Storm warnings on summer travel front

Like long-range weather forecasts, predicting prevailing travel conditions over the coming weeks and months is always speculative. But as we head into the busy summer travel season, dark clouds on the horizon indicate a bumpy ride. That's true for air travelers across the country, but US Airways passengers might just be facing a perfect storm.

There has already been plenty of turbulence in the air. As all of the nation's airlines wrestle with operating a profitable enterprise despite cutthroat price competition, restive employees, alienated customers, demanding investors and soaring costs, carrier after carrier has had to seek bankruptcy protection to re-align itself.

US Airways, Delta, United, Northwest have all flirted with extinction, but while several smaller airlines have bitten the dust, to date, none of the major carriers has folded completely. So far.

Airlines have been aggressively shaving operating costs however they can as they look to generate revenue.

They have eliminated amenities -- from in-flight meals to paper tickets -- and become adept at charging for once-free services, from curb-side luggage check-ins to last-minute itinerary changes.

While safety apparently hasn't been compromised, support work forces have been pared and outsourced, from baggage handlers, to reservationists to cleaning crews.

US Airways announcement last week that it is slashing its Pittsburgh flight service yet again is evidence of another favorite airline strategy. By reducing the number of daily departures and nonstop service they offer, airlines have been successful at increasing their "load factors," essentially the proportion of seats occupied by paying passengers when the plane departs.

More flights are fully booked, with less wiggle room to accommodate last-minute passengers, including those who may have been on flights that were delayed or canceled. Indeed operating on schedule these days has become an endless ballet of tightly coordinating planes and crews to fly them.

During peak traffic hours in major hub airports, there is literally no margin for disruption, and even a relatively minor incident can completely screw up the complex choreography. Add weather problems and there's a total meltdown.

For the management of US Airways, which has been trying to figure out how to merge the operations and cultures of two carriers into one efficient entity, the task has had its own set of challenges.

Unfortunately, their success record has not been encouraging. The melding of admittedly complicated but somewhat tangential issues, such as Web sites and reservation systems, was accomplished, but not without huge disruptions in the normal flow of operations, resulting in long delays and outright cancellations of thousands of trips.

And they're just getting to the hard parts.

In many ways, US Airways and America West still operate as two separate airlines.

With more than 36,000 employees, merging their two work forces into single labor units is proving the toughest nut to crack. The battle lines between pilot unions are already forming, with US Airways pilots angry over big losses in seniority rankings and past givebacks, and America West pilots frustrated with a number of provisions being forced down their throats.

And all the employees want to share in the recent profits being posted by the carrier, especially in light of big compensation packages for selected executives.

Rising employee anger and plunging morale are never good signs for maintaining smoothly operating systems.

Last Sunday, for example, half of US Airways flights were delayed, a level of non-service not seen since the March madness, but with no storms or reservation system meltdown to blame.

As in March, airline executives blamed the poor performance on too many passengers, but other reports cited job actions by disgruntled US Airways pilots. The prospects for any type of accord are fleeting.

One has to wonder what would have happened had US Airways' proposed takeover of Delta Airlines gone forward.

Indeed, at US Airways' annual meeting Tuesday, C.E.O. Doug Parker admitted that the labor situation was worsening, and hopes for hammering out labor agreements have been postponed from spring until the end of the year at the earliest. As Mr. Parker noted, "If we don't start running a good airline, we will drive customers away."

That may be the safest bet of all.

Even with these cutbacks at Pittsburgh International, US Airways will still operate the bulk of the airport's flights, and for trips to many cities, it's the only option.

But in other cases, there is a choice. While it may be too soon to tell travelers to avoid booking flights on US Airways, they would certainly be wise to keep these stormy forecasts in mind when evaluating their reservation options and make a purchase decision accordingly.

As Bob Dylan observed, "You don't have to be a weatherman to know which way the wind blows."