United Airlines technicians rally for new contract amid record profits

The technicians are also dissatisfied with United sending aircraft offshore for heavy maintenance. Teamsters General President Sean M. O'Brien described this practice as "a reckless race to the bottom" and something the Teamsters will not tolerate.

"United Airlines raked in over $4 billion in profits last year," said O'Brien. "but instead of investing that money in the Teamsters who do the work, they want to send our members' jobs to communist China. "

It is common for airlines to send widebody aircraft offshore for maintenance, particularly when heavy checks are needed. Airlines in the U.S., Europe, and Asia often outsource these checks to specialists to reduce costs or find shop capacity unavailable in-house at that time.

Fleet information from ch-aviation shows that United has a fleet of just over 1,000 aircraft, with 72 listed as inactive. The full listing includes:

- 81 Airbus A319s

- 78 Airbus A320 and 31 A320neos

- 115 Boeing 737 MAX 8s and 90 MAX 9s

- 40 Boeing 737-700s and 141 Boeing-800s

-12 Boeing737-900s and136737-900ERs

-61Boeing757s

-53Boeing767s

-74Boeing777-200sand22777-300s

-12Boeing787-8s43Boeing7879sand21787–10

The Teamsters' statement said that in response to workers' claims, United recently offered "an outrageous proposal" that would put passengers at risk by outsourcing critical maintenance work. Fred Wood, a United technician at SFO and member of the United Airlines Teamsters National Negotiating Committee, said:

"Every day we take on huge responsibility ensuring safety customers keeping planes air would airline today without highly skilled labor Industry leading profits demand contracts rest until win agreement earned "

Simple Flying has contacted United Airlines; this article will be updated with any comments received from them.

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