Grounded Pt. II (postponed indefinitely :)

This installment of my two part series was supposed to be the grand finale...the big tuna (not Jim Halpert, either). In a strange twist of fate, the story will be postponed until Fall. Let me explain....

We operate[d] 55 aircraft. Many of these are owned outright, some of them are leased. Eleven aircraft have their leases expire this year. Because of the current economic climate (are you sick of hearing that yet?) the company was not able to renegotiate the first four leases to come due, so the aircraft are being returned to the lessor. Simple math dictates that less aircraft equals less pilots, so the company was all set to trim off the bottom twenty pilots - including yours truly - come May 1st. Of course I was extremely disappointed to receive this news at the end of May, but confident that it was a sign that I should be doing something else and prepared to move forward. Imagine my surprise when, upon landing in Philadelphia after a flight from Syracuse, I had a voicemail from my chief pilot informing me that the furloughs had been cancelled and that they were maintaining the current staffing levels through the summer. This industry never ceases to amaze me. It is the most reactionary group of entities that I have ever seen. Oh well, I guess it means I can keep flying, so great right???

Oh yes, I finally received the medical certificate that I waited oh-so-patiently for, bless the FAA's heart. Crew Scheduling immediately put me to work, and I just wrapped up a delay-ridden three day trip in and out of the City of Brotherly Love. The first two days were routine, but the last leg of the last day wrapped up in typical fashion. We were working a flight back to the Big Apple. The flight was scheduled to go out on tiime, but thanks to some baggage mis-handling we pushed back 25 minutes late. The company flight that left for the same destination right before us was holding in the air, so the tower wouldn't release us for takeoff until they were out of the hold. As luck would have it, as soon as that aircraft was out of the hold, our destination called for a ground stop for all aircraft that hadn't left yet. Of course, we didn't have enough fuel to sit out on the taxiway, so we had to go back for fuel. By this time it was an hour after we pushed back. Once at the gate, the passengers apparently thought this meant that they could get off and go inside and find another way to wherever they were going, which caused mass confusion and turned a 10 minute fuel stop into a 45 minute loading nightmare. We pushed back after another hour, took off right away, and were immediately given holding once we reached our cruise altitude. We held for a full 45 minutes, and were 5 minutes away from "bingo fuel" - that is, the amount of fuel remaining before we would have to go get fuel. We were preparing to deal with anarchy in the back when Gotham finally accepted our arrival and I smacked one on the runway to conclude our trip.

As I write this, I'm waiting for my flight home, which is delayed a full two hours due to fallout from yesterday's poor weather that paralyzed the East Coast.

Living the Dream....