That doesn’t look correct for several reasons.
1) With COVID going on as long as it has (remember the Federal bailout which the companies mainly used just to buy back stock?), you’d think they’d have rotated pilots in and out to keep as many possible qualified.
2) Airlines know how to forecast and plan. Why would they bother scheduling flights if they knew they didn’t have enough pilots for them? They’d know how many pilots are available.
3) The uptick in cancellations is recent, sudden, and monotonic.
4) Your reason is one of several disjoint explanations all being shoved forward at the same time. Some of the others are weather in Denver and Chicago (mentioned by Southwest but not American); staffing and maintenance issues (American); lack of qualified pilots...
5) I didn’t say the vaccine wiped out herds of pilots. But if a few pilots died after the jab (both being a pilot and receiving the jab increase the risk for DVT / abnormal blood clots), then word probably got out PRONTO among the pilots. Alternatively, maybe the insurance companies underwriting the airlines are demanding all pilots get thoroughly checked before being allowed to fly again, since it wouldn’t be healthy for their wallets if a pilot was to have an embolism and stroke out while flying a plane, as it makes landing more...challenging.
6) Finally, PR dictates that the airlines want to keep any HINT of this out of the public consciousness so that people don’t stampede away from flying in fear of a pilot having a stroke.
“That doesn’t look correct for several reasons.”
I tend to give greater weight to the opinion of airline pilots as to what “looks correct”. Feel free to tell me why you think you are better informed than they are.
1) “you’d think they’d have rotated pilots in and out to keep as many possible qualified.”
Airlines didn’t take your advice. They riffed pilots.
2) “Why would they bother scheduling flights if they knew they didn’t have enough pilots for them? “
They don’t do that. But they do have no margin for error and can’t cover normal events that keep pilots from being able to cover a shift.
3) “The uptick in cancellations is recent, sudden, and monotonic.”
The pilot shortage is recent. The ripple effect of last years riffing.
4) “Your reason is one of several disjoint explanations all being shoved forward at the same time”
It’s not “my reason”. It’s what two first seaters tell me. How many airline captains do you speak to on a routine basis?
5) “But if a few pilots died after the jab (both being a pilot and receiving the jab increase the risk for DVT / abnormal blood clots), then word probably got out PRONTO among the pilots. Alternatively, maybe the insurance companies underwriting the airlines are demanding all pilots get thoroughly checked before being allowed to fly again,”
lol. “if” “probably” “Alternatively, maybe” There’s certainty for you. Have you considered a career in fiction writing?
6) “Finally, PR dictates that the airlines want to keep any HINT of this out of the public consciousness so that people don’t stampede away from flying in fear of a pilot having a stroke.”
If you think that pilots serve as PR flacks for their airlines it’s because you don’t know any.