The makings of an old-fashioned airline labor standoff will come together today in federal court in New York, with an angry flight attendants' union threatening to disrupt Northwest Airlines, a cost-cutting management calling such an action illegal and the federal government asserting that a strike would disrupt national air travel. Regardless of how the judge rules, Northwest's management and the flight attendants are largely stuck with each other.
See "Northwest and Its Flight Attendants Await a Strike Ruling", Jeff Bailey, The New York Times, August 24, 2006