Avion

Issue date: 7/11/06 Section: Aeronautica

Airliner's meteorologists and programmers also assisted to make the flights more fuel efficient by selecting new routes which would encounter more favorable winds. In addition, overseas routes will also be chosen over land routes for shorter flight routes.

"What we're attempting to do here is to use the least amount of fuel to get from point A to point B," American dispatcher Frank Pascale told MSNBC.

American Airlines also collaborated with its employees and union to exploit more options. For the past three years, the airliner was able to increase its employee productivity by 20 percent.

Aside from these penny-saving actions, American Airlines also announced to increase airfare last week to raise more revenue to compensate for the hiking fuel cost.

"Our challenge is to continue to make improvements to drive the company to profitability. We're going to stay on that path and continue working on it until we get to that point," American Airlines CEO Gerard Arpey told m-Travel.com.

Despite the management's determination to avoid entering Chapter 11, American Airlines will have to overcome other obstacles in order to achieve this goal. This includes funding a $2.3 billion under funded pension plans of which $4.8 billion will be due in 2007. Their aging aircraft fleet is also another problem since all new aircraft orders are deferred until 2013.

"Bankruptcy as a solution is kind of un-American," American Airlines CFO Tom Horton told USATODAY.

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