Some curbside baggage check-in is back

Thursday, Sept. 27, 2001 | 10:39 a.m.

Procedures at McCarran International Airport took another step toward returning to normal today when the Federal Aviation Administration authorized airlines to allow curbside baggage check-in service.

Curbside check-in service was banned at McCarran and the rest of the nation's airports after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the East Coast. The FAA has ordered airlines that want to offer curbside check-ins to implement new security procedures and McCarran officials said Wednesday that those airlines that have complied can offer the service for their Las Vegas customers.

But even though curbside baggage check-in service has been authorized for some airlines, a Las Vegas company that specializes in off-airport baggage check-ins remains idle.

A spokesman for Certified Airline Passenger Services said Wednesday that while the company is encouraged by the move to allow curbside service today, there have been no indications that the company's 120 employees will be able to return to work.

Jim Gentleman, vice president of marketing for CAPS, said off-airport check-ins from the company's 15 resort counters and one car rental agency are still suspended. The company, which now has eight employees in its corporate offices in Henderson, has undertaken some new strategies to get back in business.

Gentleman said CAPS executives are in talks with the FAA to convince the agency to allow the company to operate explosives detection systems that scan passenger luggage for bombs for all airlines. Gentleman called that "a capital-intensive proposition," since those types of detection systems cost between $600,000 and $1.2 million.

The company also is lobbying lawmakers to be included in a second federal aid package for businesses affected by the three-day shutdown of the aviation industry after planes were grounded Sept. 11.

"We weren't included in the first package," Gentleman said of a subsidy package to benefit the nation's airlines. "We've heard a new bill to help companies that work with airlines that were affected by the shut-down is going to be debated later this week or early next week."

In the meantime, some CAPS employees are working part time for American Baggage Co, a sister company that is contracted to deliver luggage belonging to incoming tourists from the airport to hotels. Other CAPS workers have been offered some temporary work by Southwest Airlines, which is in the midst of a construction project at the airport's C gates.

While Gentleman and CAPS officials hope company can return to normal operations, details of cutbacks by some of the airlines serving McCarran have started to emerge, and most of them indicate service and employment levels are going to be below what they were before Sept. 11.

Atlanta-based Delta Air Lines was the latest major carrier to announce its cutback plans. On Wednesday Delta said it would lay off 13,000 employees and cut service by 15 percent worldwide.

A Delta spokeswoman said Wednesday that it hasn't been determined how many of the company's 144 Las Vegas employees would be affected. Peggy Estes said a series of voluntary retirement offers have been made to employees and some of the deadlines for consideration aren't until late October.

Delta, the fifth-busiest air carrier at McCarran with an average of 23 flights a day, offers nonstop round-trip service from Las Vegas to its U.S. hub airports, Salt Lake City, Atlanta, Cincinnati and Dallas-Fort Worth, and to its West Coast international gateway, Los Angeles. It also has one daily flight to Orlando, Fla.

Estes said it hasn't been determined how many flights to each destination would be cut. The airline has a total of 27 flights, some of which don't operate every day, accounting for the average of 23 a day. Estes said those 27 flights would be scaled back to 21, and capacity would be reduced from 5,321 incoming seats to 4,085. Delta uses a mix of high-capacity jumbo jets and smaller single-aisle planes on its Las Vegas routes.

Other major airlines serving Las Vegas have announced service and staff cuts systemwide, but haven't spelled out details for Las Vegas. A United Airlines spokesman on Wednesday said the company wouldn't disclose service reductions by market for competitive reasons and McCarran officials said it was up to the individual airlines and not the airport to report schedule changes.

Because airlines publish their schedules on Internet sites and McCarran keeps statistics on service levels every month, some service reductions can be calculated. United, the third-busiest carrier at McCarran, offered an average of 38 flights a day at the end of August according to McCarran statistics and United's Internet site lists 35 daily flights this week. United, which says it is reducing service 20 percent systemwide, is offering one less flight a day between Las Vegas and Denver, Chicago and Washington's Dulles International Airport.

American Airlines, the No. 6 carrier at McCarran, has maintained an average 22 flights a day in Las Vegas. It has nonstop, round-trip service between Las Vegas and American Airlines hub airports of Chicago O'Hare, Dallas-Fort Worth, Los Angeles International and San Jose, Calif. Dallas-based American also hasn't determined how many people may be laid off at the company's Las Vegas reservation center. A spokesman said a decision on that could occur later this week or early next week.

Northwest Airlines, the nation's fourth largest airline, but McCarran's No. 7 carrier, is cutting the number of Las Vegas flights from 12 to nine. Minneapolis-based Northwest is trimming one of its nonstop round trips between Las Vegas and Detroit and Minneapolis, two key Northwest hubs. The airline also is eliminating its nonstop flight to Los Angeles, but keeping its one flight to its hub in Memphis, Tenn., according to comparisons between McCarran records and the airline's Internet site.

Other airlines serving McCarran announced service reductions last week. Tempe, Ariz.-based America West, the second-busiest carrier at McCarran, is eliminating 10 of its 84 daily flights to and from Las Vegas affecting routes to New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, Washington's Ronald Reagan National Airport, Phoenix, Cleveland, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, San Francisco and Palm Springs, Calif.

Las Vegas-based National Airlines, the No. 4 carrier at McCarran, cut 20 percent of its flights, including routes to JFK Airport, Reagan National and a Miami flight that was on the calendar to begin next month.

Of the major airlines serving McCarran, only market leader Southwest has maintained all its flights -- but airline officials said last week that might not last if loads don't improve in the weeks ahead.

Passengers getting on Southwest planes at McCarran and other airports Wednesday received red, white and blue stickers proclaiming "Keep America flying. I flew on Southwest Airlines today." Southwest, which has 169 daily Las Vegas flights, is trying to conserve money and announced that the stickers were paid for by one of the company's customers.