It's another day of cancellations for American Airlines -- AMR Corp (NYSE: AMR) -- as its current round of plane inspections is moving slower than had been anticipated.Roughly 900 of the airlines flights have been canceled today, representing around 40% of its usual daily flight volume. The delays started on Tuesday when the American announced that it had to re-run inspections that it held last month after the FAA decided that the work done did not meet its standards.
On Tuesday the airline canceled 460 flights, and then another 1,094 yesterday, so it has been a tough few days for passengers trying to get to their destinations. All in all, over 100,000 passengers have been effected by the current situation at American.
At first, the company stated that the inspections would probably last through at least last night, but they have since realized the degree to which these inspections will be, and are now warning travelers to expect more of the same through the weekend.
Just how big of a job is American looking at? Well, the inspections involve the airlines fleet of MD-80s. All together, this represents a total of 300 planes. Of these 300 planes, so far only 179 have begun inspections, and out of those 179 planes, only 60 have been put back in service. So, since it has taken over 2 days to get 60 planes back into service, you could assume that we are going to be hearing of a lot more cancellations in the days to come.
Typically, it would be a lot easier for travelers to find seats on alternative airlines, but with the airline industry currently running at only 80%, stranded passengers are having a much harder time finding alternatives to reach their destinations.
If you are scheduled to fly on American over the next few days, you would be well advised to take a few minutes to visit their website first, and double check that your flight is still on schedule before you go to the hassle of getting to the airport only to find out your flight has been grounded.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
4-11-2008 @ 2:41PM
Beth said...
Looks like I better keep an eye on my Monday morning flight.