A PlaneBusiness Banter subscriber sent us more information concerning the problems at Northwest today. Here’s an excerpt.

“There is anecdotal evidence that up to 1500 flights have been cancelled within a 2 week period. Crews are being rescheduled left and right and called at home on days off. Apparently there is a memo that has been sent to gate agents to tell passengers that flights are being cancelled for weather as opposed to crew shortages. Also some flights are being cancelled well ahead of schedule and showing up in the reservations system as a code other than crew shortages.  All this going into our busiest, most profitable flying months.

The shortages are due to too many pilots being laid off during Ch11, and being called back too late and too slowly. One thing this shortage is NOT being caused by, and that is crews refusing to fly higher than normal hours. In fact crews are flying close to FAA limits, and many cancellations are occurring due to crews “timing out”. Many of the pilots commute to work and are have difficulty getting to base due to flight cancellations, adding insult to injury.”

Just my own personal two cents here.

I do know that when I was locked into LaGuardia two weeks ago — Northwest was cancelling flights left and right, while Delta and other carriers were only spot cancelling.

Ticker: NYSE:NWA