Northwest reliability soars; Company concessions, rested pilots keep customers flying

Northwest Airlines pulled off a seamless August, with a minuscule number of cancellations at month's end and an apparently well-rested crew of pilots.

Late Friday morning, the airline was posting a model 99.9 percent flight completion rate, a tiny smidgen above Thursday's rate, which was also over 99 percent.

"So far, so good," said Marion McDonald at Custom Travel here, which reported no passengers on canceled Northwest flights Friday. "They've gotten their act together."

Northwest sees no issues that will cause travelers trouble over the Labor Day holiday, spokesman Jim Herlihy said.

"We feel measures we put into place at beginning of the month, with pilot work rules and incentives, including overtime compensation, have made the difference," he said.

While the pilots say the airline weathered August well - including that it had six cancellations on the same day American Airlines had 84 - what made the difference, they say, is not overtime pay but the reduction in flights the airline announced in early June.

Travel expert Terry Trippler says it doesn't matter which side is right.

"The fact is, it worked and the passengers don't care why. The pilots and Northwest management need to understand that."

With passengers now getting where and when they paid to be, he expects the bad blood will be quickly forgotten.

"Give people a some extra frequent flier miles and they forget. The public is quite forgiving, not because they are gullible so much as they just want to go," Trippler said.

At this time last month, Northwest was in near-meltdown mode for the second month in a row, with the number of canceled flights running around 12 percent - or more than 100 flights a day - as it soldiered on through the stepped-up summer travel season with thin pilot ranks.

In late July, after hearing an earful from irate travelers and agents, the airline made quick amends, offering its pilots time-and-half for working more than 80 hours a month.

The FAA allows pilots to be in the air 100 hours a month. In contract agreements worked out in bankruptcy, Northwest was scheduling pilots between 85 to 90 hours a month. When weather delays ran the clock down before the month was over, it was short-handed and in the news.

The problems the airline said were exacerbated by a higher-than-normal rate of pilots calling in sick or too tired to work.

Friday, it told union pilot leaders it was moving forward on plans to hire 40 pilots a month.

It has also recalled all 450 furloughed pilots, although it was unclear how many of them were actually still available for work.

The airline loses about 200 pilots a year to retirement and other factors. The new hiring rate will replace them, plus add 300 more, Herlihy said.

The reduced schedule, plus the additional pilots, "should take the strain off the system," he said.

The pilots are skeptical, saying the airline is still understaffed.

The next pressure point will be Thanksgiving, the busiest flying day of the year, said Monty Montgomery, spokesman for the Northwest branch of the Air Line Pilots Association.

"It takes 40 days to get the furloughed pilots back on the line," he said. "For the new hires, it's a minimum of two months in training.

"If they are hired and on the property now, they could have an impact on the holiday schedule, but we are still concerned."

- Jane Roberts: 529-2512