American Airlines Cancels 296 flights At DFW Airport

April 06--Flight cancellations at Dallas/Fort Worth Airport are continuing into a fourth day today as dozens of hail-damaged American Airlines planes await repairs.

American canceled 296 arrivals and departures scheduled for today.

It is too early to estimate the costs of the repairs and lost revenue for Fort Worth-based American, which has been operating in bankruptcy court since November. But based on past episodes, it could reach tens of millions of dollars.

Tuesday's storms dumped large hail at the airport.

American spokesman Andrea Huguely said the airline canceled 323 flights Thursday and has 55 planes out of service. All of American Eagle's aircraft are flying. In the past three days, American and American Eagle canceled more than 1,600 flights in and out of DFW.

American said it has been focused on repairing its aircraft and won't know the cost until the job is finished. Losses will depend on how long the aircraft are out of service.

"Undoubtedly the cancellations are going to have a revenue impact on American's operations," said Bill Swelbar, an airline researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "But it is too early to tell because we don't know how long these airplanes are going to be out of service."

Swelbar added that with airlines generally flying more passengers per plane, American is likely having difficulty rebooking customers whose flights were canceled.

American has added extra flights in some markets because so many passengers needed to be rebooked, Huguely said.

Last May, a severe hailstorm at DFW grounded 50 of American's aircraft for inspections. At the time, the airline said that its second-quarter revenue was $60 million lower because of the extreme weather and because of lower travel demand to Japan after the earthquake and tsunami.

And in the first quarter of 2011, when American canceled more than 8,000 flights because of snow and ice storms, it reported $50 million in lost revenue.

AMR Corp., American's parent, recently reported that it lost $1.76 billion in the first three months of bankruptcy. It wants to revoke its union contracts, cut 13,000 jobs and freeze its pension plans.

Andrea Ahles, 817-390-7631

Twitter: @Sky_Talk

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