pilots

Air Canada and its pilots resolved their contract dispute at the last minute on Saturday, preventing a strike.

Air Canada and Canadian businesses are imploring the Canadian government to take action as the airline’s standoff with pilots over a new contract nears a tipping point.

Atlas Air has invested in a pilot academy designed to better cultivate the available talent pool for flying its large freighters.

FedEx will fly fewer aircraft and go to fewer U.S. cities starting this fall after the U.S. Postal Service gave its primary air cargo contract to a competitor.

Pilots for Western Global Airlines say they need help from the National Mediation Board to move along negotiations on a labor agreement.

The end of Aloha Air Cargo’s service from the West Coast to Hawaii will result in unpaid leaves of absence for 18 pilots.

Amerijet, trying to pull out of a downward spiral, is floating possible furloughs to address a pilot surplus.

The pilots union at ABX Air, a large contract carrier for DHL, is taking a novel approach toward labor relations by promoting the company at industry trade shows.

Express delivery giant UPS is recruiting pilots again after beating out FedEx for the Postal Service’s air transport contract.

The FedEx pilots union is telling members that the company’s slow response to its demands is triggering tougher tactics. FedEx says there is so much turmoil in the union that it doesn’t know what demands to take seriously.

Bad blood between factions in the FedEx pilots’ union is making it difficult to present a unified position in collective bargaining with the company. Some hard-liners are turning against leadership and pushing for a strike to get better terms.

Pilots at FedEx say talks on a new contract are at a stalemate and have asked the National Mediation Board to send the dispute to arbitration.

Pilots at Air Transport International say the parent company wants to prolong contract talks for another two years so it can synchronize a labor deal with a new Amazon transportation services agreement. Meanwhile, the company is having a difficult time retaining experienced pilots.

FedEx Express wants to compensate for a surplus of pilots by lowering guaranteed pay and offering severance packages once a new labor contract is reached. Meanwhile, mechanics are agitating to unionize.

Cargo pilots at Air Transport International are frustrated by the pace of negotiations for a labor deal and ready to go on strike.

FedEx pilots have voted down an upgraded contract that would have raised pay scales by 30%.

Amazon is dialing back flights for its European cargo airline. The third party operating those flights has let go nearly 30 pilots.

The board of the FedEx pilots union has endorsed a contract agreement and sent it to members for an up-or-down vote.

There’s plenty of cargo news in Canada with WestJet avoiding a pilots strike and Air Canada expanding its freighter network to Costa Rica.

Cargo shipments will cease on Friday as WestJet pilots walk off the job. The airline is trying to avoid a chaotic situation by taking down aircraft ahead of the deadline.

WestJet Cargo finally got airborne last month after nearly a year of unexpected delays and now faces a shutdown by week’s end because of a labor dispute.

Amerijet, a mid-tier cargo airline with growth ambitions, has struck a tentative deal with pilots for a new contract.

FedEx is shrinking its network of pilot bases in an effort to cut costs. The move follows a recent decision to transfer a major maintenance facility at LAX airport to Indianapolis.

The FedEx pilots’ union is asking members to vote on a strike authorization for possible later use.

Artificial intelligence, not magic, allows Merlin to operate small aircraft without a human pilot.

Hawaiian Airlines faces some headwinds in 2023, including some extra temporary costs to prepare for new business flying freighters for Amazon.

FedEx Express and the union representing its pilots on Wednesday filed for federal mediation with the National Mediation Board to help unglue contract negotiations that began in May 2021. The joint filing by FedEx (NYSE: FDX) and the Air Line Pilots Association requests expedited mediation under the Railway Labor Act. FedEx pilots are disgruntled by […]

(UPDATED: Lufthansa announced Sept. 12 that it finalized a contract with pilots that will carry through the end of June 2023. And dnata announced Sept. 8, 2022, that had reached agreement in principal on a new collective bargaining agreement with employees, forestalling a potential strike.) Airport services provider dnata is making contingency plans for a […]

A 24-hour strike by Lufthansa cockpit crews will shut down the company’s freighters. Logistics providers worry future union actions could be more serious.

UPS Airlines is keeping its pilots happy with a new contract extension.

FedEx pilots want a rich new labor deal to keep up with their counterparts at United and UPS.

The omicron variant is depleting aircrews at FedEx just as it has among passenger airlines, resulting in customer delays for both industries.

Sun Country maintains labor peace with its pilots.

A union that recently wrested allegiance of pilots at Cargojet away from a competing union now says the company fired some members for their organizing activity.

Atlas Air pilots are peeved that an outside arbitrator jammed a new labor contract down their throat. Union says many are threatening to leave.

Bad apples can jump from one company to another because their full employment history doesn’t always follow them. It happens in all industries. But when bad pilots get a second chance, it can be deadly.

The Air Line Pilots Association has accused the bargaining unit for Cargojet pilots of going along with the company’s effort to weaken new anti-fatigue rules.

Hong Kong has finally made it easier for certain airlines to operate by easing some COVID restrictions for pilots. Cargo operators will benefit the most.

Not X-men. Xwing. But it’s cool too if you like planes that fly by themselves.

Pilots at Western Global Airlines are unionizing.

Kalitta Air pilots on Tuesday ratified a new collective bargaining agreement, which the Air Line Pilots Association says significantly improves retirement benefits and working conditions. The four-year labor contract covers more than 800 pilots with the Ypsilanti, Michigan-based airline. The previous contract became amendable on Dec. 20. “After one year of negotiations amidst the pandemic […]

Hong Kong has some of the most rigid COVID-19 health measures and travel restrictions in the world. New rules targeted at home-based crews are impacting operations at Cathay Pacific and FedEx, where pilots are also griping about the lack of good air conditioning when overnighting in China.

Pilots and air traffic controllers can take both new coronavirus vaccines under new guidance from the Federal Aviation Administration.

Pilots could have violated their medical authorizations to fly if they took the COVID-19 vaccine on their own without permission. The FAA removed that issue and gave them permission Saturday.

Who will get to the front of the COVID vaccination line? Virtually everyone agrees front-line doctors and nurses, and people in nursing homes, should be first, but after that industry sectors are fighting over who is more important. Freight transportation groups say they should be in the top tier.

UPS pilots say the company isn’t holding up its end of the bargain to keep them safe while flying cargo during a pandemic. UPS denies the claims.

The CARES Act was a Band-Aid for the airline industry, holding tens of thousands of jobs in place for a brief period. Now the Band-Aid is coming off and without a fresh dressing, American Airlines and competitors are planning big layoffs.

Air Transport Services Group is becoming a one-stop service shop for outsourced airline services, especially for cargo operators.

FedEx pilots say they face risks to their safety, well-being and mental health in Hong Kong, where they must submit to aggressive quarantine procedures.

Blame game: The National Transportation Safety Board says an incompetent co-pilot caused an Atlas Air cargo plane to crash. Contributing factors were an inattentive captain, poor pilot vetting by the company and the FAA’s slowness developing a database for pilot records. The pilots union only points the finger at the company and the FAA.

Recipe for disaster: a pilot who made serious mistakes, panicked, had a history of reacting poorly under stress and lied about it to his employer – Atlas Air.

Pilots don’t want to fly to Hong Kong because of mandatory crew tests for coronavirus. Some airlines have hit the pause button on flights to avoid crews getting trapped in long quarantines.

Airline watchers need to pump the brakes on optimism for an industry recovery just because some preliminary figures show an uptick in bookings and fewer cancellations, says Delta’s CFO.

The COVID-19 pandemic has created choppy conditions in the airfreight market, but air cargo companies like Atlas Air are mostly seeing upside for their business.

The airline industry is considered essential to keeping the creaky economy going, but pilots, flight attendants and ground workers don’t always feel they are treated as essential when it comes to protection from the coronavirus.

A major pilots union is criticizing airlines for allegedly skirting recommended best practices to protect workers from the coronavirus.

A pilot’ union says airlines need to be held more accountable for protecting cockpit crews from the coronavirus, but at the corporate level all airlines appear to be taking health guidelines very seriously.

Pilots can fly aircraft with expired medical certificates for three extra months because the FAA doesn’t want to burden healthcare workers or increase chances for spreading the coronavirus.

UPS pilots stand to see improved wages and retirement benefits from a new contract.

More substantive talks could ensue in the four-year-old labor saga between Atlas Air and its pilots’ union after a federal appeals court ruled the union must abide by arbitration procedures.

Canadian airlines, already facing a pilot shortage, now face higher labor costs associated with new pilot work rules.

The Southwest Airlines Pilots Association on Monday sued The Boeing Co., [NYSE: BA]claiming the manufacturer engaged in fraud and that the grounding of the 737 MAX by regulators is costing its pilots millions of dollars in lost wages each month.  In a complaint filed Oct. 7 in the District Court of Dallas County, Texas, the […]

Taken by themselves, recent safety concerns with Boeing aircraft might be seen as part of normal checks and balances. But in the wake of the 737 MAX accidents, any safety question is receiving extra public scrutiny.

Logistics providers have been able to plan around the British Airways labor disruption and avoid cargo delays for their clients.

Market expert Cathy Roberson looks at the airlines’ and air cargo carriers’ need for pilots today and for the forthcoming future. Many factors are contributing to this ongoing need; ecommerce is a major factor.