USAir Grounds 25% of Flights After Strike : Transportation: Thousands of travelers are affected as ground crew workers walk out over wage and benefit concessions.
Thousands of USAir passengers Monday were subjected to lengthy delays and last-minute scheduling changes after the nation’s sixth-largest passenger carrier canceled 25% of its flights in response to a machinists strike.
USAir flight attendants agreed to honor the picket lines of the 8,300 machinists and ground crew workers, who have balked at wage and benefit concessions sought by the carrier, but a federal judge ordered them to return to work late Monday. A hearing on the order is scheduled for Thursday. USAir pilots, who have agreed to the concessions, say they will continue working.
Several carriers, including American, Delta, Northwest and Continental, are honoring tickets for canceled USAir flights. Although it is a slow period for airline travel and plenty of seats are available, passengers flying into such USAir strongholds as Pittsburgh, Pa., and Charlotte, N.C., are likely to face problems.
At the USAir hub in Pittsburgh, about one-third of the 343 scheduled departures were canceled at the recently remodeled and expanded airport. Aircraft maintenance and repair work was being completed by management employees, the airline said.
In California, where USAir has dramatically reduced operations in recent years, the airline was apparently able to operate most of its flights. At Los Angeles International Airport, 25% of the 52 scheduled jet flights from Los Angeles were canceled, said airline spokeswoman Agnes Huff. No figures were available on inbound flights.
The labor dispute comes at a crucial time for USAir, which is seeking $400 million in concessions from its nearly 50,000 workers while negotiating a partnership and financial infusion from British Airways.
The alliance, which requires government approval, would give USAir access to an extensive international route system that it lacks and $750 million to pay down debt.
The strike and any lingering bad blood might endanger the proposed alliance between USAir and British Airways, said Barbara Beyer, president of Avmark, a Washington, D.C.-based aviation consulting firm.
“Nobody in their right mind buys somebody else’s problems. That includes British Airways.”
British Airways spokesman John W. Lampl said the labor dispute has no implications at present on the alliance with USAir.
The strike is also a risky move for the International Assn. of Machinists. Thousands of airline workers have lost their jobs as a result of a two-year-long industry slump, and the remaining workers at some carriers have already accepted or are being asked for concessions to prop up their struggling employers.
“It’s a terrible time” for a strike, UCLA labor economist Daniel J. B. Mitchell said. “You got an economy in recession. You got concession bargaining going on at other airlines.”
In addition, the lack of pilot sympathy will hamper machinist efforts to shut down as much of USAir as possible, Mitchell said.
The machinists, who have been without a contract since March, 1990, have opposed the airline’s proposal for using lower-paid workers to handle some ground operations, such as pushing airplanes to and from gates. The union fears that those lower-wage workers could eventually replace machinists as well.
After negotiations over the weekend, no further talks between both groups have been scheduled.
How long USAir can hold out with a scaled-down schedule and fewer mechanics remains to be seen.
Faced with large payments on debt and equipment, “the airlines are saying privately that they really can’t sustain long strikes because no matter what you do, the meter keeps running,” said Daniel Kasper, director of the transportation practice at Harbridge House, a Boston-based consulting firm.
At Los Angeles International Airport, about 20 machinists and flight attendants picketed outside the USAir departure area and handed out yellow flyers to passengers that asked “Do you know who is servicing your flight?”
USAir employee Tim Gibler, whose ground crew job is the kind USAir would like to fill with cheaper labor, arrived at the airport to picket around 5 a.m. and looked tired. “I’m not worried about the outcome,” he said. “They’ve been negotiating for 2 1/2 years, so I’ve had time to put some money away.”
The strike began a few hours before the Rafter and Tyson families of Black Mountain, N.C., were scheduled to fly home via Charlotte and Asheville on USAir. Instead, they flew on Delta Air Lines to Asheville via Atlanta.
“They’ve been very nice and cooperative this morning, at least so far,” said Joe Tyson as he stood in line at the USAir counter at Los Angeles International. Tyson said he was happy with the result, especially since the new arrangements got him back 15 minutes earlier.
