American Airlines Group Inc is to notify 13,000 workers that they could be laid off due to the prolonged industry downturn if the COVID-19 situation does not improve and US government aid is not extended, the carrier said on Wednesday.
The airline expects to fly at least 45 percent less in the first quarter, the carrier’s executives said in a letter to employees, extending the industry slump as expectations for a travel recovery are delayed due to the slow rollout of COVID-19 vaccines.
“Of course, this is not where we want to be, and we will work with union leadership to do everything we can to mitigate job impact as much as possible,” American chief executive officer Doug Parker and president Robert Isom said in the letter.
Photo: Reuters
The airline no longer expects to be at full capacity this summer, they said.
“The vaccine is not being distributed as quickly as any of us believed, and new restrictions on international travel that require customers to have a negative COVID-19 test have dampened demand,” they added.
American’s announcement came after United Airlines Holdings Inc last week sent similar notices to 14,000 workers.
Parker and Isom said that they backed efforts by airline worker unions to win another round of support in the US Congress, with current federal aid set to expire on April 1. US President Joe Biden has proposed a US$1.9 trillion COVID-19 economic relief package, currently being discussed in Congress.
The company also plans to establish new programs to encourage early retirement or voluntary furloughs.
Hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, American’s revenue fell 62 percent last year, and the airline reported an annual loss of US$8.9 billion.
In a quarterly earnings report released last week, the carrier said that it expected revenue this quarter to fall 60 to 65 percent compared with the same period last year.
American furloughed 19,000 workers in October last year after a prior round of US federal support expired, but brought the workers back after the US Congress enacted more federal support at the end of last year.
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