Passengers, please fasten your seat belts

To others, it was a callous and unnecessary judgment made by corporate executives overreacting to political forces pent up by years of official disdain for both enforcing existing maintenance regulations and protecting the traveling public. It's a disregard many fear is emblematic of larger currents defining how the American government has operated of late.

No matter your perspective, one fact is certain. The abrupt cancellation of more than 3,100 flights in a week grounded some 300,000 travelers, too many of whom were left with no other way to get where they were going.

As in other schedule meltdowns in recent years, for passengers it made no difference what the trip was for, how far in advance it was reserved, whether it was booked it online or through a travel agent, whether it was first-class or coach, nor how much fuel surcharge or security fee was paid -- no one was going anywhere that day or, in some extreme cases, even that week.

The official line: Safety trumps all other concerns. So sorry.

But the questions must be asked: Were those planes with undocumented wheel-wiring bundle fixes any less safe to fly the day before they were grounded? Is the otherwise superlative airline industry safety record over recent years of no importance?

If the answer to either of these questions is yes, then criminal inquiries should commence.

But if the only factor that changed was a corporation's willingness to accept the potential liability for a miniscule flight risk greatly magnified by renewed federal regulatory enforcement, then consumers and their advocates should be outraged.

Canceling up to 40 percent of its operating schedule certainly represents many millions of dollars in lost revenue to American Airlines and the other carriers who also grounded their MD 80s. This lost revenue is especially critical in the face of fuel price issues.

The financial losses to those 300,000 unlucky travelers are far greater, not to mention their collective inconvenience and anxiety.

Couldn't a less-disruptive process been worked out to re-establish regulatory compliance?

If not, air travelers are in for an even more exasperating summer than experts are already predicting.

Even this past week, Trans States Airlines, which flies Embraer ERJ145 regional jets for several commuter companies including US Airways Express from Pittsburgh and United Express from Dulles, started grounding planes for similar FAA compliance problems. As of this writing, 100 flights out of St. Louis have been scrubbed. There's every reason for local travelers to anticipate the same situation soon.

Another troubling conclusion is that this unfortunate dynamic between what we'll call "regulatory under-sight" and "regulatory overreaction" might well be a cancer that has already worked its way into the heart of too many American business sectors in recent years, transforming national institutions into withering hulks, castles of cards.

It is this fear that makes some observers skeptical of any proposed changes that come along, such as the plan announced earlier this week for the merger between Delta and Northwest airlines. That's especially true considering the myriad difficulties to which air travelers have been subjected since US Airways and America West merged in 2005. During the complex financial negotiations that have gone into this present merger, which would create the world's largest airline, how much consideration has been given to the impact it will have on the traveling public?

It's too early to predict consumer impacts. Apart from other considerations, regulatory hurdles must be cleared similar to those that tripped up a proposed United/US Airways merger several years ago.

And if this deal does go through, service at Pittsburgh International probably won't experience much change, at least not initially. Delta and Northwestern account for about 15 percent of flights from the airport, but there is no overlap between the cities they serve. Delta flies to its hubs in Atlanta, Cincinnati, New York's JFK and Salt Lake City, while Northwest flights go to Detroit, Memphis and Minneapolis. A combined carrier will certainly reassess its hub airports, but any change is years away, and, by then, another round of consolidation most likely will have taken place. News of the Delta/Northwestern deal already has rekindled speculation about US Airways and United getting together.

Of course, the corporate justifications given for these changes will continue to be couched in terms of consumer benefits and lower fares, but in this era of soaring fuel prices, shaky economies, cutthroat competition, and carbon-use considerations, unless these claims are backed by enforceable service regulations and passenger guarantees, they're likely to prove to be little more than lip service.

Once there was a time when hot air made flight possible, but those days have passed.