ALPA Cites Morale, Stress Problems; Urges Pilots To "Fly the Contract"

Northwest Airlines is currently the nation's number five airline... but if its recent surge in flight cancellations doesn't even out soon, that position could be in jeopardy.

Flight cancellations at NWA far exceed those of other major US airlines, according to CNNMoney. Just Monday, the carrier cancelled 173 flights -- that's about 12 percent of its total 1,148 scheduled flights for that day.

That compares to an average of only 2.1 percent of overall cancellations at the other major airlines, including American Airlines, United Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Continental Airlines, US Airways, Southwest Airlines, and JetBlue.

NWA was second only to American Airlines, which cancelled "only" 5.6 percent of its flights. Sadly, Northwest's cancellations exceeded the amount of cancellations by six major airlines combined, which totaled 134.

As of 1445 EDT Tuesday, the carrier had cancelled 143 flights, or more than 10 percent of its scheduled flights. CNNMoney obtained the stats from the flight tracking service FlightStats.

The Air Line Pilots Association says the problem is due to management changing work rules that push pilots past reasonable limits and delays that eat into FAA-mandated allowed flight hours -- thus causing a pilot shortage.

The carrier, on the other hand, blames the weather. Northwest issued a statement saying recent bad weather on the East Coast and Midwest disrupted the schedule and was the primary reason pilots were without allowed flight hours needed to staff all its flights. Plans are in the works to fix the problem, like making sure flights are cancelled far enough in advance to facilitate appropriate rebooking.

"How could it not be bad planning? If it was weather you'd see it across the board at other airlines," said Wade Blaufuss, a spokesman for the ALPA and NWA 757 first officer. "We have a fatigue problem, a morale problem and a stress problem."

Blaufuss said the current work environment has discouraged its 385 furloughed pilots from coming back to work. He said most of those that have been called back have declined.

The ALPA is telling its members to follow their contract to the letter. "Fly safe. Fly the contract. Don't fly sick. Don't fly fatigued. Don't fly hungry," the union's hotline message said recently.

Blaufuss denies a work-to-rule campaign is part of the problem, saying the problem lies with current company rules that don't allow for normal disruptions or problems.

"It all looks great on paper 'Let's schedule to the max possible with no slack in the system,'" said Blaufuss. "But it's an airline, with a lot of moving parts. We're not manufacturing widgets. All these things have to work in synch."

At its June 15 meeting, ALPA members passed a no-confidence resolution stating "all indications are that staffing is below what is required to properly fly the summer schedule and this staffing shortage will have a noticeable and costly impact on NWA's summer flying, revenue and passenger goodwill."

The carrier has had more than its fair share of labor problems. Its pilots were the last major airline pilots group to go on strike in 1998; the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association went on strike in August 2005, and the union has repeatedly protested and criticized the carrier on money issues.

NWA emerged from bankruptcy May 31 and this is the first time in five years that no major U.S. carrier was in some form of bankruptcy proceeding.

FMI: www.nwa.com, www.alpa.org