Senate panel probes holiday meltdown at Southwest Airlines

By DAVID KOENIG
AP Airlines Writer

Congress is hearing today about the December meltdown at Southwest Airlines. A Southwest executive said in prepared testimony Thursday that the airline is taking steps to avoid a repeat of the breakdown that led to nearly 17,000 canceled flights over the December holidays. But the president of the pilots’ union at Southwest says Congress needs to hold the airline accountable, and give firm dates for how it will fix a crew-scheduling system that was overwhelmed in December. Sen. Maria Cantwell, chair of the committee holding the hearing, says there will be other snowstorms, so we need to learn why Southwest’s operation collapsed and what needs to change so it doesn’t happen again.