PlaneDoctor™ - Breakthrough goal announced at Tulsa Maintenance

TULSA, Okla., March 3 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- A joint team of management and labor leaders from American Airlines' Tulsa Maintenance & Engineering Base today announced a "breakthrough" goal to generate $500 million and turn the base into a profit center by the end of 2006.
    The vision of transforming the base -- which employs more than 7,000 people -- from a traditional cost center into a profit center would be achieved through its highly successful Continuous Improvement process to reduce costs, generating revenue from third-party maintenance contracts, and bringing in-house any currently outsourced work that can be accomplished more efficiently in Tulsa.

In early 2005, representatives from both TWU Local 514 and the Tulsa base management convened to set a new paradigm: to transform the world's largest aircraft maintenance base into a world-class, profitable facility. This shared commitment is a first for the Tulsa base, and is one of several large scale, joint planning sessions that have occurred within American Airlines since the company and its unions launched the Working Together initiative in late 2003.
    "We are not letting others decide what our future should be -- together we are going to do everything within our ability to control our destiny and success," said Dennis Burchette, President of TWU Local 514. "We're doing that through the process of working together. Tulsa was one of the first sites where this practice began. With this joint vision in place, we are building on this process and breaking new ground -- not only at American Airlines but also in the airline industry."
    Carmine Romano, Vice President-Tulsa Base maintenance, said, "We know we are bucking the trend of the aviation industry by keeping most of our maintenance work in house, but we have agreed to take a different approach to address our challenges. A key element in this approach is understanding that our employees represent a huge competitive advantage. The goals we have set forth can be achieved only by working together and empowering our employees. It will require a commitment by everyone -- not just one or two people, but everybody."
    American Airlines has made tremendous strides in the last year at its Tulsa facility, as well as at its two additional overhaul maintenance bases located in Fort Worth, Texas, and Kansas City, Mo. From increased
efficiencies to numerous cost-savings initiatives, American's maintenance and engineering employees have succeeded in reducing costs and making Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul (MRO) improvements to become a competitive MRO provider.
    As a result, American has already been competing for and winning bids to perform maintenance and engineering work for outside companies at all three of its bases. The ability to win such bids is a result of those employees' strong focus on working together and using the Continuous Improvement process to generate suggestions of improvements in the MRO processes. In turn, employees use the principles of the Continuous Improvement process to turn those ideas into plans of action that they execute.
    The American Airlines Tulsa Maintenance & Engineering Base is the headquarters for the airline's maintenance and engineering worldwide. It is the largest of the airline's overhaul bases, and the world's largest maintenance facility. Maintenance work at the Tulsa base is done on American's fleet of MD-80, Boeing 757 and Airbus A300 aircraft. Overhaul work also is conducted on the Pratt and Whitney JT-8 and GE CF6-80 engines. The base also is home to a wheel and brake overhaul facility and composite repair center.