Northwest Put To The Test

Northwest Airlines Corp. gets a true test of its ability to keep planes flying during a mechanics strike today, as its flight schedule returns to heavier weekday levels.

About 4,400 Northwest unionized mechanics, cleaners and custodians walked off the job Saturday morning, generally the lightest flying day of the week, when the carrier operates 1,215 flights.

Northwest operates 1,381 flights on Sundays and 1,473 on weekdays, company spokesman Kurt Ebenhoch said.

In anticipation of the looming strike, the nation's fourth-biggest carrier switched to its fall schedule Saturday, a week earlier than planned, lightening the schedule by about 17 percent.

Northwest also spent 18 months preparing for the strike, arranging for about 1,900 replacement workers, vendors and managers.

But airline consultant Scott Hamilton of Leeham Co. in Sammamish, Wash., predicted it will be harder for Northwest to maintain its weekday schedule.

"Sooner or later if the replacement mechanics can't keep on top of it, it's going to start causing cancellations," Hamilton said.

Northwest said there were few cancellations and most flights were on time over the weekend, but wouldn't provide specifics.

However, an official with the striking union disputes that.

Bob Rose, president of Local 5 of the Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association in Detroit, said in the six-hour period from 6 a.m. to noon EDT Sunday, Northwest had 85 delayed flights at Detroit Metropolitan Airport and 68 at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, the carrier's major U.S. hubs. Northwest had 234 delays at those two airports on Saturday, Rose said. He had no data on canceled flights.

"Northwest is hurting. They're hurting themselves, and they're hurting the passengers," Rose said.

No new talks are scheduled between Northwest and the union, which is refusing to take pay cuts and layoffs that would have reduced their ranks almost by half.

The union mechanics averaged about $70,000 a year in pay, and cleaners and custodians can make around $40,000. The company wants to cut their wages by about 25 percent.

Northwest also sought to lay off about 2,000 workers, almost halving a work force that is already half the size it was in 2001. The cuts would be concentrated among cleaners and custodians; Northwest has said other airlines use contractors to do that work for less.

AMFA represents nearly 3,500 mechanics, about 790 cleaners and 75 custodians.

Northwest has said it needs $1.1 billion in labor savings. Only pilots have agreed, accepting a 15 percent pay cut worth $300 million when combined with cuts for salaried employees. It is negotiating with ground workers and flight attendants, and it has said it can reopen talks with pilots once it gets concessions from the other groups.

After talks broke off late Friday, union negotiator Jim Young said the mechanics would rather see the airline go into bankruptcy than agree to Northwest's terms. The Aircraft Mechanics Fraternal Association represents about 11 percent of Northwest's 40,000 employees.

In addition to Detroit and Minneapolis, Northwest has hubs in Memphis, Tenn., Tokyo and Amsterdam, Netherlands.