CHICAGO — Boeing Co.’s machinists, on the third day of a strike over job security and compensation, might be walking the picket lines for more than a month, if history and industry analysts prove any guide.
The members of the Chicago-based planemaker’s largest union, the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, have stopped work over three of the last six contracts. Those strikes lasted four to 10 weeks.
“I would expect this one’s going to be long,” said Scott Hamilton, founder of Seattle-based aviation consultancy Leeham Co. who has been following Boeing for 20 years. “There are some pretty serious issues that they’re pretty far apart on.”
The union’s 27,000 members in Washington, home to Boeing’s Seattle-area manufacturing hub; Kansas; and Oregon are using the leverage of a record order backlog and the tight timetable of Boeing’s delayed 787 Dreamliner in an effort to gain a sweetened deal from the planemaker.
The company needs to make about 40 jets a month to meet its 2008 deliveries forecast. It had planned to test the Dreamliner in flight in November in order to start shipments in next year’s third quarter.
Boeing, which trails only Airbus SAS in commercial planemaking, last week said a protracted strike would keep the 787, its most successful new plane based on orders, from flying this year. Airlines have been counting on newer, more fuel-efficient aircraft to help them battle record oil prices.
Boeing rose $1.02 to $63.91 in New York Stock Exchange composite trading Monday.
