United Airlines employees sounded more like tired workers Friday than like future owners of beleaguered UAL Corp., the nation's second-largest air carrier.
Optimism was mixed with disillusionment among those interviewed at Los Angeles and Chicago airports. And, most of all, pilots, flight attendants and machinists said they want their long ordeal to be over.
"I wish we could go back to before this started, back to when we were a good airline," said one flight attendant who has worked for United for 25 years.
UAL announced Friday that its directors have agreed to sell the Chicago-based company to its employees for $4.38 billion in cash, notes and securities. Unions representing pilots, flight attendants and machinists have agreed to pay an estimated $201 a share, composed of $155 in cash, $35 of UAL debt and an estimated $11 worth of stock in a UAL subsidiary.
The transaction could mean the end of months of uncertainty and turmoil for UAL and its 71,285 employees, with rumors, bids, counter bids, failed offers and a threatened proxy battle having plagued the company.
At Los Angeles International Airport and O'Hare International Airport in Chicago, many UAL workers were searching for information on the buyout. "Right now, it's mostly rumors," said Joseph Santoro, a lead ramp service machinist in Chicago.
The majority of men and women wearing United wings preferred to say nothing or to speak only on condition that they remain anonymous--some for fear of retaliation and some simply out of worry about jinxing the deal.
The agreement was good news to flight attendant Jan McKinney, who has had her fill of airline troubles. McKinney has been with United only one year--after 10 years with Frontier Airlines, which filed for bankruptcy protection in 1986.
"They went bankrupt on my day off," McKinney said. "I came to United, and I'll be glad when all this stuff is settled.
"I'm real excited about it," added McKinney, who was heading for a flight out of Los Angeles.
"I'm optimistic, too," said her co-worker, Sue Srimongkol.
Said United pilot George E. Zimmer, who had just completed a flight to Chicago from New York's LaGuardia Airport: "It's long term. Now we know we have a job."
Under the agreement, the unions will give concessions on wages and benefits worth $2 billion over the next five years.
