The union also said in a statement on Sunday that its members are barred by federal law from using a strike to resolve a labor dispute without exhausting other options first. “Constraints have always been, can you get aircraft, can you get airports, facilities, gates? This is the first time where the constraint is staff.” “I’ve been at the airline for 33 years,” he said. And the airline has had to bring on new employees to replace those departed workers to meet the demand, Mr. Thousands of employees volunteered for buyouts, early retirement or long-term leave during the pandemic. Jordan said at a September conference hosted by Cowen, an investment bank. “I think we could have been less optimistic about how quickly we could get folks back off of leave and trained and all that,” Mr. “The domino effect continues, and what we see, due to some internal failures, is it’s happening so many times that they just can’t move everyone.” That figure was 71 percent on Saturday and 85 percent on Sunday, according to Mr. In a typical day, about 10 percent of pilots are reassigned from the flights they were scheduled to operate.
Murray said, the widespread cancellations were caused by technological issues and problems with how pilots are reassigned and rerouted during disruptions, a process complicated by Southwest’s uniquely large, point-to-point network. Pilots called in sick at a normal rate this weekend, he said. “Some airlines continue to experience scheduling challenges due to aircraft and crews being out of place,” the agency said in a statement over the weekend.Ĭasey Murray, the president of the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association, dismissed the idea that pilots had called in sick to protest the company’s vaccine mandate, though the union has asked a court to prevent Southwest from enforcing that requirement. The Federal Aviation Administration acknowledged that flights were delayed or canceled on Friday because of severe weather, military training exercises and a brief staffing shortage at one air traffic control center, but said that the disruption lasted only a few hours. Conservative lawmakers pointed to Southwest’s cancellations as evidence that vaccine requirements could harm the economy. The airline and the union that represents its pilots took pains throughout the weekend and on Monday to say that the disruption was not caused by protests over the airline’s recently announced vaccination mandate, denying an idea, fueled by some early news reports, that had gained traction online among conservatives and anti-vaccination activists.
“To every customer that experienced a cancellation or delay, Southwest offers our sincerest regret regarding disrupted travel plans.” The airline’s share price fell more than 4 percent Monday.
BOYCOTT ADVANCE USE CONTROLLER FULL
“We hope to restore our full schedule as soon as possible,” Southwest said in a statement. Southwest blamed the cancellations on several causes, including problems with the weather and air traffic control on Friday and an inability to get flight crews and planes to where they were needed.Ĭancellations on Friday, primarily caused by severe weather, prevented planes and crews from being where they needed to be on Saturday, a cascading problem that led to cancellations and delays throughout the weekend and into Monday, the airline said.