This article from NYTimes.com has been sent to you by psa188@xxxxxxxxx /-------------------- advertisement -----------------------\ Explore more of Starbucks at Starbucks.com. http://www.starbucks.com/default.asp?ci=1015 \----------------------------------------------------------/ Travelers Seem Calm as Airlines Squirm April 26, 2003 By DAVID BARBOZA CHICAGO, April 25 - There were few tears or traumatized passengers at O'Hare International Airport this afternoon. Travelers who have lived through the bankruptcy filing by United Airlines have come to believe that if American Airlines is eventually forced into bankruptcy protection - something it avoided yet again today - everything will work out. "I don't think about it," said Ira Nadel, who just returned to Chicago from a business trip to Salt Lake City on United. "Somehow, things will work out. I can't imagine two of the biggest airlines going under." His wife, Audrey, however, had some of her own concerns. "What's this going to mean for our frequent-flier miles? We want our miles." Her sister, Leslie Silverman, fresh from an American flight from Hartford, and busy pulling bags together at Carousel 10, cut in. "Is that your biggest concern? This is our economy," she said to her sister. "We're not going to have an airline to fly." But most travelers here at O'Hare - one of the world's busiest airports and a major hub for American and United - seemed calm, disinterested, even blasé about the volatile situation at American. Gerry McLaughlin, 60, a human resources worker in Chicago who was searching for some large, black suitcases in the American terminal, considered the possibility of a bankruptcy filing. "They're not the first airline to go into bankruptcy and they won't be the last." "They'll go into bankruptcy and eventually they'll come out," he added. "It's the way the system is supposed to work." American, of course, did not file for bankruptcy protection today. But some of the airline's employees suggested that morale had plummeted. You could not sense that at O'Hare, where the check-in counters were being run by smiling clerks. But for many of American's workers around the country, there was a sense that time was running out for their flight careers. "I'm going to fly as many hours as I can," said Karla Johnson, who has worked as an American flight attendant for 14 years. "This is my only income. Right now, I fly between 115, 120 hours in a 30-day time period. I'm allowed to fly up to 160 hours. I'll fly as much as possible." Indeed, this was a day when many of American's flight attendants - who had held out until the last moment on negotiating a contract - were expressing outrage at management. They did not have kind words for Donald J. Carty, who resigned Thursday night as chairman and chief executive at American and its parent, AMR. "He should have resigned because how can we trust him," said Tania Wagner, an American flight attendant who is based in Miami. "He was running the company, and we didn't know what he was doing. We cut so many things to keep the company from going bankrupt when behind the curtain he was keeping the money." Ms. Wagner said she expected that she might lose her job. And so might many of her colleagues. "I think a bunch of us are going to be fired, but we don't know," she said. For most American's employees, the contract talks had come down to something very elemental: jobs, careers and making a decent wage. Yet travelers - still coping with the aftermath of Sept. 11, long security checks, a war in Iraq, a mysterious illness in foreign lands, constant flight delays and the everyday complications like finding children's suitcases - it really does not feel as if the life of one of the world's biggest airlines is at stake. Last year, more than 66 million passengers traveled through O'Hare. There were over 2,000 flights a day, about 80 percent of them on American Airlines or United, which is based here and is a unit of UAL. No one expects the big airlines to collapse or pull out. "I'm not worried at all," said Sister Maria Catherine, a Roman Catholic nun who arrived in Chicago this afternoon with Sister Mary Beata to attend a conference. "We're worried for the people; we don't want them to lose their jobs. But we think everything will be fine." Many passengers, though, said that what was happening to American Airlines was partly a result of a weak economy and partly a result of corporate greed. "What those guys were doing was an outrage," said Henry Ruiz, 42, who had traveled to Chicago from McAllen, Tex. "The executives have lost all credibility, especially Carty." Steven J. Schulman, 51, a professor of economics at Colorado State University, looked up from a book he was reading while seated in the American terminal at O'Hare to express similar feelings. "This is indicative of a moral collapse," he said. "The powerful people think everything is theirs for the taking. How come my son understands the difference between right and wrong and they don't?" He was not finished. "They take things because they can. It's wrong in the fourth grade and it's wrong now." There are, of course, those who worry about whether American will stop flying here or there, or whether they'll lose out on certain comforts, like Christine Lance, 28, who said she liked the seat room American flights offered. Then there was the competition, the men and women who worked at other airlines. A 31-year-old US Airways pilot named Vincent, who declined to give his last name, said he was just happy to have a job. "I've got friends working at Home Depot because they've lost their jobs," he said. "They're pilots, but they aren't pilots because they're not working anymore." http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/26/business/26REAC.html?ex=1052384232&ei=1&en=219ecd9f4f78b6bb HOW TO ADVERTISE --------------------------------- For information on advertising in e-mail newsletters or other creative advertising opportunities with The New York Times on the Web, please contact onlinesales@xxxxxxxxxxx or visit our online media kit at http://www.nytimes.com/adinfo For general information about NYTimes.com, write to help@xxxxxxxxxxxx Copyright 2003 The New York Times Company