DALLAS (AP) - American Airlines is sending
layoff warning notices to more than 11,000 employees although a
spokesman says the company expects job losses to be closer to 4,400.
The notices went out to
mechanics and ground workers whose jobs will be affected as American
goes through a bankruptcy restructuring.
American Airlines spokesman
Bruce Hicks said Tuesday that fewer than 40 percent of those getting
notices will lose their jobs. Hicks said federal law requires the
company to notify anyone whose position could change, including those
who could get "bumped" by more-senior employees whose jobs are
eliminated or outsourced.
American said in February
that it planned to cut 14,000 jobs, including 13,000 held by union
workers. But if Hicks is right, the final job losses will be about a
third of that.
Over the summer American
accepted slightly smaller cost-cutting measures as it negotiated new
labor contracts, and it agreed to give bonuses to flight attendants and
ground workers who quit. So far 1,800 flight attendants and 800 ground
workers have applied to take the money and leave.
Layoff notices went to
nearly 3,000 workers in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, where a maintenance
facility will close, and nearly 3,000 more at a base in Tulsa, Okla.
Also receiving notices were about 1,200 workers in Miami, 1,100 in New
York and Newark, N.J., 900 in Chicago, and smaller numbers elsewhere.
"As bad as this is - and we
knew this day was coming - we've been able to lessen the pain," said
Jamie Horwitz, a spokesman for the Transport Workers Union.
Separately, the leader of
the pilots' union blasted the company, saying it is "paying lip service"
to negotiating a contract while using the bankruptcy process to wring
punitive cost-cutting concessions from pilots.
Eight other labor groups
approved long-term contracts that will help AMR cut annual labor
spending by about $1 billion. Pilots, however, voted overwhelmingly
against the company's last contract offer, and a federal bankruptcy
judge allowed American to impose new pay and working rules on pilots.
The acting president of the
Allied Pilots Association, Keith Wilson, said in a message to members
that he would meet this week with Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood
and other senior officials in the Obama administration and Congress. The
union has asked federal officials to approve steps that could
eventually lead to a strike, but that permission hasn't been granted.
Hicks said American is ready to resume negotiations "when the union is ready."
Still, pilots are holding a
strike-authorization vote. And according to the company, they are
calling in sick more often than usual, contributing to an increase in
canceled flights. American has trimmed its September and October
schedule by up to 2 percent to make sure it has enough pilots to operate
flights.
Hunter Keay, an analyst for
Wolfe Trahan & Co., said he does not think the threat of
cancellations will lead travelers to avoid American. But he said there
has been "a clear deterioration in labor relations" at American.
An American merger with US
Airways Group Inc. could produce a bigger airline with more revenue and
more labor peace, Keay said. US Airways has lobbied for a merger but
American executives have been reluctant.
American and parent AMR Corp., which is based in Fort Worth, filed for bankruptcy protection in November.
