This Is Your Wake Up Call

"This is your wake up call!"  How many times have you heard that? Time to get up, time to get moving, time to swing into action.   This is your wake up call! Your wake up call, your safety net, your reminder.....life is calling, again.

Most of you are retired, you are sitting there thinking it's not my wake up call, I had my turn, wake some one else. If only it were that simple. IF I thought there was someone else to call I would but there is no one, no one who will understand like you will.

The pay-cuts, the bankruptcies, the pension terminations, Braniff, Eastern, 9/11, furloughs, mergers, parking airplanes these were wake up calls in our industry. Sadly, many of us missed the call, we slept through the opportunity to change things.

We can not sleep through this, this is not something that effects only the people of the airline industry.....this effects everyone, it is just harder to see if you aren't used to wake up calls. So, I say to you again, "This is your wake up call!"

I heard tonight that 100 airports (in the US) are facing the possibility of losing ALL air service. I read, over the weekend, that American plans to cut more than half of their flights to  San Juan and the Caribbean in the fall. The implication is that the Caribbean will cease to be a family friendly vacation haven and will suffer dramatically. Flights will be too infrequent and too expensive for the average person. But it is not just the Caribbean, this is your wake up call!

The price of oil is a major catalyst to the incarceration we now face, yes, incarceration. Think about this, oil raises the fuel bills at the airlines, wages have already been cut, pensions have been terminated and the only way to cover the cost is to raise the fares ----but a fare hike only works if everyone hikes the fare. Plan B, cut capacity. If there are not enough seats for everyone to go.......passengers will pay more to make sure they get one of those precious seats. Seems simple, sounds innocent but look closer. This is your wake up call!

Slowly, quietly, systematically we, the American people, are being incarcerated. No, we are not being put in jail, we are simply losing the ability to go anywhere or do anything.  Fewer flights and non-revs are going NOWHERE!!! But more importantly, there will be no spontaneity in our society.....no more last minute trips to Vegas, no more weekends in the Bahamas, no more surprises to visit a child, parent or grandparent. Every trip, no matter how small, will require planning, budgeting...it will require time! Parking airplanes, reducing capacity MAY save the industry but it will destroy the way America lives. This is your wake up call!

Inflation at the pump has us changing the way we drive, rising grocery prices have us changing the way we eat, pay cuts, furloughs, lost pensions have us laying awake worrying. The mortgage crisis, the healthcare crisis, lost dreams, declining  hope. This is your wake up call!

We can not expect others to hear the call yet, they have not had the practice, their phones have not rung like ours. Your mission is to wake them up! You have to take the time, you have to explain the ramifications of less airline service to the guy who never flies.....you have to insist that people look at the changes they have made to get by, you have to support Paul Rancatore and Bud Gammon, financially and every other way. Paul and Bud will go to Washington and explain how important the airline industry is. Paul and Bud can make Congress understand the incarceration that has been imposed on us against our will.

We are old, we are tired, we have fought the fight for a long time and yet the phone is ringing again. This is your wake up call! If we fail to answer, it will be too late. There will be no travel, no dining out, no leisurely drives along the coast-- we will be in a prison of our own making and there will be NO way out.

Don't let the lessons we learned be in vain. Sit down at your computer, pick up your phone, spread the word. This is your wake up call! Now wake up those around you. Support Paul and Bud, send a letter to the editor of your newspaper...use your imagination but wake them up!    editor@bigjetcity.com