1 July 2002
To All Of Our Pilots,

Washington Virtual Airports (WVA) has clearly been a disappointment. Operations began well, but have decreased every month since its opening. Because of the lack of success of WVA, we have considered replacing it with a new virtual airline. I would like to tell you about the strong proposals that have been brought forward in the message boards, and my feelings about them.

Air Tahiti/Air Tahiti Nui: There was once an Air Tahiti Nui-based virtual airline. This virtual airline would include its international operations with those of its inter-island counterpart in one of the most beautiful regions in the world. One of the drawbacks of this proposal is the relative lack of worldwide destinations.

KLM: The only other KLM-based virtual airline is operated by NorthWest Virtual Airlines. Should KLM reach a full codeshare agreement with Continental, which seems likely, KLM would be a strong addition to have, and would most likely involve a restructuring of Continental-Northwest Virtual Airlines (CNVA). However, I feel that if we added KLM to our operations, we could risk CNVA's credibility by appearing to copy NWVA's operations, which would then include nearly all of the same operations as ours. In addition, our relative lack of Belgian and Swiss pilots is concerning, raising doubts about our popularity in Europe.

Northwest Cargo: We have never had cargo operations before, and the idea was brought up. FedEx and UPS are the logical choices for a cargo virtual airline, but the only way to obtain flight schedules is within the company. However, Northwest Cargo, part of Northwest's operations, has available flight schedules. Northwest Cargo flies from the United States to Asia. This could easily be added to Continental-Northwest without creating a separate virtual airline.

SkyTeam: SkyTeam is the world's third-largest airline alliance, consisting of Aeromexico, Air France, Alitalia, CSA Czech, Delta, and Korean Air. Our operations would consist of some or all of those airlines. While this is a strong idea, some of these airlines are relatively weak in their popularity, such as Aeromexico and CSA Czech. In addition, we have long had problems in developing an Asian member base, so including Korean Air would be a risk. Alitalia currently has a good virtual airline, and there are currently two Air France-based virtual airlines as well. Finally, there are four Delta-based virtual airlines, leading to concerns that the market for Delta virtual airlines is currently oversaturated.

US Airways: Continental-Northwest was created as a replacement for Virtual US Airways, which was one of our original three virtual airlines, along with Virgin and now-closed Midway Virtual Airlines. The real airline shut all US Airways-based virtual airlines down in September 2000. I recently contacted the airline again in an attempt to gain permission, which was unsuccessful. We would only be able to reopen the virtual airline if the real airline ceased operations, which is a possibility.

A different virtual airport: Perhaps Washington was the wrong city to reintroduce the virtual airport concept in. As you probably know, Washington Virtual Airports allows pilots to fly all real flights from Washington's Dulles and National airports, rather than all systemwide flights of one airline. Perhaps it would have been better to reintroduce virtual airports in larger and busier airport areas, such as Chicago (Meigs, Midway, and O'Hare), London (City, Gatwick, Heathrow, Luton, Stansted), or New York (Kennedy, LaGuardia, Newark).

Because of the uncertain future of both KLM and its relations with Continental, and US Airways's future existence, I feel it is necessary to wait some time before coming to a resolution on what course to pursue. I hope you understand my reasoning.

Over the past few months, we have been working to increase our support in our other home countries of Australia, Belgium, Switzerland, and the U.K. Through increased links in cultural websites, we have been able to improve our pilot base in those countries, but not to appropriate levels. I will continue to work towards increasing our popularity in these countries.

Pilots have asked for the Screenshots section to be returned. We operated a Screenshots section for several months last year, but it was not popular, and was ultimately closed with the old message board and mileage/codeshare program. If you would like to see this section return, then please voice your opinions on this issue in the message board. We are currently evaluating easy options for pilots to create and send screenshots to us.

Several pilots have also requested that we make downloads available on our website. I have discussed why such a request is unreasonable at this time in the message boards. My response can be found here.

An important poll this month on our websites was about how long a pilot could not fly for without being removed from the roster. The final results for this poll were roughly split between keeping the time at one month and extending the time to two months. However, I would like for you to consider our current rules on this issue as well: if you can't fly for one month, then you only need to fill out the inactivity form on the Pilot Rosters page to let us know. Not only is this simpler and faster than filing a PIREP, it is a part of the contract that you agreed to when you joined.

Please feel free to contact me with any questions or comments you have about our organization's future. I strongly encourage you to discuss them with our other pilots through our Message Boards.

Aaron Robinson
aaron.robinson@simairline.net
AOL Instant Messenger: SimAirlineNet