Robert A. Siegel

Siegel’s practice recently has largely divided into two areas. One is representing major airlines in disputes with unions over tensions created by airline mergers and consolidations. That is something he has been doing for several years by now.

The other, newer but unavoidable, is advising his clients about employment law issues related to the coronavirus pandemic, including the impact on flight operations and on airline employee groups.

“One active issue is whether furloughs could be implemented under force majeure clauses in collective bargaining agreements,” Siegel said. Questions about furloughs dropped off after Congress passed the CARES Act, which prohibited furloughs by employers receiving loans under the act.

He also fielded questions from airlines about requiring employees to be vaccinated. Besides needing to accommodate those with religious or health concerns, his clients also had to analyze whether their various bargaining agreements would allow or prevent such requirements, he said.

The pandemic also created an unusual dispute between United Airlines Inc. and its flight attendants that Siegal took to arbitration last summer.

Airlines were hit especially hard by lockdowns and travel bans. United had so few international flights that it closed the flight-attendant bases at the Tokyo, Frankfurt and Honk Kong airports. Without bases, the attendants could not work. Many were allowed to transfer to U.S. bases, but only if they already had visas.

When United refused to let the rest transfer to London, the union filed a grievance. “The problem was London didn’t have any flying either,” Siegel said.

After a two-day, virtual trial, the arbitrator ruled for the airline. “In my mind, it was a difficult situation created by the whole impact of covid on the airline industry,” he said.

On the airline-consolidation side of his practice, Siegel had an important win early this year in a matter he has been working on since 2012, which in turn grew out of the 2001 merger between American Airlines Inc. and Trans World Airlines Inc. The specific battle concerned how the American pilots’ union sorted the TWA pilots into its seniority list. “They were essentially put at the bottom of the integrated list after the merger,” he said.

The pilots sued, but their lawsuit was caught up in American’s 2011 Chapter 11 bankruptcy and then dismissed. Two federal district judges affirmed that dismissal, and in February, the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld those decisions. Krakowski v. Allied Pilots Association, 19-4378 (2nd Cir., Feb. 1, 2021).

Although he has handled plenty of litigation, Siegel said much of his merger-related work over the years had been counseling his clients about the Railway Labor Act rules, since that act covers airline labor issues rather than the National Labor Relations Act.

But he only represents airlines, never railroads. “Mine is an industry practice,” he said.

— Don DeBenedictis