Posts tagged with "president of Association of Professional Flight Attendants"

November 18, 2019

As Popular Science reminds us, flying is actually the safest way to travel, statistically speaking—but now, even airline flight crews are worried about boarding the Boeing 737 Max when it is finally cleared to take off again next March.

By that time, fleets of Boeing aircraft worldwide will have been grounded for a year, following two crashes that killed a total of 346 people.

But that’s not long enough, the head of the pilots union for Southwest Airlines, Jon Weaks, wrote in a letter last week. He accused the aircraft manufacturer of rushing the  plane back into service and of “arrogance, ignorance, and greed,” in its approach to the 737 Max, Business Insider reported.

What’s more, American Airlines flight attendants are “begging” not to have to work on the 737 Max when it returns to service after its grounding, the head of the union representing them said on Thursday, November 14, according to a report by the same news outlet.

“I will tell you that I hear from flight attendants every day, and they’re begging me not to make them go back up in that plane,” Lori Bassani, the president of the Association of Professional Flight Attendants, said, according to The Dallas Morning News.

In fact, earlier this month, Bassani warned that many of the airlines’ 28,000 flight attendants could refuse to board the 737 Max once it is cleared for takeoff, if they do not believe it is safe.

American Airlines has 24 737 Max planes in its fleet, with 76 yet to be delivered by Boeing.

In separate comments Thursday, Bassani said that despite her worries about the Max’s return, her union would not join the scores of airlines, pilots, and victims’ families taking legal action against Boeing over the 737 Max crashes and its subsequent grounding.

Airlines and staff are suing the plane manufacturer over lost wages from the plane’s grounding.

“It’s not our only aircraft, so our people didn’t really lose wages,” she told the Dallas Business Journal. “Their schedules were changed and they were impacted, but they could always get another flight on another airplane.”

Research contact: @businessinsider