Bavi­ta Gopaulchan

There were two flight can­cel­la­tions and some de­lays yes­ter­day but the T&T Pi­lots As­so­ci­a­tion (TTAL­PA) said it was not due to in­dus­tri­al ac­tion pi­lots al­though they are dis­ap­point­ed by the Gov­ern­ment’s si­lence on its four per cent wage in­crease and re­quest for a meet­ing.

Pas­sen­gers on BW480 head­ed to Ft Laud­erdale were at the de­par­ture gate when they were ad­vised by Caribbean Air­lines (CAL) rep­re­sen­ta­tives that the flight had been can­celled ap­prox­i­mate­ly an hour be­fore the sched­uled 10.15 am de­par­ture.

Among the af­fect­ed pas­sen­gers were stu­dents sched­uled to sit ex­ams and oth­ers head­ing to a fu­ner­al who said they were left with no choice but to book seats on an­oth­er air­line.

“They on­ly said that the crew did not show up,” a pas­sen­ger said.

A 5.55 pm flight bound for JFK In­ter­na­tion­al in New York, BW550, was al­so can­celled. Af­fect­ed pas­sen­gers were lat­er in­formed that re­cov­ery flights would be put in place. CAL’s Cor­po­rate Com­mu­ni­ca­tions ex­ec­u­tive man­ag­er said the re­cov­ery flight to New York was sched­uled for last night while a re­cov­ery flight for Ft Laud­erdale was sched­uled for this morn­ing.

While CAL of­fi­cials not­ed that re­funds are as­so­ci­at­ed with fare rules and oth­er con­di­tions, they did not re­spond to ques­tions on whether there was any ac­tion be­ing tak­en by the pi­lots. How­ev­er, In­dus­tri­al Re­la­tions Con­sul­tant, Christo­pher Bai­ley, sought to as­sure that the can­cel­la­tions and de­lays were not un­usu­al.

On Mon­day, TTAL­PA re­quest­ed a meet­ing with Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert to dis­cuss the re­sump­tion of talks on the nine-year ex­pired col­lec­tive agree­ment for 2015 to 2020 and “the com­pa­ny’s de­vi­a­tion from re­cruit­ment stan­dards as out­lined in CAL’s Op­er­a­tions Man­u­al rais­ing se­ri­ous safe­ty con­cerns.”

It was the union’s sec­ond let­ter to the Gov­ern­ment this year. A let­ter was al­so sent to the Im­bert on April 9 re­quest­ing a meet­ing.

“There has been no ac­knowl­edge­ment nor re­ply to the let­ter so noth­ing what­so­ev­er,” said Ja­son Wick­ham, TTAL­PA’s vice chair­man.

The union rep­re­sents more than 100 of CAL’s 200-plus pi­lots. On Oc­to­ber 3, some of them staged a peace­ful plac­ard protest at Pi­ar­co call­ing for a four per cent wage in­crease.

Wick­ham said: “I wouldn’t say pi­lots are los­ing hope but there is a lev­el of frus­tra­tion be­cause as I said it has been nine years. TTAL­PA has been very re­spon­si­ble in terms of the four per cent of­fer we have made to CAL, which is in line with the CPO’s of­fer, so we do not think we are be­ing un­rea­son­able.”

A dozen in­ter­na­tion­al mem­ber as­so­ci­a­tions and unions have come out in sup­port of TTAL­PA, in­clud­ing the Aus­tralian Fed­er­a­tion of Air Pi­lots (AFAP), Dutch AL­PA, AL­PA Cana­da and the Irish Air­line Pi­lots As­so­ci­a­tion.

Wick­ham could not con­firm as he said the union will have to meet to dis­cuss any fur­ther ac­tion to be tak­en. He said CAL pi­lots are among the low­est paid in the re­gion and he fears there could be an ex­o­dus of pi­lots from the air­line.

“They have been at­tend­ing in­ter­views in­ter­na­tion­al­ly. Many of them are pur­su­ing to con­vert their li­cences to Amer­i­can-type li­cences. Quite a num­ber of them have been ac­tive­ly look­ing and do­ing the nec­es­sary pa­per­work in or­der to meet the re­quire­ments to move. But we have seen a cou­ple of them leave al­ready. Since 2016, CAL has lost 45 pi­lots,” Wick­ham said.

Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert and Min­is­ter in the Min­istry of Fi­nance Bri­an Man­ning have not re­spond­ed to re­quests for com­ment on the mat­ter.