Minneapolis – Northwest Airlines Corp. got off to a smooth start by keeping its planes flying when mechanics went on strike. But the real test for the company and its replacement mechanics arrives with a far busier weekday schedule.
The strike began Saturday, generally the lightest flying day of the week. Northwest averages 1,215 flights on Saturdays – but that increases to 1,381 on Sundays and 1,473 on weekdays, company spokesman Kurt Ebenhoch said Sunday.
The airline will find that maintaining its schedule will be tougher as the workweek begins, said airline consultant Scott Hamilton of Leeham Co. in Sammamish, Wash.
“Sooner or later, if the replacement mechanics can’t keep on top of it, it’s going to start causing cancellations,” he said.
About 4,400 Northwest unionized mechanics, cleaners and custodians walked off the job Saturday morning after refusing to take pay cuts and layoffs that would have reduced their ranks almost by half. No new talks have been scheduled. Northwest said there were few cancellations and most flights were on time.
Terry Trippler of Cheapseats.com said Northwest’s schedule had recovered from a work slowdown just before the strike began Saturday morning. Northwest apologized to passengers for delays then and said it would work to resolve them.
“This weekend has gone much much better than I think (the union) thought it was going to, and maybe a little bit worse than Northwest wanted it to,” he said.
The nation’s fourth-biggest carrier switched to its fall schedule Saturday, a week earlier than planned, lightening the schedule by about 17 percent.
Between 4 and 10 a.m. MDT Sunday, Northwest had 85 delayed flights at Detroit Metropolitan Airport and 68 at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, said Bob Rose, president of Local 5 of the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association.
Northwest said it spent 18 months preparing for a strike by the mechanics union, arranging for about 1,900 replacement workers, vendors and managers. The Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association mechanics averaged about $70,000 a year in pay, and cleaners and custodians can make about $40,000. The company wants to cut their wages by about 25 percent.
