I flew the friendly skies as a flight attendant for about 3.5 years. Primarily there for safety, but really there for passengers to have someone to yell at for nothing I could really do for them 🤣. The best job I’ve ever had, being a regional flight attendant isn’t for everyone.
Below are my experiences with the job. If you’re thinking about the career, check out my guide to becoming a flight attendant.
Comair was a Delta Connection carrier that operated from 1977 to 2012
Delta bought out Comair and made it a wholly-owned subsidiary in 1999
What I did as a Regional Flight Attendant
Being a regional carrier, Comair flew mostly within the Middle to Eastern United States. I was hired well after their hay day, but I did get to have many trips out to Eastern Canada. Safety checks performed on aircraft safety equipment every time I got on and off a new plane. Flight Attendants serve passengers snacks and drinks, listen to their complaints, and made light conversation as time allotted.
Flight Attendant Job Highlights
- I looked super badass once when I was working first class (which I rarely got to do) in a remodeled CRJ-900 (Delta was improving their service for frequent flyers, and began taking out some seats in the 70/90 seat planes and adding first class). I did my best to memorize the last names of the passengers in first class. Calm down. It was only up to 12 names. One day, the new Inflight Manager was sitting in first class, and I got her name and the gentleman next to her right (his name was something like Okabenjawabe). When I met her in the crew lounge, she presented me with a $10 gift card to Dunkin’ Donuts!
- I had a couple medical emergencies on flights I worked and was able to hold my composure. I even had some guests tell me how great I did at keeping it together.
- One time, the captain called me in midflight to tell me the right half of the plane had shut off. He asked if I wanted to tell the passengers. I told him he could do it. Pilots are usually pretty good at making situations like that not sound too bad. He gets over the PA systems and straight up states, “Ladies and gentlemen, the right half of the plane has shut off.” I smiled and made eye contact with the passengers as fear and shock glazed over their faces. Inside, every organ in my body was exploding.
Not Everyone Hates a Regional Flight Attendant
- Another time, when flying to the New York, we got redirected to Boston because of bad weather in New York. Everyone in the plane was upset and asking all sorts of questions about connections, until I got to row 11. The couple sitting in seats C & D were smiling as big as could be. “We didn’t want to go to that wedding anyways.” they told me! It was EXTREMELY rare to have people excited about that kind of situation.
- A gate agent brought a man my plane before anyone else in Halifax, Nova Scotia one day before the rest of the passengers came in. He explained to me that him and his wife were taking his six year old son to Disneyland. The kid had no idea where they were going (that morning, the parents said they were going to a grocery store or something and WHOOPS! They ended up on a plane!). It was that boy’s first time on a plane. He looked so excited. He was one of the happiest children I’ve ever met, and he didn’t even know where he was going! I even gave him some M&M’s and told him he’s lucky his parents got lost in the car that morning! Unfortunately, I didn’t get the parent’s email just so I could see the reaction on that kid’s face when he showed up to Disneyworld!
I also have experience working at the airport as a Cross-Utilized Agent!
The Biggest Highlight
At this point, if you’re wondering if being a regional flight attendant is for you, check out my page with some guidance!
Free flights on Delta, Southwest, American, JetBlue, Spirit, and a couple other airlines I can’t remember at the moment. If you weren’t taking advantage of the free flights, why were you even working as a flight attendant?
Positive Takeaways
- So many stories about airports, passengers, and places I’ve visited to count.
- I spent easily $100,000’s in plane tickets. On Delta, if there was first or business class open, I got it. I flew to Guam for fun once (New York -> Tokyo -> Guam -> Tokyo -> New York) and sat first class every leg of the trip! It was the only time I sat in the upper deck of a 747!
- I met a lot of interesting people all over the place. I could visit any of my friends around the country anytime.
- Attended WWE events all around the country. I wish I would’ve been more informed about Independent pro wrestling at the time!
- While I was on a work trip, the company paid for hotels. With long overnights, I got to do and see a lot of things.
- No need to pay rent since I was single with no kids and adventurous. With a gym membership at Anytime Fitness, I lived out of my car and could shower if needed. The company paid for hotel rooms while I was on duty. When I was off work, I could hop on a plane and go anywhere. When I was based in JFK (New York City), I went to Vegas a lot. There were at least 10 flights a day I could hop on! I could drink in first class on the way there, party around Vegas, then hop on a plane back to work the next day!
The Big Positive
- One of the main reasons this has been the best job is because I worked alone 95% of the time. Federal Aviation Regulations require one flight attendant per fifty passengers. I was only ever based in airports that had the CRJ200, a 50 seat aircraft, based there. I would work a plane with another flight attendant very rarely, so I didn’t have to be bothered by a coworker’s laziness or attitude most of the time. I’m not saying that all were lazy or cranky, but I loved not having to worry about it!
Negative Takeaways
- I ended up moving on with my life because the morale in the company was pretty low. Once the talks started that Delta was shutting down Comair, people called in sick a lot, and a lot of people started quitting.
- I was furloughed (laid-off, but still on the company books) for about a year. It kind of worked out because during this time I was called back in to the Army, but I would have much rather not have been called back in to the Army!
- Seniority.
- Perfect Attendance. Even though the vast majority of flight attendants were calling in sick quite a bit, I never did. I clocked in late once, but that was by two minutes because the monorail at JFK stopped for a good 20 minutes! Comair had a policy that if you had Perfect Attendance for an entire year, you got a reward. When I came back from furlough and completed my first complete year of perfect attendance, I asked my Inflight Manager about it. That program had been nixed while I was on furlough, and no one knew about it. It’s a lot of effort to make sure you’re at work all the time, especially as a flight attendant. When the light at the end of the tunnel is turned off, it’s kind of a bummer!
The Not-As-Negative
- Being that it was a regional airline, I did spend 99% of my overnights within the United States. Not totally a bad thing though – I did get to visit and see a lot of the U.S. (Alaska is the only state I haven’t been in).
- The actual pay was pretty bad at first ($15.50/hour). I was on reserve and only guaranteed pay for 78 hours a month. If I worked more, I got paid the extra. By the time I was finished few years later, I was at about $25/hour. There was an hourly per diem that started when you left on a trip and ran until your last flight.
- I was based in Detroit (DTW) for the last part of my time as a flight attendant. This meant that I could work up to 6 flights a day with some of these flights being less than 20 minutes. Many times, flight crews would call in “sick” if they had to do these short flights at the end of their trip so they could make it home. One of us on Reserve would be called in to do a couple 20 minute flights.
Final Words on Being a Flight Attendant
Again, this is the best job I ever had. When I was in my interview with SkyWest Airlines (the first group interview I had), a former flight attendant told us in her speech that once you got the airline blood in you, it’s impossible to completely get rid of it. She was right.
I’m even giving some thought at giving it another go. This time, I’d go on a bigger airline. All my friends that went to bigger airlines act like it’s heaven compared to regional flying)! If you’re interested in becoming a flight attendant, check out my guide on becoming flight attendant!
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