The union representing more than 700 Spirit AeroSystems engineers presented the company with a counterproposal on wage and benefit issues today.
The engineers are represented by the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace. The current contract expires July 11.
Significant differences still exist between the parties, the union told workers in a memo.
But “SPEEA is working diligently to arrive at an agreement that is of mutual benefit and our team is able to recommend to members,” it said.
Talks on Wednesday will focus around the final major issues.
Frontier Airlines and Midwest Airlines formed a ticketing agreement that will allow Frontier to travel to destinations currently served by Midwest, the airline said this week.
But whether the marketing alliance will help Wichita fliers is too soon to say.
“It’s too early to know what’s going to happen,” Valerie Wise with the Wichita Airport Authority said. Frontier already serves Milwaukee, which is Midwest’s hub.
Both airlines were acquired by Republic Airways Holdings of Indianapolis last week. Frontier was bought out of bankruptcy. Republic, through its subsidiaries Chautauqua, Shuttle America and Republic, operate flights for other mainline airlines. Therefore, Republic does not have a hub or network of its own.
The marketing agreement between Frontier and Midwest will begin late this summer.
Frontier operates two daily flights from Wichita to its hub in Denver.
Negotiations between Spirit AeroSystems and its engineering union continue this week, but the union has a tough challenge ahead of it, Midwest director Bob Brewer said this morning.
The contract between Spirit engineers and the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace expires July 11.
The talks took a “grim and disappointing” turn on Friday when discussions turned toward benefits and compensation, the union said.
“We were thoroughly surprised by the first run of the economic issues,” Brewer said.
SPEEA is continuing to work with the company, Brewer said. He is hopeful talks will conclude this week.
WICHITA: It’s not a good feeling when you step off an airplane and realize your bag didn’t make it with you.
AirTran Airways CEO Bob Fornaro talked about lost bags last week while in Wichita for the Wichita Aero Club luncheon. Fornaro said that he considers an airline’s most important metric is its baggage performance.
“We want customers to make it with their bag,” Fornaro said. The airline got high marks on baggage handling in the Airlinperofe Quality Rating study co-authored by Wichita State University’s Dean Headley.
In my own experience, one case sticks out the most. A photographer and I arrived in Naples, Italy, to spend a week working on a reporting project for the Eagle. My bag arrived the day before I left. Thankfully, I had stuffed a pair of pants in a backpack. I wore khaki pants every day for work and jeans every night. The photographer wasn’t so lucky. Her bag never did arrive.
Fornaro said it best last week.
“Nothing good happens when you don’t have a bag.”
I’ll be out of the office for few days, but will return soon. Thanks for reading and check back often.
Tailwinds,
Molly
State and local subsidies that help cushion AirTran Airways against losses are what keep the carrier flying in and out of Wichita Mid-Continent Airport, AirTran’s CEO said this morning.
“We’d have a tough time getting the profitability,” AirTran CEO and president Bob Fornaro said this morning when asked what would happen without the subsidies. “The subsidy is necessary.”
Fornaro will be the keynote speaker at today’s Wichita Aero Club luncheon.
The state provides AirTran with a $5 million per year revenue guarantee. The city and county each provide $1 million in guarantees.
The state’s money for air service must be approved each year, however.
Wichita’s geography in the middle of the country hurts, because customers want to go north, south, east and west.
“That makes it hard to get the volumes,” Fornaro said. “People who want to go to Denver don’t want to go to Atlanta. It requires more service.”
In his day job, Wade Alexander flies jets for Cessna Aircraft. But in his free time, he loves to fly his 1960 Piper Comanche, which he affectionately calls his “Junkyard Dog.”
The aircraft has an interesting history. He discovered the plane after it had been wrecked by a previous owner when he ran out of fuel. Wade spent a year and a half bringing it back to flying condition.
It’s now a compilation of at least six different airplanes. Each wing, for example, is from a different plane. Wade — who owns the Comanche with a partner — did a lot of the work himself.
Recently, he and I flew the “Junkyard Dog” down to Vinita, Okla., to eat lunch. Wade even let me do some of the flying. From the airport, it was a short walk to a “fly-in” McDonald’s he’d discovered one day. That’s it in the background of the photo.
The McDonald’s straddles the highway. So while eating chicken sandwiches from a table upstairs, we could watch cars and semis pass along the highway underneath.
Afterward, we flew over Grand Lake where there were plenty of boats on the water below. We landed at the Shangri-La airport before heading back to the Augusta Airport.
I never knew a trip to McDonald’s could be so fun. But then, everything is a little more adventurous with a Junkyard Dog.
Egypt’s Smart Aviation will take delivery this year of two Cessna Aircraft Citation Sovereigns certified for medical evacuations this year.
The interiors will be adapted to handle patient care.
LifePort, a supplier of medical aircraft interiors, will certify a patient loading system in a single configuration this month for the Sovereign, followed by a dual patient interior later this year.
A good friend called this morning. She’s been worried about her son-in-law, who’s worked at Cessna Aircraft for 11 years in production. He was braced to get a 60-day layoff notice today.
Thankfully, he was spared this morning. Another son-in-law wasn’t so lucky. He was laid off in an earlier round of cuts.
A Cessna employee called me this morning as well. He didn’t get laid off, but was aching for those who were. We all are.
As Cessna’s head of marketing Tom Aniello told me for a story this week, the folks in marketing, sales and in management take all of this very seriously. They’re in a fight to sell airplanes so people can stay working, he said.
The market for new airplanes will come back. But it will take time.
In the meantime, let’s give a hand and a boost where we can to those who are feeling the effects from this down economy.
A U.S. Navy E-6B arrived at Boeing Wichita on Monday for nine-months of extensive modifications, Boeing said.
Workers will install a specially designed antenna and upgrades to its communications function.
The E-6B is a modified Boeing 707 and supports airborne command post missions for the U.S. military.
