Conflicts in the
cockpit 'threaten
safety' at SAS
Young pilots at Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) are reportedly trying to bully older pilots out of the cockpit, and aviation authorities fear on-the-job conflicts are endangering passenger safety. The authorities are demanding that SAS' management and unions halt the bullying immediately.
Newspaper Dagavisen reported Monday that the bullying of veteran SAS pilots appears out of control. Inspection leader Kjell Klevan at Norway's Civil Aviation Authority (Luftfartstilsynet) says the authority first warned SAS about the bullying more than five months ago, but charges that SAS hasn't taken any "concrete measures" to address the problem.
"We've only received verbal assurances that airline safety is being taken care of," Klevan told Dagsavisen. He also made it clear on national radio Monday morning that that's not good enough.
The bullying apparently stems from more pending staffing cuts at the long-troubled airline. Younger pilots allegedly are trying to bully their older colleagues into resigning or retiring, in an effort to save their own jobs. It's often crew with lower seniority who get laid off during rounds of staffing cuts, and they want the older pilots to give up their jobs instead.
Concerns about harassment are serious and the bullying appears brutal (see below). One pilots' union already has exluded those over 60, "because they don't comply with our collective bargaining agreement to quit after they've turned 60," said Svein Duvsete of the Scannor Flygerforening (Pilots' Association), which organizes around 300 SAS pilots who worked for domestic airline Braathens when it was taken over by SAS.
Neither Duvsete nor Jens Lippestad of the union for SAS Norway pilots (Norske SAS-flygeres Forening, NSF) agree that such exclusion amounts or contributes to bullying. NSF hasn't excluded pilots over 60, but Lippestad claimed that "those who claim they're being bullied will defend themselves as much as they can. The fact is that they're not abiding by a collective bargaining agreement they have gone along with (by refusing to retire at age 60) and that creates frustration."
SAS' management, meanwhile, denies its pilots are bullying each other, even though a survey of working conditions showed that 160 of 800 pilots reported that they were being bullied by colleagues. Dag Falk-Petersen, operations leader for SAS Norway, will only admit that some pilots may be the targets of "discomfort."
Falk-Petersen said SAS bosses have held meetings both with "those who experience discomfort and those who don't want to fly with pilots eligible for retirement. We have also been in contact with the unions and written on our web site what we expect of our employees and what kind of working environment we want to have at SAS."
He said the Civil Aviation Authority's charges of bullying "are not correct," contending that working conditions at SAS "are better than they've been for a long time." He also rejected any claims that conflicts among the pilots pose safety concerns.
Excerpts from SAS pilots' internal web site:
"Bully them out of SAS," wrote one SAS captain in an online debate. "Fly with the old farts, but leave them in the 'barracks' when the crew goes out to eat or enjoy themselves.""They make me want to throw up," wrote another SAS pilot, referring to his older colleagues. "Why fly with 60-plus pimps? Refuse to fly with them. That's the best way to get the pigs out."(Another pilot urged that older pilots should lose their pensions, be degraded and kicked out of the pilots' union. One veteran pilot was threatened that his legs would be broken or that he might be killed if he didn't quit his job, claims one of his colleagues. A 63-year-old pilot told Dagsavisen that pilots over age 60 are routinely called "bags of dirt, whores and pimps.")
Aftenposten English Web DeskNina Berglund
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