TWA Expected to Unveil Plan to Keep It Flying

Trans World Airlines Inc., its unions and creditors plan today to unveil an agreement that should keep the financially ailing airline flying, sources close to the negotiations said Sunday.

TWA scheduled a news conference in Washington today after what an airline spokesman said were “significant developments resulting from negotiations held over the weekend.”

“These involve Carl C. Icahn and the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., which will have significant bearing on TWA’s financial and competitive posture,” the spokesman said without elaborating.

Icahn, the airline’s chairman and majority owner, has been negotiating with the federal pension agency over demands that he must contribute to the carrier’s pension fund to make up for a shortfall it estimates at $1.2 billion.

Last week, U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Helen Bailick in Wilmington, Del., ordered a pension agency lawyer to cooperate with efforts to bring TWA out of Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

TWA has been operating under protection of Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code since January.