Stuck in the Southwest: Airline chief testifies to Congress on December crisis

DALLAS. On Thursday, a senior Southwest Airlines executive testified before Congress about the December air travel crash that resulted in a $220 million net loss for the Dallas-based airline in the fourth quarter.

Southwest canceled about 16,700 flights in the last 10 days of December. The crisis began with a winter storm, but Southwest continued to struggle long after most other airlines had recovered, in part because its crew planning system had become overwhelmed. Union officials said they have been warning the airline about the system for years, especially after similar but less serious flight disruptions in October 2021.

In a four-hour Senate hearing, Southwest COO Andrew Watterson answered questions from frustrated lawmakers.

“Let me be clear, we screwed up,” Watterson said in his opening statement.

ABC News reported possible evidence that more than 500 flights left without passengers.

Watterson laid out plans to spend millions on upgrades to de-icing systems and $1.3 billion on technology. He said that new software would be launched on Friday to change crew schedules.

“The big issue that led to this, which led to our processes and technology being overloaded, is how we handled winter operations,” he said.

In January, the US Department of Transportation said it was investigating whether Southwest Airlines was cheating customers by knowingly scheduling more flights for the end of December than it could realistically handle. The department said scheduling too many flights would be considered unfair and misleading practice under federal law.

The head of the airline’s pilots’ union called the strong unique direct link system and said the real problems came from outdated software and operation.

“Despite the many opportunities, Southwest management did not listen to their pilots and frontline employees who saw the crisis coming,” said Capt. Casey Murray, SWPA president.

December’s holiday travel setback cost Southwest $800 million in lost profits and higher costs, including employee bonuses and reimbursement to customers for hotels and alternative flights.

Southwest returned all but 200 of the bags without labels or identification. Watterson said they’ve reimbursed nearly 275,000 customers, of which about 11,000 remain.

“The main reason was how we handled our winter operations, and that’s where you’ll see how we put some focus over a multi-year period, because that’s what caused the dominoes to fall,” Watterson said.

Southwest COO Andrew Watterson was expected to speak at a hearing before the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, scheduled to begin at 9:00 am Central Time. Representatives of the pilots’ union are also expected to speak at the hearing.

Editor’s Note: The Associated Press contributed to this article.

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