Some United Attendants Are Rehired

United Airlines has called back 600 flight attendants who took voluntary layoffs, and company executives said they would invite 851 more to return to work by late fall.

The first group is scheduled to return to work by Aug. 9, with the rest to be recalled by the end of November.

More flight attendants are needed partly because more passengers are flying on United planes, United spokesman Jeff Green said. Last week, the UAL Corp. unit said its planes were on average 88.1% full in June.

Although the Assn. of Flight Attendants welcomed the recall, the union said the action was needed to fill vacancies left by workers who were quitting in response to pay and benefit cuts implemented by the carrier as it tries to emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

“We’ve got flight attendants leaving and they need people to fill those jobs,” said union spokeswoman Sara Nelson Dela Cruz. “They’re leaving because this isn’t the same job it once was.”

United’s flight attendants are threatening to strike after the carrier, based in Elk Grove Village, Ill., formally turned over their pension plan to the federal Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp. A federal bankruptcy judge in May approved United’s plan to unload its plans on the agency.

The flight attendants’ union said the termination violated its labor contract and triggered its legal right to strike. It has threatened to stage random, unannounced strikes.