Purchase, N.Y.-based AAWW is DHL’s largest cargo contractor and Amazon’s “newest one,” according to a release sent for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.
The pilots “say their company (AAWW) does not have enough pilots to meet clients’ needs and are looking for work at other airlines because their employer refuses to come to an industry-standard contract agreement that will address staffing shortages,” the Teamsters’ release said.
RELATED: ABX-union dispute goes to arbitration.
The “looming mass departure” of pilots from AAWW is revealed in two surveys of current and former pilots at Atlas Air and Southern Air — subsidiaries of AAWW — released today by the Airline Professionals Association, Teamsters Local 1224, the union said.
Earlier this year, pilots at Atlas, Southern, ABX Air and two other cargo carriers that fly for DHL voted with 99 percent support to strike, the union said.
According to the union, 88 percent of surveyed AAWW pilots say their carrier does not have enough pilots.
RELATED: Strike ABX pilots return to work.
“As professional pilots, our top priority — second only to safety — is making sure our customers get their deliveries on time, and that’s why we are so concerned about the direction of our airline,” Teamsters Local 1224 President and Atlas Air captain Daniel Wells said in the release. “I’ve already seen a number of pilots leave Atlas for better opportunities at other carriers.”
A message seeking comment was left for an Atlas Air spokeswoman.
Joe Hete, chief executive of Air Transport Services Group — which owns Wilmington’s ABX Air — told the Dayton Daily News last week that the issue of scheduling and the number of flights pilots are assigned will now go to arbitration.
“First and foremost the judge ruled that the remaining open issue the union raised is a ‘minor dispute,’ so effectively it goes to grievance/arbitration,” Hete said. “Beyond that, should be business as usual.”
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