Operator Layoffs at Cleveland Hopkins Won’t Impact Fall Flights, Airport Says

The hundreds of baggage handlers, ticketing agents, gate managers and ramp operators let go last week at Cleveland Hopkins International won’t hamper flights or service, the airport said.

Over the weekend, Swissport USA, the Switzerland-based company that handles passenger bags at 60 airports across the country, filed paperwork at the state level to officialize a mass layoff of 213 of their employees. Swissport has had a contractual relationship with a list of airlines since they set up shop here in 1996.

The move lands after a summer of comings and goings. In July, Frontier announced that they would be ending five direct flights out of Cleveland, blaming “seasonal” fluctuations in the market. And in early September, tens of thousands of flight attendants at United around the country, and dozens at CLE, made clear they were poised to strike, if corporate didn’t agree to a pay raise.

All changes that, whether seen on the flight board or at the gate, could possibly alter air travel rhythms in the coming months.

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Mark Oprea

United flight attendants picketing at Cleveland Hopkins in early September.

Plausible interruptions that Swissport’s former airline clientele and Hopkins itself denies will be noticeable when the company formally ends its ground handling operations in Cleveland on November 4.

“All airlines currently under contract with Swissport have contracted with another provider to render the same services after the end of the Swissport agreement,” a Hopkins spokesperson told Scene on Tuesday. “So there will be no disruption of service.”

In an email, Swissport told Scene that all 213 employees were handed WARN notices, federally-required notificatat least two months prior to being let go.

Like Hopkins, Swissport signaled that let-go employees were lined up to work with G2 Secure Staff and PrimeFlight Aviation Services—which handle operations for JetBlue and Frontier—yet weren’t clear on how many of those workers actually agreed to new job offers.

“We thank our employees for their dedication and excellent performance over the past several years, and we will focus on helping them find new employment opportunities,” a Swissport spokesperson wrote Scene.

They added: “We will make sure our current airline customer will have a smooth transition to the new ground services provider in November.”