Hello everyone. It’s that time again. PlaneBusiness Banter is now posted. This week we are talking airplanes, pilot contracts and we wrap up the third quarter earnings season with our in-depth look at the recent earnings calls from WestJet, Air Canada and Republic Holdings.

American Airlines had clearly wanted a contract with its pilots in place before the AMR board meetings began Wednesday of this week. Does not look like that is going to happen.

The lack of a contract continues to drag down shares of the airline. Tuesday shares slid 1%, closing at 1.92. Shares dropped 5% on Monday.

Looking at what the company has proposed, I think it’s going to be hard for the APA Board to sell the deal to its membership given the wide disparity between the numbers its members had proposed and numbers the airline has proposed.

We look at the 101 page position paper the pilots at United Airlines distributed last week regarding their concerns over training and integration procedures with the merged airline. Who knew the FAA inspector who was fined for his involvement with the Southwest Airlines fiasco a few years ago is the same FAA inspector involved in the FAA SOC [single operating certificate] process at United Airlines?

Of course we also wrap up the third quarter earnings season as we take our in-depth view at the recent earnings call from Republic Holdings, Air Canada, and WestJet.

Then there is the Dubai Airshow. We give you all the top news from the event that passed $55 billion in orders as of Tuesday.

As usual, all this and much, much, more in this week’s issue of PlaneBusiness Banter .