US Airways News

[aroundtheblock]

Though I may be afraid to hear the answer, has anyone heard how US Airways is doing recently?

 

[CoopDog]

Not real well

US Airways Sees Third Quarter Loss
October 03, 2003 7:04:00 PM ET



NEW YORK (Reuters) - The chief executive of US Airways Group, the No. 7 U.S. airline, forecast a net loss for the company's third quarter on Friday, and said revenue was not improving at the rate the airline had hoped.

Earlier in the day, US Airways had estimated that its unit revenue grew 6 percent to 7 percent in September, which reinforced comments from Continental Airlines this week showing that revenue trends for the month improved.

The typically-strong third quarter should result in the industry's first operating profit since the end of 2000, Merrill Lynch analyst Michael Linenberg said on Friday.

But US Airways' results for the third quarter won't fare as well as its competitors', the airline's chief executive, David Siegel, said in a Friday telephone recording to employees.

``While other airlines are hinting that they may break even or show a profit for the quarter, that is not going to be the case for US Airways, I'm sorry to say,'' Siegel said.

Siegel said the airline's results for the quarter were sacked by increased competition from lower-cost carriers and by hurricane Isabel, which swept across the East Coast where US Airways' operations are focused, and prompted the airline to cancel more than 700 flights.

US Airways, based in Arlington, Virginia, also expects to show a loss for the quarter on a pretax basis, Siegel said. Merrill's Linenberg said the U.S. airline industry as a whole should show pretax losses for the quarter.

The air carrier, which emerged from bankruptcy on March 31, has made a broad effort to increase its use of smaller, cheaper regional jets on many routes.

But Siegel said challenges still remained for US Airways to hit targets for introducing regional jets into service.

US Airways filed an application this week to list its shares on Nasdaq, a process Siegel said could take four to six weeks.

© 2003 Reuters

 

[CoopDog]

Now they're going to piss off the IAM

Reuters
US Airways subcontracts work, inflames mechanics
Monday October 6, 3:45 pm ET


NEW YORK, Oct 6 (Reuters) - US Airways Group Inc. said on Monday that it will outsource heavy maintenance on 10 of its airplanes to an Alabama company, which prompted the airline's mechanics' union to file for a temporary restraining order that would prevent the move.

US Airways said 10 of its Airbus narrow body aircraft are due for their first round of mandatory heavy maintenance checks this fall, but said it does not have the facilities or equipment to perform the work.

The Arlington, Virginia-based airline, which emerged from bankruptcy on March 31, will outsource the maintenance to ST Mobile Aerospace Engineering Inc, based in Mobile, Alabama.

The International Association of Machinists, the union that represents US Airways' mechanics, called the decision to subcontract the work unjustified, and said it violated the mechanics' collective bargaining agreement.

"In the 54 years the IAM and US Airways have had a collective bargaining relationship, the company has never subcontracted heavy maintenance of aircraft," the union said. The union filed for the temporary restraining order in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania.

US Airways' mechanics perform heavy maintenance on all of the airline's Boeing (NYSE:BA - News) airplanes, and keep up with day-to-day fixes on the entire fleet.

The Airbus airplanes are nearing five years in service, when they start to require more comprehensive routine checks mandated by the Federal Aviation Administration and European aircraft maker Airbus.

US Airways said it would work with the IAM to decide whether heavy maintenance on the Airbus airplanes could be done by the airline's own mechanics in the future. The airline said the next round of heavy checks on Airbus planes would not be due until September 2004.

No details on the monetary value of US Airways' deal with ST Mobile Aerospace were provided.

The Retirement Systems of Alabama, which manages Alabama workers' pensions, agreed to a 37 percent ownership stake in US Airways during its bankruptcy, and fund representatives account for more than half of the airline's board.

US Airways spokesman David Castelveter said the airline did not take RSA's ties to Alabama into account when it was choosing a subcontractor.

"The decision to go with ST Mobile was purely based upon their reputation for doing this type of work," Castelveter said.