Aviation executives and observers who expect US carriers will be able to expand their capacity to meet rising demand for travel are in denial about the near- and long-term effects of the country's pilot shortage, United Airlines' chief executive argues. "Anybody that thinks that the airlines are all going to be able to grow at the rate they've said is wrong, including those airlines," United's Scott Kirby said on 1 June during the Bernstein Strategic Decisions Conference in New York. "The reality is there's not enough pilots for everyone to staff." The Chicago-based carrier went through "the seven stages of grief" when the pilot shortage first hit US regional airlines during the Covid-19 pandemic, before its impact was felt by larger carriers. "I think I'm uniquely good at getting to acceptance quicker than most people," Kirby says. "We accepted [the pilot shortage] and figured out what to do about it. A lot of other people are still in the denial phase, but it's here." United and its pilots' union Air Line Pilots Association on 13 May signed an agreement in principle encompassing terms for a new contract. Kirby wrote in a LinkedIn post that day that United was the only US carrier to "work with its pilots' union to reach an agreement during Covid". United, which intends to hire an additional 10,000 pilots by 2030, disclosed on 1 June that it will add on a new four-story building to its 23-acre flight training centre in Denver. The expansion will make room for 12 additional advanced flight simulators, training classrooms, conference rooms and offices. Kirby contends that United has an edge on other US majors and, especially, on regional and low-cost carriers in its ability to recruit and retain pilots. "We're at the top of the food chain. If you're a pilot, United is always at the top tier for pay. [We have] the most widebodies of any airline in the country. You get paid more to fly a widebody, plus you get to fly to cool places." He says that low-cost carriers had previously been able to attract pilots by offering to upgrade them to captain faster than US majors could. United can now match low-cost carriers' speed in which pilots get upgraded to captain because it was the only US carrier that did not retire widebodies during the pandemic, creating relatively more room for career growth, he adds. US airlines' pilot staffing holes are only going to get deeper as time goes on, Kirby says. "There were several thousand pilots that retired early during the pandemic. You had two years of no airlines hiring new pilots, so you dug the hole even deeper. Additionally, you need more pilots to operate the same amount of flights today because sick calls are higher. I think that's permanent. You need 4-6% more pilots to operate an airline than you needed before just because Covid leads to a higher level of sick calls." Kirby notes that during the decade preceding the pandemic, US airlines typically added 5,000 to 7,000 new pilots per year. "At the start of this year, airlines said they were going to try to hire 13,000 pilots… it's going to take a long time to address and fix this."

The US Department of Transportation on 1 June lifted restrictions on charter and commercial flights to Cuba imposed by former president Donald Trump, enabling US airlines to plan new flights to the island nation amid the recovery of leisure travel. The move is part of a broader strategy by current president Joseph Biden to support freedom of movement for citizens of Communist-run Cuba and to encourage the growth of a free market economy there. The DOT in October 2019 restricted US airlines from operating routes to any destination in Cuba other than Havana’s Jose Marti International airport, and in 2020 restricted charter flights to all Cuban cities except Havana. The DOT lifted the ban at the request of secretary of state Anthony Blinken, who sent a letter to the department on 31 May. “We aim to support Cubans’ aspirations for freedom and for greater economic opportunities so that they can lead successful lives at home,” the US State department says. “We continue to call on the Cuban government to immediately release political prisoners, to respect the Cuban people’s fundamental freedoms and to allow the Cuban people to determine their own futures.” Lifting Trump’s ban enables US carriers to reopen routes operated during the second quarter of 2019 to the Cuban cities of Holguin, Camaguey, Santiago de Cuba, Santa Clara, and Varadero. American Airlines scheduled 902 flights to Cuba during that quarter in 2019, Cirium schedules data shows, making it the biggest US operator of flights to that nation. JetBlue Airways scheduled 715 flights to Cuba during that period, followed by Southwest Airlines with 377, Delta Air Lines with 273 and United Airlines with 182 flights. Delta and United had no flights scheduled to Cuba during the second quarter of 2022. Limited to only Havana flights, capacity on American’s network to Cuba during the second quarter is 39% lower compared with that period in 2019, while JetBlue’s capacity is 72% lower and Southwest’s is 18% lower. The USA resumed diplomatic relations with Cuba in 2015 when Biden was vice-president alongside then-president Barack Obama. US carriers resumed commercial flights to Cuba in 2016 for the first time since 1961.

The UK government has accused airlines of failing to prepare for the surge in passenger demand, as press reports highlight delays and cancellations across the country. Deputy prime minster Dominic Raab told Sky News that carriers had not undertaken the preparation for the rebound in activity, laying the blame for problems firmly at their door. "Grant Shapps, the transport secretary, has been talking to the industry for months now saying this will come and that you need to make sure that you have your recruitment in place," says Raab. "I don’t think the airline operators have done the recruitment that they should have done and taken the advice that the transport secretary gave them." Shapps has demanded a meeting with airline bosses about the disruption, Sky reports, commenting that "despite government warnings, operators seriously oversold flights and holidays relative to their capacity to deliver". He adds: "Where the industry has asked us to make changes to help them meet demand we have done so – for example, changing the law to speed up bringing in newly recruited staff." The aviation industry itself has been warning of a summer of problems for months, as staff levels, much depleted during the Covid crisis, ramp back up – although often at a slower pace than passenger numbers. A tight labour market means that many airline and airport staff have left the industry altogether, having secured better pay rates in other areas of the economy. Delays receiving security clearance for staff has further contributed to problems, as have high sickness rates from Covid-19. Notably, airports body ACI Europe warned last month of the "impossibility" of scaling up staffing in order to accommodate the expected jump in passenger levels. For their part, airlines say that the majority of flights are taking place across the UK and Europe as planned. TUI, which has come in for particular criticism because of problems at Manchester, announced that it would be cancelling 43 services per day through June, or around a quarter of its flights at the airport, reflecting its lack of operational capacity. "We can reassure our customers that the remainder of our flying programme is expected to operate as planned." Other airlines pre-emptively cancelled services earlier in the summer, with British Airways-owner IAG announcing on 6 May that it had axed around 10% of its services from Heathrow this summer, in anticipation of disruption at the facility. EasyJet, which likewise has come in for press criticism of its performance, said in April that it was aware of staffing issues, centred around high absence rates, but that it expected these would be resolved in time for the summer. It subsequently announced plans to reduce seat numbers on some aircraft to enable them to fly with fewer crew.