Comair is used to change. But nothing could likely have prepared officials at the Erlanger-based regional airline for what 2001 had in store for them.

        It's been less than a half a year since the pilot strike that threatened to put the carrier out of business was settled.

        At 89 days, it was the 27th-longest strike in airline history, and before the events of Sept. 11 devastated the entire industry, the walkout was perhaps the biggest aviation story of the year.

        Based on estimates given out by company officials, it cost Comair's parent company Delta Air Lines more than $320 million in lost revenue and restart costs, and kept Delta from being profitable for both the spring and summer.

        Comair laid off 2,400 workers, including about 1,600 local employees, and returned 37 planes, most of which have been or will be brought back.

        It also cost Comair's 1,200 or so pilots more than $13 million in lost wages.

        The community took a hit as well. The strike, coupled with April's riots, hurt area tourism. It meant the shutdown of an entire section of the airport and an additional 152 layoffs.

        And the loss of local spending by passengers and Comair employees had a negative effect on the local economy, which was just starting into recessionary mode.

        Whether the strike changed the company forever remains to be seen. But it did have an impact on the rest of the regional airline industry, as other carriers took different approaches with their pilots or regional carriers in general.

        And whether Comair or its pilots won in the ultimate economic battleground has yet to be decided as well.

        The contract the pilots signed was better, but not much better, than the one they turned down both before the strike and midway through.

        It made Comair pilots the highest paid in the regional industry, but it didn't raise pay levels to that of Delta mainline pilots, even on a per-passenger basis. Still, it left many pilots feeling as if it was “a complete” contract, with the same kinds of benefits and limitations on work rules that mainline pilots have.

        Comair is still licking its wounds, but has all but resumed the growth pattern it was on two years ago before the storm clouds gathered. It plans to have more planes at the end of 2002 than it did at the beginning of 2001.

        And the next year looks bright, with Delta pushing more business to its regional carriers as a way to cut costs.

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Tristate by the numbers
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