Alberchico From United States of America, joined Sep 2004, 2685 posts, RR: 0 Posted (7 years 10 months 1 week 5 days 1 hour ago) and read 4112 times:
Were all the majors making profits and hiring pilots right up until 9/11 or did they start to slump before. If there were no terrorist attacks, would the majors like AA or UA continued making profits? How was the management at the majors BEFORE 9/11 ?
short summary of every jewish holiday: they tried to kill us ,we won , lets eat !
Srbmod From United States of America, joined Mar 2001, 16888 posts, RR: 51 Reply 1, posted (7 years 10 months 1 week 5 days 1 hour ago) and read 4096 times:
Quoting Alberchico (Thread starter): Were all the majors making profits and hiring pilots right up until 9/11 or did they start to slump before.
The economy started to slump in the last few months of 2000 as a result of the tech bubble bursting. Airlines started to see a slump in travel and profits were beginning to slide and some airlines started layoff and had hiring freezes. It really was the beginning of the downward trend of the cycle for the industry. 9/11 just made a bad situation worse. Had 9/11 not happened, the recovery would have started several years earlier than it did (and not everybody has recovered yet). Without 9/11, the industry would have probably been back to normal by now. You probably still would have had the US and UA bankruptcies and probably the Hawaiian and Aloha ones as well (As in a down economy, people won't go on as expensive vacations, so folks would have stayed on the mainland instead.). There still would have been some airlines go out of business, like National still would have gone out of business as they were in CH. 11 close to a year before 9/11. Midway and Vanguard may have been able to ride out the storm, but probably not without some sort of merger deal or new ownership (And probably would have become Hooters Air). Ozark/Great Plains still would have failed, and some of the charter airlines that depend on the US military contracts may have been affected, as the Iraq War probably would have never taken place, nor would the Afghan involvement. I think AirTran would not have grown as big as it had either, as they took advantage of opportunities that arose as a result of the post-9/11 cutbacks and the cutbacks associated with the financial problems of some airlines.
Dutchjet From Netherlands, joined Oct 2000, 7864 posts, RR: 58 Reply 2, posted (7 years 10 months 1 week 5 days ago) and read 4076 times:
Short answer: the airline industry was already headed for trouble. The US and world economies were losing strength, and after some very good years of record passengers, fast expansion, lots of aircraft orders and high-flying profits, things were slowing down and the airlines were facing an over capacity problem. The airline industry has always been cyclical, and a downturns were nothing new. Of course, the events of 9/11 made everything far worse and sent the entire industry into a nose-dive.
FlyingTexan From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 4, posted (7 years 10 months 1 week 5 days ago) and read 4031 times:
United and American were complete disasters and in terrible financial health. United was falling with their antics (or shall I say the unions) during the Summer of 2000.
ETStar From Canada, joined Jan 2004, 2103 posts, RR: 9 Reply 5, posted (7 years 10 months 1 week 4 days 23 hours ago) and read 4003 times:
Yup, and that event simply precipitated their spirals, and was well used and taken advantage of to justify layoffs and cost cuttings... the troubles did start way before that day though.
I wouldn't just dump on the unions. The proposed merger with US Airways was a costly problem - as was Avolar. The airline had been grossly mismanaged for some time.
Alberchico From United States of America, joined Sep 2004, 2685 posts, RR: 0 Reply 8, posted (7 years 10 months 1 week 4 days 16 hours ago) and read 3851 times:
Quoting Mariner (Reply 6): As noted in United's own history of itself, the problems existed before the Summer of Hell - the summer of 2000.
Are you talking about the delays that airline suffered that summer?
short summary of every jewish holiday: they tried to kill us ,we won , lets eat !
Mariner From New Zealand, joined Nov 2001, 22719 posts, RR: 88 Reply 9, posted (7 years 10 months 1 week 4 days 15 hours ago) and read 3839 times:
Quoting Alberchico (Reply 8): Are you talking about the delays that airline suffered that summer?
The summer of Hell was an industrial action by the pilots, a slow down. It caused chaos throughout the system, which is why it was caused "the summer of Hell":
FriendlySkies From United States of America, joined Aug 2004, 4006 posts, RR: 6 Reply 10, posted (7 years 10 months 1 week 4 days 15 hours ago) and read 3830 times:
And then a few weeks after that Goodwin was out of a job.
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