Pilot Shortage Strikes Airline For Second Month

Northwest Airlines may not be the only airline out there to have cancelled flights lately... but it is by far the one getting the most press. The Eagan, MN-based airline -- just two months out of Chapter 11 -- continues to face problems with scrapped flights, discontented pilots... and angry passengers.

Airline spokesman Roman Blahoski blamed a high rate of "pilot absenteeism" for this weekend's cancellations, which the airline says amounted to eight percent of Northwest's total schedule.

Even that number may be optimistic, however, according to FlightStats.com... which reports 178 Northwest flights were cancelled Saturday, amounting to 13.3 percent of its schedule. Things were even worse on Sunday -- when the airline dropped 213 flights.

The discrepancy lies in the Department of Transportation's definition of flight cancellations, Blahoski told the Minneapolis-St. Paul Star-Tribune. Some of those flights were cancelled a week ahead of time... meaning they do not count against the airline's dropped flight totals in the eyes of DOT.

Still, says analyst Terry Trippler, a cancelled flight is a cancelled flight... and it's a problem Northwest is rapidly becoming known for.

"Right now, this airline is dysfunctional. Someone has got to take charge and straighten it out," said the Minneapolis-based airline expert Sunday.

That kind of "the buck stops here" attitude seems lacking at the carrier, however. As was the case at the end of last month -- when Northwest dropped nearly 12 percent of its schedule over a weeklong period -- the airline blamed the problem on its pilots.

"Unfortunately, we saw a significant spike in certain narrow-body pilot absenteeism this morning, which forced us to cancel flights," said CEO Doug Steenland in a letter to employees last week.

Wade Blaufuss, spokesman for the Northwest branch of the Air Line Pilots Association, says Steenland isn't painting the full picture. The union rep maintains that due to cuts in personnel at the carrier -- intended to add to profits at the airline -- pilots "are being pushed to fly up to their monthly legal limits well before the month is over, with not enough reserve staff to pick up the slack."

"This is a staffing issue. If it were strictly a morale issue, absenteeism would be systemwide" and affect pilots flying other aircraft types as well, Blaufuss added.

Not helping those pilots' willingness to work some overtime for the carrier, Blaufuss said, is the fact pilots have taken a combined 38.9 percent in pay cuts since 2004, while Steenland was able to pocket a four-year stock bonus worth nearly $27 million upon the carrier's exit from bankruptcy.

"Northwest management must accept that it is their responsibility to staff the airline for real-world operations, not just what fits their bonus-driven, cost-cutting targets," said Blaufuss.

And that may well mean more cancelled flights to come.

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