous!

feq.flyr

No pilots = no flights
No flights = no schedules
No schedules = SOL

The troubles seem directly related to labor problems, even though you don't care about that.

FFlyer

The whole point is, of course, to make the flying public angry, so that they stop flying United, putting financial pressure on the corporation to accede to the pilots demands.
That being the case, you had better care about United's labor problems if you or those you care about are going to be using their services anytime soon.

Nancy

I'm sorry, but I would not feel comfortable flying on an aircraft with a pilot who is flying overtime. Regular people get tired driving long distances or doing anything requiring long periods of concentration. I find it hard to believe that an airline the size of United employs so few pilots that hundreds of flights are being cancelled. Our problem is that we fly out of a smaller market (Grand Rapids, MI) into O'Hare and then on to wherever we are going. United is the only airline out of Grand Rapids that flies something other than commuter planes. We fly two weeks a month on business. Up until a couple of weeks ago, this wasn't a problem. Our last trip to DC was something of a nightmare. But because of the service to Grand Rapids and trying to consolidate those damned frequent flier miles, we've made United our choice. Talk about between a rock and a hard place. Good thing we're not prone to air rage!!! *s*

FriendlySkies

I hate to alarm you Nancy, but if you've flown more than 10 times in your life I'm sure you've been piloted by crewpeople working overtime. Overtime for pilots is not defined the same way most employees define it. It's not that they've been up all night flying the eve before, it's that they've reached a limit in # of hours per week set by the airline. But they may be coming in entirely fresh and be on overtime for the week.

Jeff

It's not a weekly limit that defines flight regulations.
FAA regs are that domestic pilots can fly up to 8 hours in a 24 hour period, 100 hours a month and 1000 hours a year. A pilot can be on duty 14 hours in a 24 hour period.

Hobbyist

THe overtime dilemma is related to the fact that pilots are ususally scheduled to fly only 75-85 hours per month by major carriers. Cross country pilots only fly 10-12 days a month in many cases. So on off days they may pick up extra $$ by flying more. This is overtime, but as stated above, the pilot may be completely fresh.
I'm sure Nancy has been flown by pilots on overtime.