Frontier Airlines pilots edged closer to a strike Monday, asking the federal government to release them from 18-month-old mediation, setting the stage for the talks to move on either to arbitration or to “self-help” measures that may include a strike or lockout.
The Denver-based airline’s roughly 1,200 pilots argue they are the lowest-paid pilots of narrow-body jets in the United States, with pay rates for captains coming in 40 percent below the industry average. The last contract between the ultra-low-cost carrier and its pilots, represented by the Air Line Pilots Association International, was signed in 2007, when Frontier was in bankruptcy protection.
