US investigating December flight cancellations at Southwest

By DAVID KOENIG
AP Airlines Writer

DALLAS (AP) — The federal government is investigating whether Southwest Airlines knowingly scheduling more flights than it could handle in December, when it ended up canceling nearly 17,000 flights. The Transportation Department says scheduling too many flights would violate federal laws against deceptive practices. The department said Wednesday it’s in the early stages of its investigation, and it will also make sure that Southwest provides prompt refunds and reimbursements to customers who were stranded by the cancellations. Southwest’s breakdown started with a winter storm and was compounded when its crew-scheduling system became overloaded. The airline has hired a consultant to study what went wrong.