AA cuts a few February flights – pilot retirements to blame

We’ve been telling you to expect fewer domestic seats in the air this year, and here’s more evidence of that.

American Airlines (AA), the world's largest air carrier, is axing 76 of its flights this month according to a report in Tulsa World. To put that in perspective, the airline says that’s about one-tenth of 1 percent.

What’s at work here? The Allied Pilots Association (APA), which represents American’s 12,000 cockpit crewmembers, says retirements are to blame.

“Time and time again,” asserts Captain Lloyd Hill, APA President, in a prepared statement, “the evidence has pointed to a pilot shortage at American Airlines.”

Hill contends the carrier simply doesn’t have enough pilots to crew aircraft during so-called “off-schedule” operations such as severe weather; nor, he maintains, can AA accommodate contingencies, such as February’s spike in retirements. Hill attributes that surge to the recent downturn in the stock market. Pilots approaching retirement can lock in the value of a part of their retirement benefit for 90 days. That means February retirees aren’t affected by a drop in the price of stocks.

The Allied Pilots Association chief maintains American customers “are paying the price for management’s short-sightedness”.

Tulsa World notes that in February AA is scheduled to operate some 63,800 flights. Seventy-six cancellations, a company spokesperson told the newspaper, constitutes “a very, very small number”.

© Cheapflights Ltd Jerry Chandler

Comments

[scott loeb]

Pilots are retiring because they are cashing in pension plans that, last I read, give them more than $1 million a piece. Leave it to the UNION leader to suggest that the company is somehow at fault . . . particularly while they are negotiating contracts. How about putting these self-serving labor comments in context?