From Bloomberg:

US Airways Group Inc., grappling with the U.S. airline industry’s worst service and on-time rankings, may hire an operations chief 11 months after deciding not to fill the position.

“We’ve been telling employees all summer long that we understand a chief operations officer is something we ought to consider doing,” said Andrea Rader, a spokeswoman for the Tempe, Arizona-based carrier. “It’s beyond the we think it’s a ‘nice idea’ stage.”

Hiring a chief operating officer would mark a change of strategy. Late last year, President Scott Kirby took on oversight of flight, maintenance and safety operations after the resignation of operations chief Al Crellin, 59. The airline said then that Kirby would keep the duties “long term.”

It’s about time. Although I don’t think, as this article implies, that  Crellin’s departure was the problem. I think it’s clear that there was too much responsibility spread too thinly across too few people — after the airline did not reappoint a COO, following Jeff McClelland’s death in ’06. This occurred before Crellin left the airline. (Although this decision probably hastened his departure.)

Ticker: (NYSE:LCC)

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