The airlines, like any industry, has its own terms and lingo. In case I haven't explained it before, let me give a quick refresher course....
- Flight Attendant: (note: we are no longer referred to as a stewardess or steward) =) an individual qualified to perform safety duties and deliver customer service in the aircraft cabin....gets to wear polyester to enhance his/her appearance (another note: our primary purpose is to be there for the passengers' safety....and then it's all about "Coffee, tea, or me?")
- deadhead: transportation of a crewmember (flight attendants or pilots) from one point to another to cover a trip/return to base
- reserve: schedule is built by the company with days a flight attendant will be on reserve (on call) and available for duty, and days off (this is me!)....I'm on call from 5am to 5pm. Depending on the airline and how senior your base is, you could be on reserve anywhere from a few months to more than 10 years. It's like being a substitute flight attendant. The answer to the question on everyone's mind....YES, we are paid a guaranteed number of hours each month, regardless of how much we fly.
- line holder: schedule is built by the company comprised of trips for the given month, as days off (this is what we all want to be) =)....it will happen eventually!
- turn: a round trip, i.e. LAX-DFW-LAX
One more note on how the pay works. We are paid for flight time only - door close to door open (this is called
block-to-block). For example, we could be on duty for 11 hours in a day, but only have 7 hours of flight time....those 7 hours is what we're paid. We do get per diem as well, a certain amount for every hour we're away from our base (or
domicile), and that helps with the lattes and lunches. =) So being on reserve can work ok, even if you're not called to fly, but having a line is much better, because you can work more hours, and get way more per diem....it definitely adds up!
Being based out of LAX, I have only flown locals so far. (A
local is a trip that starts and ends at your domicile in the same day....no overnights in other cities.) Last Thursday I flew a local with a Denver crew on our CRJ 700. LA-Salt Lake City-Denver-deadhead back to LA. Easy peasy lemon squeezy, as one of my students used to say! I got to the airport early, so decided to grab some tea from Starbucks....as I'm walking down there, a man stops to ask me how to get to Continental....as I'm talking to him, an attractive young gentleman wearing that amazing polyester walks by me and throws his hand in the air in a sexy wave....it is none other than
Jason Parks. He was doing a Dallas (DFW) turn (were you paying attention when I told you what a turn was??). I invited him to join me at Starbucks, which he did, and then we both went on our way into the friendly skies.
I decided to take the train to the airport, because they had scheduled my trip ahead of time, and I could plan on when I was going to leave and give myself plenty of time to get there, saving myself some gas money! In the afternoon when I got back to LAX, I went outside to catch the shuttle to the train. It was pretty full....when I got off the shuttle, Jason got off as well! Well, that made my day, seeing him twice! And it was extra nice to have someone to hang out with on the train, instead of having a guy who doesn't speak English sit next to me, tell me I'm beautiful, and ask if we can exchange numbers!
I came home and let my dad know I would be off the next two days....sometimes he gets confused about when I'm on reserve and when I'm off....I'll tell you why in my next post....stay tuned for "Life on Reserve, Part 2"!
messages, eTrip (see if they scheduled you anything without calling you about it yet), MySpace, Facebook, etc. Check your phone. Take a shower. Get dressed. Get something to eat. Check your phone. Go to sleep. The next day you may change it up by eating before you take a shower and get dressed. Or you might not even bother getting dressed....
Which one of us is working?
