Pilots' Victory

After a 22-day strike, the 1,500 American Airlines pilots won a fat 18-month contract this week. Their settlement ended the worst series of labor dogfights in U.S. airline history. American contracted to put a third junior pilot in jet cockpits, pay him at least $650 a month. The pilots also won pay boosts from a top of $19,220 a year to $22,596 for flying piston-engine DC-78. They will get $28,340 for skippering Boeing 707 jets, which American plans to put into service Jan. 25. The raises are retroactive to August 1957, when the old contract lapsed. That means a senior DC-7 pilot will pocket a lump of about $4,500 in back pay.

The pilots did not win their demand to cut the maximum work month to 75 flying hours (it remains 85 hours). But American did agree to give them some flight credit for time away from home and at the airport but not actually in the air. For example, if a pilot is on duty for ten hours but socked in by weather, he will be credited with five hours' flight time.

The American pilots' victory, which will set the pace for the whole industry, was wrought at great cost to others. Some 20,000 other American employees were put out of work for a week by the 22-day strike. American and its suppliers lost an estimated $33 million.