The Americans ‘warned’ of the shortcomings that caused the flight to be canceled

American Airlines was warned that it did not have enough pilots to carry out the ambitious summer flight, the carrier’s union said, as the cancellation of hundreds of flights caused passenger anger.

The airline Fort Worth (Texas) said this week that it will reduce plans to reopen it after shortages appeared due to bad weather over the weekend. Due to staff shortages, it was not possible to recover quickly from the weather disruption at its main centers, and dozens of flights had to be canceled.

The American has been the most aggressive of the three largest carriers in the U.S. to return flights to their schedule. Driven by the demand that revived in the American market, he intended to sell the Americans only 5 percent fewer seats in July than in 2019.

The company said Monday it was cutting about 1 percent of flights scheduled for mid-July to “achieve additional resilience,” stressing the intricate role of carriers as the coronavirus pandemic shrinks.

The Allied Pilots Association, which represents 15,000 American pilots, said it had warned the airline that there were few workers due to short-term staffing and approved voluntary leave and early retirement to overcome the pandemic.

“We warned them, ‘Hey, this [staffing level] It’s likely to be very harsh when a weather event happens to us, ”said APA communications committee chairman Dennis Tajer.“ We don’t have enough pilots. ”

Unlike competitors United and Delta, the Americans had 1,600 pilots briefly receiving federal government funds. Payroll Assistance Program, which was intended to boost the airline industry through a pandemic when the number of passengers dropped.

This made it difficult for the pilot to return to active status immediately because U.S. Federal Aviation Administration regulations require new training, Tajer said. The airline also withdrew 1,000 pilots earlier.

The airline’s decision to withdraw 100 aircraft required more training so that pilots could learn how to make another aircraft. Tajer said the Dallas-Fort Worth company’s training center was “very stressful” because the airline had to rent time for an outdoor simulator.

“We’re happy because we’re flying so much, and we’re disappointed that we don’t get the tools,” he said, before getting the analogy of baseball. “They said so!” and give the hockey stick. “

Bad weather has broken down centers in America, including Chicago, Miami, Dallas-Fort Worth and Charlotte, in nine of the first 15 days of June. It hinders the airline’s ability to deploy aircraft and crew effectively, and the effects may remain in the system when available pilots and flight attendants go against breaks required by federal regulations.

About a third of the cancellations recorded from June 18 to 21 in America were due to the unavailability of a flight crew member, according to a company report, the most common reason being all but those days.

“The first few weeks of June have brought unprecedented weather to our largest sites, which has had a huge impact on our operation,” the airline said. “We have made direct changes with the aim of influencing the minimum number of customers, adapting flights to markets where we have a wide range of accommodation options.”

Savanthi Syth, an analyst at Raymond James, said that without the Payroll Assistance Program – which distributed $ 63 billion to airlines, including $ 12.8 billion – more carriers would struggle to suddenly increase demand for U.S. home travel.

“This is the PSP doing its job,” he said. “Otherwise we would be in a much worse situation than we are today.”

The Americans said the decision to cut flights was “better than landing people.” “They saw that the network needed more cushions.”