July 21
As widely reported, American Airlines announced an industry record aircraft order yesterday for 460 jets spread across Boeing and Airbus. American’s tweets came alive in the morning and I clicked through one and watched part of the live stream from a Dallas Admirals Club where American’s Chairman & CEO Gerard Arpey made the formal announcement with Airbus & Boeing executives flanking his sides. The carrier will introduce Airbus A319 and A321 aircraft beginning in 2013 along with adding additional next generation Boeing 737s to their fleet. In addition to eliminating MD80s, the eventual retirement of American’s 757s and 767-200s was also mentioned, and for a more descriptive breakdown of the order, check out AAdvantageGeek’s posting today.
Also yesterday, American announced a $286 million loss for the second quarter of 2011, worse than analysts had anticipated and an unfavorable signal pointing to dismal full year results. According to an article by Terry Maxon appearing in the Los Angeles Times on July 1st, airline analysts claim AMR Corporation “will lose more than $600 million in 2011 and more than $100 million next year.” This while Delta and United are predicted to post profits of $1.2 & $1.3 billion respectively this year, with both carriers likely earning $1.7 billion in 2012. How long can American continue to hemorrhage money like this? No wonder they were first at bat in the attempt to shake up the distribution model whose annual expense for an airline is near the top after direct operating costs.
Next up, the Irish Times reported yesterday that American is planning to close its Dublin Ireland reservations center where approximately 130 employees currently man the facility that has been around for the past 15 years. The carrier informed the Irish Communication Workers Union and is now in “a period of consultation to discuss a proposal to outsource the work to an offshore location.” No disrespect, but I’m hoping offshore from Ireland means those jobs will come back to the U.S.
Finally, according to the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection (BUAV), American Airlines has clarified its policy on transporting non-human primates (monkeys) to outright ban the acceptance of such animals intended for “laboratory research, experimentation or exploitation purposes.” Very welcome news and how sad to think that some airlines still accept monkeys for this purpose. Only one U.S. airline remains on BUAV’s list of carriers that “do or would” fly primates destined for the research industry. Eh hem… paging Continental Airlines. I will follow up this post with a direct inquiry to United to see if they’re even aware Continental is on the list.
