Fuel costs may ground more flights, says AA CEO
American Airlines CEO Gerard Arpey warned Thursday that the soaring costs of jet fuel could force his airline to cancel even more flights this fall. "It's been an extraordinary price increase," Arpey is quoted as saying by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram (free registration) about the rise of jet-fuel costs. "As an industry, we're going to have to figure out how to pass that cost on to our customers, which so far we haven't been able to do." American has already trimmed 15 flights from its schedule, saying fuel costs made them too expensive to operate. Meanwhile, Arpey could also be getting ready to push workers for additional cost cuts, reports The Dallas Morning News (free registration).
The paper notes that Arpey didn't actually use the word "concession" during his Thursday speech, but says he suggested AA can't survive in its current financial condition. "We have been, in my mind, continuously restructuring the company for many years now, and we're going to have to continuously reconstruct the company going forward, and we need labor to be our partner in that process," Arpey said. "We're going to work together to find our way out of this situation." Arpey also repeated earlier calls for the government to cut fees and taxes levied on airlines, according to The Associated Press. Some of those fees are added directly to travelers' fares, but cutting the fees could allow the struggling airlines to use that as a de-facto fare increase.
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