get this
Comair jobs at risk
By Greg Paeth
Post staff reporter
Comair pilots had an informational picket line Tuesday at the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport.
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As many as 240 Comair jobs could be at risk with Delta Air Lines' decision to award some of its flying business to another airline.
Delta officials have told Erlanger, Ky.-based Comair that it will lose a dozen of its 70-seat aircraft next year.
Delta, Comair's parent company, said that beginning in February the flying will be handled by SkyWest, which already provides service on more than half of the 2,500 regularly scheduled "Delta Connection" flights.
The announcement from Delta came Tuesday, the same day Comair pilots started informational picketing in front of the Delta hub at the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport.
"We are disappointed in today's news and as long as we are unable to complete our restructuring (in bankruptcy court) we face real risks to the remainder of our fleet," said Comair spokeswoman Kate Marx.
She declined to provide any job loss estimate and said the company hopes that the workforce will shrink through attrition to avoid layoffs.
Paul Denke, a spokesman for the Comair chapter of the Air Line Pilots Association, said 70-seat aircraft typically are staffed by 20 people in five four-person crews: a captain, first officer and two flight attendants.
Comair had warned repeatedly that its fleet of regional aircraft could shrink unless pilots and other labor groups agreed to contract concessions that the company says it needs to complete a financial restructuring in bankruptcy court.
Comair is still in position to lose more of its aircraft and more of its employees based on decisions by Delta, which had sought bids from regional air carriers earlier this year to handle flights on 43 70-seat jets, as many as 50 50-seat jets and as many as 50 76-seat jets.
Because the Comair fleet does not include any 76-seat jets, the carrier is still in position to lose more of its 70-seat and 50-seat aircraft.
Since it entered bankruptcy last year along with Delta, Comair has trimmed about 800 jobs, including some 700 in Greater Cincinnati, where its 4,300 employees make it one of the biggest employers in the region.
Delta spokeswoman Gina Laughlin said the airline plans to announce its decisions on the additional flying by the end of the year.
The union's Denke was skeptical about whether the statement by Delta was an unequivocal pronouncement that Comair would lose the 12 planes. He said rather than a simple announcement that the planes are being withdrawn from Comair, the announcement was referred to "the flying that is equivalent to 12 planes."
Delta's Laughlin said she didn't think there was anything nebulous about Delta's statement. "I think it's pretty straight forward," she said.
SkyWest, which owns another regional carrier, Atlantic Southeast Airlines, is based in St. George, Utah. SkyWest pilots are not represented by ALPA although Atlantic Southeast pilots are members of the union. Delta sold Atlantic Southeast to SkyWest about 14 months ago as Delta prepared to restructure through a Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
Delta's announcement that it was trimming the size of its Comair fleet overshadowed the Comair pilots informational picketing at the airport.
Comair and its pilots are scheduled to square off Monday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court, where the company has asked the judge to allow the airline to impose contract terms on its approximately 1,500 pilots.
On Friday, Comair pilots will begin voting on whether to authorize a strike. The balloting will take 15 days.
As they walked the picket line Tuesday, pilots indicated that the Comair-ALPA skirmish in Cincinnati may be duplicated elsewhere in the country in what some described as an effort to "save the profession."
Some said they saw the Comair talks as part of a much a larger issue that focuses on contract concessions that pilots have been pressured to accept ever since the terrorist attacks of 2001 crippled the U.S. airline industry.
"This is a display of unity that says the pilots speak with one voice," said Capt. Bill Baker, executive administrator of the committee that is negotiating for the Comair chapter of the Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA).
"The pilots have taken a beating in this country over the past few years and it's only through dialogue across property lines (with several airlines) that we're going to be able to protect our profession," Denke said.
"I think the airlines have whipsawed regional carriers one against another," said John W. Perkinson Jr., a spokesman for ALPA, which represents some 61,000 pilots at 40 airlines in the U.S. and Canada.
"US Airways has 10 to 12 regional carriers," Perkinson said. "I can't see why they would do that other to drive down costs."
Policies and practices at US Airways are of more than passing interest to employees of Comair, the regional carrier that is owned by Delta. Last week US Airways made an unsolicited bid to acquire Delta for $8 billion.
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