goingnowherefast wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2020 7:09 pm
The majors can't freeze hiring when they're this far behind and retirements putting them even further behind.
Says who? What happened when 9/11 hit - retirements slowed significantly while people hung on. Forecasts have airlines, globally, taking a $30 Billion dollar hit due to COVID-19. Doesn't necessarily mean big red or team teal will shut down, but any means, but it will have an impact on the industry.
As mentioned in another thread, there's no way in hell the global industry is going to wake up one day and say "well, we're going to shut things down for 14 days or so, and see what happens". Air travel certainly helps any contagious disease have more freedom to spread, but being how connected people are regardless of air travel just means it'll get there eventually. Look at Europe, you can travel through numerous countries in a day or two via rail or road - shutting down the airports just slows the large leap and bound spreads that will instead occur more slowly...
goingnowherefast wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2020 7:09 pm
The majors can't freeze hiring when they're this far behind and retirements putting them even further behind.
Says who? What happened when 9/11 hit - retirements slowed significantly while people hung on. Forecasts have airlines, globally, taking a $30 Billion dollar hit due to COVID-19. Doesn't necessarily mean big red or team teal will shut down, but any means, but it will have an impact on the industry.
As mentioned in another thread, there's no way in hell the global industry is going to wake up one day and say "well, we're going to shut things down for 14 days or so, and see what happens". Air travel certainly helps any contagious disease have more freedom to spread, but being how connected people are regardless of air travel just means it'll get there eventually. Look at Europe, you can travel through numerous countries in a day or two via rail or road - shutting down the airports just slows the large leap and bound spreads that will instead occur more slowly...
Retirements based on 65, show a minimum of 100 per year for the next decade with many years well above that.
I’m not personally worried about the Coronavirus. The flu is far deadlier.. Each year, the CDC/ WHO/ health authorities warn of how bad the flu season is forecast to be. People don’t stop traveling...
I think it will be interesting to see how current dynamics in the industry play out.
With this being said, we have a cyclical industry and I think each slowdown since 9/11 has had a major commonality : experience levels required increase and wage and working conditions decrease and never truly rebound. These slowdowns have manufactured the consent for further denigration of working standards by employers.
Similarly, the media and elites love injecting sensationalism and good doses of fear and hysteria is into society. I see this playing out currently and that is my worry. - look at what can be historically justified with sensationalism, fear and hysteria !
To me, at minimum, this virus has the potential to further degrade conditions in our industry. ( In my opinion) I’m basing that off of the current climate of fear in the markets and society as a whole. I think it’s going to get rough.
goingnowherefast wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2020 7:09 pm
SARS happened shortly after 9/11. There weren't any pilot jobs already. As was said before, AC has 900 vacancies, WJ has a lot as well. Jazz and Encore are feeding both despite their own shortages. Then there's all the smaller carriers. There's probably 2000+ pilot job openings available today in Canada. That's probably 3000 more job openings than there were available when SARS hit.
The majors can't freeze hiring when they're this far behind and retirements putting them even further behind.
When I was doing my PPL, back in the early 90s, a couple of my instructors were on layoff from Air Canada; also, IIRC, Air Canada was laying off people in YWG with 10 years of seniority...never underestimate the power of the dark side.
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North Shore wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2020 7:55 pm
When I was doing my PPL, back in the early 90s, a couple of my instructors were on layoff from Air Canada; also, IIRC, Air Canada was laying off people in YWG with 10 years of seniority...never underestimate the power of the dark side.
Maybe guys with 10 years were taking LOAs? Someone can maybe name the exact number, but the largest layoff in AC history was barely a couple hundred or so... I don't think that would get to 10 year guys.
I don't think there will be layoffs in all this. They are short. They are getting shorter. Maybe a slow down of hiring.
If people stop flying that's one thing. But stock prices are speculative and reactive right now, they don't drive the operations.
There’s a lot of conflicting information out there, but what I’ve read is that it is far more contagious than the flu, and some people are saying it’s more fatal. I’ve also read that air travel is already in quite a downward trend. I mean, that’s pretty obvious anyways when all the airlines are suspending their flights to China.
It’s just a matter of how intensely it spreads and if it peters out or not. Maybe Trump is right and the warmer weather will slow it significantly (f*ck that guy regardless).
rudder wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2020 9:18 am
It seems like everybody forgot what SARS looked like and how it affected the industry.
This has the potential to be larger.
I don’t think half the pilots on the forum are old enough to remember SARS. My FO asked me where I was on 9/11 and I asked him and he said he was in junior kindergarten.
This isn’t about the stock market or even government edicts. That is the Trump measure of impact.
This is about how the public responds and if they choose to modify their behaviour by delaying or avoiding air travel.
The question on the next analyst call is - what do forward bookings look like?
It is partially controlled by the governments. If a government decides to quarantain a couple of hotels, the public might be more reluctant to visit those countries. I know I would. Not because I am afraid of the virus, but because I don't want to be inconvenienced by the government's reactions to said virus.
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As an AvCanada discussion grows longer:
-the probability of 'entitlement' being mentioned, approaches 1
-one will be accused of using bad airmanship
It's mortality rate is extremely low compared to SARS or H1N1. Mind you there are a lot of people being infected, but many are fine after a few weeks. It's just like a really bad flu. People with compromised immune systems are the ones hit the hardest but how is that any different than the normal flu?
So far for the 2019/2020 flu season over 16,000 people have died in the USA and over 250,000 infected. But no one really talks about that.
altiplano wrote: ↑Thu Feb 27, 2020 9:52 am
The '03 SARs outbreak was contained by June, I expect we'll see similar timelines here.
The coronavirus is completely different virus. It's structure is different. The replication is different. Incubation period is not fully established. WHO can't tell their head from their a$$ and half of them are undecided if its going to be a pandemic?!
This isn’t about the stock market or even government edicts. That is the Trump measure of impact.
This is about how the public responds and if they choose to modify their behaviour by delaying or avoiding air travel.
The question on the next analyst call is - what do forward bookings look like?
I am sure there is an element of truth in your statement(bookings). However things will settle out in due course(always did) aka SARS, West Nile and the like and travel will rebound( that is, if there will be a mass exodus from travelling to begin with). Sure, there will be temporary adjustments in the very short term but will mellow out sooner than later I am willing to surmise.
altiplano wrote: ↑Thu Feb 27, 2020 9:52 am
The '03 SARs outbreak was contained by June, I expect we'll see similar timelines here.
The coronavirus is completely different virus. It's structure is different. The replication is different. Incubation period is not fully established. WHO can't tell their head from their a$$ and half of them are undecided if its going to be a pandemic?!
Betting 2022.
SARs was a Corina type virus also. But we'll see... I'm not an epidemiological expert.
ogc wrote: ↑Sat Feb 29, 2020 2:32 pm
Saw this article on Twitter provides some context of how bad one of these could get. A quick synopsis of the 1918 "spanish" flu
except the Spanish flu was literally H1n1 or Swine flu before we started calling it that. In India in 2017 (maybe 2015) almost 40,000 died of H1n1. It's a recurring seasonal flu. This is much less potent.
North Shore wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2020 7:55 pm
When I was doing my PPL, back in the early 90s, a couple of my instructors were on layoff from Air Canada; also, IIRC, Air Canada was laying off people in YWG with 10 years of seniority...never underestimate the power of the dark side.
Maybe guys with 10 years were taking LOAs? Someone can maybe name the exact number, but the largest layoff in AC history was barely a couple hundred or so... I don't think that would get to 10 year guys.
I don't think there will be layoffs in all this. They are short. They are getting shorter. Maybe a slow down of hiring.
If people stop flying that's one thing. But stock prices are speculative and reactive right now, they don't drive the operations.
Air Canada laid off 243 pilots 1990 into 1993. The last pilot to NOT be laid off at the time had a date of hire in 1989.
I'm guessing that 243 would be close to 10 to 15% of the seniority list at the time??
The early 90's layoff had nothing to do with a potential global pandemic or some other crisis like 911 and was related to economic issues and structural changes like the removal of 3 seat airplanes (last 727 was retired in 1992) from the fleet and the transfer of short haul flying to the regional carriers.
If there are any lay offs due to COVID-19, I suspect they will be relatively short.
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Last edited by rxl on Sun Mar 01, 2020 9:38 am, edited 1 time in total.
