American Airlines Has Problems

Canceling 900 flights to meet mandatory inspection requirements is not ideal, but in most cases it would seem like the giant aviation business equivalent of filing your taxes. You have to do it, but once you take care of it, you're done.

At least, that's how it ought to be. In the case of American Airlines, they've been filing their taxes over and over again.

American, the nation's largest carrier, has now scrubbed more than 2,400 flights since Tuesday, when federal regulators warned that nearly half its planes could violate a safety regulation designed to prevent fires.

That's more than one in three flights canceled over the last three days.

That can't be good for business. American isn't the only airline to have to cancel flights since this whole thing starts, but they seem to be getting hit by it all rather hard, and drawing plenty of attention to their problems. I wonder if this will help the cause of the proposed passenger's bill of rights.