Release #: Vol. 84, No. 10
December 01, 2015

Our Union: The Rest of the Team

By Capt. Tim Canoll, ALPA President

“The main ingredient of stardom is the rest of the team,” said U.S. basketball player and coach John Wooden. This grounding principle guides coaching in basketball, but it’s also the benchmark of ALPA’s work. From negotiating contracts to advancing safety, our union’s lasting accomplishments rely on a strategy of seeking advancement with a team effort and attitude.

This issue of Air Line Pilot tells the story of the Sun Country pilots’ five-year marathon to bargain a new contract. Capt. Brian Roseen, the Sun Country pilots’ Master Executive Council (MEC) chairman, recalls the pilots’ focus on both the team and the long term. “As prior MEC negotiators had reminded us, we knew that every pilot would find something in the new contract that he or she did like as well as something that they didn’t like, but the fact that we would all be better off under a new contract is what kept us unified,” he says.

The Sun Country pilot leaders cited the pilots’ solidarity with the MEC and the Negotiating Committee as well as ALPA’s support and resources as the reasons behind their success. The Strategic Preparedness and Strike Committee, led by Capt. Brian Florence (United), joined with ALPA staff experts from the Representation, Economic & Financial Analysis, and Communications Departments to fuel the effort. While three members of the Sun Country Negotiating Committee may have sat at the bargaining table, the rest of the team was present in both spirit and in substance, contributing in every way.

Similarly, when recent FAA tests showed that as few as three lithium batteries on board an aircraft are needed to cause a fire that could overwhelm the available fire suppression, ALPA’s team used the new data to renew our union’s longtime call for action.

While lithium-metal batteries are banned worldwide from being shipped as cargo on passenger airliners, they continue to be permitted to be shipped in unrestricted quantities on all-cargo airliners. ALPA adamantly maintains that these batteries pose the same risk regardless of the type of aircraft that transports them. Capt. Scott Schwartz (FedEx Express), the director of ALPA’s Dangerous Goods Program, is helping to lead our union’s efforts to advance one level of safety in all flight operations. Congress must give the Department of Transportation the authority to fully regulate all lithium batteries, including those carried aboard all-cargo aircraft.

In addition, ALPA’s Government Affairs, Engineering & Air Safety, and Communications teams are reaching out with our members’ concerns about UAS safety to the news media, lawmakers, and safety regulators in the United States and Canada.

As a member of the FAA’s Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) Registration Task Force Aviation Rulemaking Committee (ARC), ALPA supported its goal to ensure registration of UAS adds accountability and increases safety for operators. While not included in the ARC’s recommendations, ALPA feels strongly that mandatory registration of UAS at the point of sale is essential. Registration during the sales process would enable the FAA to more easily enforce the registration rule and would help make clear to purchasers the responsibility in owning a UAS. In the report, the FAA stated that it will continue to regulate as necessary to ensure safety, even beyond the ARC recommendations. ALPA is part of the team pressing for safely capitalizing on the economic opportunities that UAS offer.

In October 2014, the Board of Directors adopted ALPA’s strategic plan to provide a focus for every action we take as well as a measure for success. In the case of all strategic plan priorities—including safely integrating UAS, collective bargaining, and safeguarding the shipment of lithium batteries by air––it will take a team effort to do the job. Our success in every element of the plan hinges on our ability to work in unity to advance nimble strategies and to watch carefully for changes in the economic and political environment. 

This article is from the December issue of Air Line Pilot magazine, the Official Journal of the Air Line Pilots Association, International—a monthly publication for all ALPA members.

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